Wednesday Blessings

 Well, here it is Wednesday evening, and this week is half over already.  I'm trying to keep up with everyone and everything, and it seems like I keep falling behind.  Hard to believe the month of August is almost half over already too!  Time just keeps flying by...and sometimes I wish I could be like Blackie sitting on the back porch, just watching the birds and not a care in the world...(oh, and it was raining lightly at this time...praise the Lord!)

Oh, for the Blackie fans...here he was sitting on my desk in the  morning while I was trying to "work" at my computer (reading blogs and trying to write),  and I introduced him to a new little friend to distract him from trying to bite my hand every time I tried to use the mouse on the computer...

It's just a funny little ink pen we got somewhere, and Blackie rather liked it, and thankfully it was a good way to distract him from my hand for a few minutes, and then he got bored and got back down and went to find daddy for a while. Whew! Finally I could get some work done! It's like having a toddler!

So, here's some things to be happy about for the August Happiness Challenge...I may have mentioned that Sunday (Aug. 16th) will be our 57th wedding anniversary.  And since it is on a Sunday, we won't try to go out to eat or anything special on that day because the restaurants are too busy usually after church. (Although I may pick up some food on the way home so I don't have to cook! That's always a plus!).

So today we decided to go out to lunch with our "kids" Benton and Rose, since they were off from work.  My first choice was our usual spot, "Corky Bells" on the St. John's River. But because we have been under another heat advisory the past couple of days, we really didn't want to go there and sit down by the riverside since it would just be too hot to enjoy. Even though they do have a nice dining room inside,  I decided I'd rather save that for September for my birthday, and we could try another seafood restaurant in town that none of us had ever been to before, named "Musselwhites".  

Here we are outside the restaurant...I am VERY happy to be standing beside my dear hubby of 57 years. God has been so very kind to us and we are very thankful and blessed. I am also happy that his eye is doing better each day since his cataract surgery last week. He does go back to the surgeon on Friday to have it checked again, but we don't anticipate any issues.

And here we are inside... I am happy to be sitting beside Rose with my sweatshirt on (when it's almost 100 degrees outside), but the AC vent inside was blowing directly on my neck and head and it was way too cold, so my sweet son Benton went out to the car and brought in my sweater, and then because the air was still blowing on me, I switched places with him at the table and sat beside Rose ... (I have become my mother and must carry a sweater in the car for when we go into places that may be too cold. LOL.  How many of you do that???)

And Benton sat in my old seat next to John.  He said it was kind of chilly and his food got cold, but he's tougher (& younger) than I am and it didn't bother him as much as it did me. LOL.

We admired the scenery/decor while we ate our coleslaw and waited for our dinner:

The decor was nice...and the coleslaw was good, but when our food came I was so shocked by the very small portions of seafood (even if it WAS the lunch menu...it was a very small portion!) that I forgot to take any pictures of our food.

All four of us were extremely disappointed in the scanty portions of seafood (I had 3 very small broiled shrimp and 4 extremely small scallops, and they were all rather tough and rubbery) along with the hush puppies and sweet potato fries ...which were good...but the seafood was very very disappointing. We debated on complaining to the waitress and/or manager, but decided to just eat our food and vowed never to go back again. We still left a good tip for the waitress, because it wasn't her fault the food was not what we expected. And for the first time in my life I wrote a rather unhappy review (nicely of course) on their website, and noticed that we were not the only ones who had been disappointed in their portions. We probably should have read the reviews before we went there, but we live and learn.  

But even though the dinner did not turn out quite as good as we hoped it would be, we were all thankful to be together and I consider myself to be very blessed indeed.  Even when things don't turn out the way we hoped they would, there is always something to be thankful for.

Psalm 103:1-5   A Psalm of David.

1 Bless the Lord, O my soul;

And all that is within me, bless His holy name!

2 Bless the Lord, O my soul,

And forget not all His benefits:

3 Who forgives all your iniquities,

Who heals all your diseases,

4 Who redeems your life from destruction,

Who crowns you with lovingkindness and tender mercies,

5 Who satisfies your mouth with good things,

So that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s.

And so I will end this day's saga with those words from King David above, reminding us to Bless the Lord (Praise the Lord), and never forget all His benefits to us.  Yes, He does forgive our sins (iniquities), and thankfully He has healed us of more illnesses and sicknesses throughout our lives than we can even count.  I do believe He has saved us from "destruction" many times, perhaps even times we weren't aware of...and in spite of our lack of obedience or thankfulness or repentance of sins from time to time...He loves us and blesses us and "crowns us with lovingkindness and tender mercies"...perhaps when we really don't deserve them.  And yes, He does satisfy our mouths with good things much more often than we've ever been disappointed in a meal at a restaurant or anywhere else. He gives us plenty of food to eat and we should never complain, because there are so many people out there who would beg for the crumbs from our tables...  And this psalm says that our "youth is renewed like the eagle's".  At this stage in my life I would love to have a bit of youth renewal, but I am thankful that I am still in pretty good shape (for the shape I'm in), and I truly can't complain. 

So all in all I will say thank YOU Lord, for so many blessings.

Current view over Still Waters Pond.

Good Night!