Back to reality after a wonderful long weekend full of God's amazing "gifts" of sleep and refreshment

A beautiful sunset near Cannon Beach, OR

Most of you know, that is of course if you read Luke's blog often that sleep is something that has become very precious and rare for me these days. That is why when I heard about a homeschool workshop that was being offered in Portland, OR this past weekend I jumped at the opportunity to attend, not only hoping to go to renew my reasons for homeschooling, but also to get a few nights of uninterrupted sleep. So Yoli and I left around 8 pm Friday night, after her birthday party was over to drive down to Portland, getting there around 10:30.

Here I am taking a much needed break to go for a walk, those large building you see in the distance is downtown Portland, OR

I will be honest even when I'm not hearing Luke's alarms go off all night it is still challenging for me to find sleep, but I did find it after tossing and turning until close to 2 am that night. We then had to get up early Saturday morning to make it to the Homeschool workshop by 8:45 am. The workshop was good, though not exactly what we had hoped for, I guess since we've both been homeschooling for many years now we both know what works for our style of learning and the workshop just didn't seem to match up to our style. After sitting for about 4 hours of teaching I knew that I needed to get out for a walk or I would be snoring during the next session. I went for a walk around a beautiful neighborhood in Portland and even though it was in the 80's I throughly enjoyed my walk.

Ecola State Park in Oregon

We both knew that we had planned to stay two nights away, so we decided that since it was such a beautiful day we would head out to the beach, so we drove about 2 hours and ended up at Cannon Beach. It was absolutely gorgeous there!! We sat eating clam chowder at MO's looking at the beautiful sights about us, marveling at God's goodness to us to allow us this extra night of rest. After checking at many of the hotels in the area we found out that all were booked because of a motorcycle convention going on, so we ended up having to drive south about an hour to find a hotel room. That drive was another "gift" from God, as the sun was setting and we were blessed to see a beautiful sunset. That night I was able to get to sleep around midnight, waking up feeling much more refreshed, ready for a quick walk before getting ready for church.

Yoli and I out for our walk along the bay in Girabaldi, OR

We found a small Assembly of God church in Girabaldi to attend. The service was another "gift" from God as we were able to bask in the wonderful presence of God during the worship service and then hear an amazing message about Noah's obedience to God. I felt the touch of God as all the pain from my knee that has been hurting me for many weeks go away, it was amazing!!

Here I am standing in front of the little church we attended on Sunday morning

Yoli had mentioned maybe we could stay one more night, so that we could enjoy that day without feeling rushed about going home and after talking to my wonderful husband, Amy and Natalie they all decided that they would take on Luke duty one more day so that I could get one more day of rest, another "gift" from God. After we enjoyed a delicious lunch at the Tillamook Cheese factory, we spent the day relaxing at another gorgeous beach, where I had the pleasure of building a little rock statue.
Sunday night we stayed in Seaside and I was able to go to sleep even earlier and then blessed to sleep in until close to 10 am. I woke up feeling so refreshed and ready for another walk/hike. We drove out to Ecola State park, where I went on a short 1 1/2 mile hike from Ecola to Indian beach. The whole time I was on my walk I kept thanking the Lord for this "gift" of another beautiful day and even though it was very windy and chilly it was still an amazing day.






We drove home the long way getting home around 9 pm. Gordy went to bed almost immediately and Amy shortly after him as they had not gotten much sleep with me being gone and here I sit at 4 am getting up every 10 to 15 minutes all night long to suction Luke. Yes, I'm exhausted, but I'm also so very glad that I had a few nights of good sleep.

Today I will be calling Luke's Dr. to take him back in for another appointment. I don't think that he's kicked the pneumonia yet. I'm trying so hard not to be anxious about what I will find out as I just don't know what they will be able to do for him as he's already been on 3 weeks of antibiotics. PLEASE pray he get's better soon, I just don't know how long I can go on without sleep at night, even though I'm so thankful for the respite and sleep I did get!

Love in Christ,
Luke's Mommy Sue