For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast. For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do. – Ephesians 2:8-10

More than anything else, at least for me, Friday was about our youngest grandchild, Geoffrey. It is not easy to process life when you are four, so there can be a lot of tears – and that can be hard on the grownups too.

So I was hopeful for a good day and, thankfully, we got one.

Our walk to the park after breakfast was almost magical. Geoffrey sat in the mockup “airplane cockpit” on the playground climbing equipment and decided we were going to fly somewhere together. His creative imagination was on fire and we had no shortage of places to go and adventures to take.

First he flew us to Africa. When we landed we had to disembark (down a slide) then look for the animals before feeding them – and sometimes having to run away fast!

After Africa we took off again we made our way to India, then Australia, then China (always getting out of the plane to find the animals) before ending up back in the United States where we switched our mode of transportation and took a Royal Caribbean cruise to Alaska.

On the cruise we had to climb up to our stateroom (Geoffrey remembered we needed a keycard) then order food because he was hungry. It was a long cruise and we saw quite a lot (including whales and Polar Bears) until we suddenly realized it was time for school and had to take a tender back home because, apparently, the cruise ship still had places to go.

A good day all around

After we left the park Geoffrey finished up a really good week at school, so Rebekah and I took him to Target to pick up a special treat t on the way home.

In the evening I cooked fillet mignon for the whole family, listened to Beks practice her cello (she is really doing well) and talked with David about roller-coaster design.

Geoffrey played some games with Rebekah while I cleaned the kitchen and then – after a long relaxing bath time he curled up in my lap to eat his snack before bed.

“Huggies, Grandaddy,” he said when I put him to bed. “I love you.”

So this particular visit is over, and while we didn’t get everything squared away how we wanted to we are thankful for our amazing grandchildren.

As always, the photographs here say a lot more than I can write. And, as always, the scriptures resonate with both truth and direction: “For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works…”

So let’s get them done! – DEREK