Saturday, June 14, 2014

Saturday, June 14, 2014

Tonight's picture was taken in August of 2003. This maybe my favorite photo of Mattie by the ocean. Clearly he was hesitant by what he was seeing and yet intrigued by his first beach experience. After all the Atlantic is daunting. Beautiful but scary. It is loud, with crashing waves and it is huge. Mattie always had a healthy respect for things that could potentially cause him danger. Which was why I truly never had to child proof our home. I did on certain things, but with Mattie I really did not need to. He had a sixth sense about what to touch and what to stay away from and the ocean was one of those things on the long check list of things to avoid for a while until ready! Mattie's hands, like all small children, were precious. They were like antenna in a way. The fingers would go up and seem to take in data and signal back to his brain messages about his environment. His left fist was up in this photo, I did not capture the fingers radiating out, but that wasn't atypical for Mattie. His hands and fingers fascinated me, as they did Peter as well! Mattie was born in the ON position..... his brain was ALWAYS engaged and his body wasn't far behind!


Quote of the day: The truest indication of gratitude is to return what you are grateful for. ~ Richard Paul Evans

On Friday evening we experienced a Honey Moon. Apparently this is a very rare sighting. The next one to occur is in June of the year 2098. A Honey Moon is when the full moon is at its perigee (when it's closest to earth during its orbit—so it will appear super large on the horizon) and is paired with the June summer solstice (when the sun cuts its highest path in the sky—and a smattering of atmospheric dust and pollution, and the whole thing will give off an amber—or "honey"—hue). The color of this moon was hard to capture, but it was literally HONEY yellow and what a glow. It lit up the Atlantic and the beach!

Yesterday evening we took our last walk on the beach and I decided to pose for a photo on top of one of the life guard chairs. Sitting on these chairs seems to be a very popular destination after hours with folks. I can see why in a way because you do get quite a bird's eye view from up there. It attracts the young and old alike. Kids like to climb up the chair like a jungle gym and adults seem to like to venture up there for a quiet minute's peace away from what is happening below them on the beach. Naturally I can safely say this because behind this chair was where our condo was situated and from our balcony I got to observe so much of what was happening on a nightly basis. 

This morning I felt like I was moving in slow motion as we were packing up our condo. 
We really needed this time away and in all honesty I was just beginning to relax and unwind. We could have used several more weeks by the beach. It was my hope that in this week's time Peter would have lost his cough and we would have come back feeling stronger. I can't say that this is true however for either of us. 

The condo space was truly lovely and met our needs. The actual living space was much smaller than what we live in at home, yet what made the space absolutely memorable was the outdoor component. That I wouldn't have traded for anything. 

Here was our amazing view! We practically lived out on the deck, which was right off the living room. We kept the sliding door open all day long while we were in the condo so we could here the ocean waves crashing onto the shore. The bird traffic was amazing with pelicans flying over non-stop and daily dolphin sightings. The balcony alone made this week long trip completely memorable. 

When we tired of the tall chairs and table, we moved to the lounging chairs. Which is where I wrote most of the blogs... facing the Atlantic! Something I will miss this week. 

Our drive home today took about six hours. We hit what seemed like one traffic jam after the other. As we drove through Newport News
I saw many aircraft carriers in port and I tried to snap some photos while in the moving car!