Touring the Hometown

For the past couple of years, Mom and I (sometimes with Courtney in tow!) have celebrated Mother's Day and/or birthdays by seeing some local sites. A few weeks ago we had our belated celebration of both for 2014.

My agenda was to tour the famed Basilica, take B-more's free tour bus to the Inner Harbor to do some walking, and eat an early dinner in the Locust Point neighborhood. Would you believe I took Mom to the wrong church?? She knew it...but kept quiet as we enlightened ourselves on Universalist Unitarianism in a historic, 1817 church building that really didn't seem like the Basilica I'd remembered singing in with the Baltimore Choral Arts Society...so we still have a Basilica tour on the bucket list!

We got off the free tour bus at the Inner Harbor and walked to Federal Hill, then toured the Sculpture Garden at the American Visionary Arts Museum.

I have a genuine love for quirky art, especially if it's made of found items, recycled materials, or garbage. :) And Mom looks cute on that funky pink donkey! (Makes me wonder if Mom was ever in the Donkey Race in an RVR rodeo??)

While I'm not typically a fan of glittery items, I love all the mosaics using broken glass and mirrors. See Mom peeking out from behind the glittery egg?

The glittery mosaic bus. Someone thought, "I think I'll cover an entire bus with broken glass and all sorts of other random things (I think the hood of the bus contains bunches of plastic flowers and a plastic swan--the kind sometimes found on grandparents' lawns.)

Mom and I walked and walked and walked through Baltimore streets. Seriously, I wonder how many 70+ women walk as much as Mom did, and how many younger than that could have logged our 14,000 steps for the day?? (Like the dolphin fountain in this newer, upscale neighborhood?)

I managed to get us to the restaurant at the ONE hour of the day that the kitchen is closed. They still serve food--just nothing hot. We had a choice of about three salads. Again, Mom was super nice about it, and we enjoyed our salads al fresco. 

In retrospect, we should have walked around a little more and gone to one of the many corner restaurants in Locust Point. However, until we walked more AFTER our meal, I didn't know how many corner restaurants there WERE in Locust Point!

But those little oopses didn't dampen the experience of being together, and we enjoyed lots of walking and talking on an absolutely glorious day!

I appreciated this.

This is how I would write if I could, well, write like this. Here's to turning our backs on trends and enjoying what we have!!

Evelyn Quotes

I wish I recorded ALL the great and memorable things our girls say.

(See Evelyn in the tree in the picture below? She found a "secret hideout" at a local playground that was pretty awesome. It even came with an entire set of clothing, including undergarments, left on the ground. Hmmmm....)

Yesterday Evelyn informed me she thought it was really unfair that women take men's last names when they get married. "I'm not changing my name when I get married," she said. "My husband is going to take MY name." (Given the fact that my in-laws have no grandsons with the Blackman surname, this might just work in the family's genealogical favor...)

(This pic of the cousins makes me smile, with Evelyn holding court so dramatically.)

I wish I'd record all the funny things Evelyn says (and does) in her dreams and sleep. She's a sleep-walker, sleep-talker, light sleeper, and a hard-to-fall-alseeper. (Amelia has literally slept through tornadoes.)

Tonight Alan and I heard Evelyn's frantic voice calling in distress from upstairs, "Mommy!! Mommy! Mama!! Mom! Mama! Mommy!!" I ran upstairs.

She was sitting on the side of her bed. "What's the matter, sweetie?" (Yes, I call her "sweetie.")

"I'm fine," she replied, crawling under her sheet. I could tell she wasn't really awake.

"Are you sure you're ok?"

She put her head on her pillow, "I fell asleep. I dreamed."

She closed her eyes, "I dreamed I had to call your name."

Her voice began to get quieter as she drifted off. "I had to call for you...because I have to follow you," (voice trailing) "...into the future."

Well, then, let's just hope I lead well. :)

(This, by the way, is one of my favorite pictures ever of the cousins!!)

Summer

Our neighborhood street festival...besides snow-cones, the girls love riding their scooters down the middle of the street. :)

We walked to the local bakery on my b-day. On theirs, we go to Dunkin' Donuts. But it was my b-day, so it was local and lovely!

We spent a long weekend in VA Beach with Mom and Dad Blackman. One day the girls & I headed to the boardwalk rides, and at night we introduced Grandma & Grandpa to "Spot It."

The girls on the VA Beach ferris wheel. One of my new favorite pics of them. :)

On July 8th, a sudden, violent wind storm blew through RVR, snapping huge trees. Several campers were injured and one was killed. It's been a summer of enormous heartache and healing at RVR. Evelyn was a camper that week, along with several other staff kids. Our hearts still break for the dear mom who lost her son. Please pray for Antoinette Benns as you think of her.

RVR was inundated with cards of sympathy and compassion. These are just a few, posted in the camp office. My favorites were often notes from other camps around the country offering encouragement from God's Word.

It's been tempting to feel jarred and upset by the jolting rhythm of summer 2014. But what a reminder in the sea, whose rhythms are different every day--sometimes glassy and lilting, at other times choppy, forceful, and violent. But the sea is constantly moving, active, and alive, and I am refreshed by it. May life, infused with God's Spirit and Word, offer daily refreshment in its activity and alive-ness!