April Is Moving On

Hello!  It's Friday!  That means Friday Fave Fives at Willow's Cottage.  It's been a crazy week.  I'm not sure why, but it just was.  Maybe it was the two evenings we spent at the university listening and watching the performing arts students present their capstone programs.  Oh, and the new small group from our church is meeting on Tuesday nights.  Yeah, busy.  So I'm a bit late writing my Fave Fives, but I am nonetheless truly grateful for the opportunity to look back over my week and CHOOSE to be THANKFUL.

1. Medical people.  A friend of ours has been in the hospital for a week.  Finally home, he is still needing a doctor's care.  I am thankful that we have excellent health care and especially modern medicines like penicillin which heal infections.  It's not something we should take for granted.

2. Evidence of spring.  When the jacaranda trees bloom, we know it's really spring!

3.  Funny captions.  My sister-in-law, knowing my love of all things yarn related, sent me this picture and comment.  She is a quilter and mentioned she had seen the same photo with a caption about fabric.  It made me laugh.

4. Adorable students.  I assigned my writing students to write about someone they admired.  I was pleasantly surprised at how many of them wrote about their dads.  So sweet.

5. One of my classes challenged me to write the same assignment.  So I did.  And guess, what?  I wrote about my dad!  Here is what I wrote.  I'm truly thankful I had a great dad.

            I admire my father.  My dad whose name was Frank was very tall.  He was six feet two inches.  By the time he was six years old, he was taller than both of his older brothers.  Like me, Dad had light blond hair, fair skin, and bright blue eyes.  Dad grew up on a dairy farm in Southern Oregon where he learned to drive a tractor before he was a teenager.   When he was thirteen, his father died, so he had to help more than normal with milking the cows and caring for the crops.  He told me he didn’t enjoy helping his mom in the kitchen, but because he did, he was an excellent cook.  During World War II, my dad joined the Army-Air Force.  Unfortunately, he became very ill and suffered permanent damage to his heart, but that didn't stop him from choosing to live a happy life afterward.  Ever since I was a tiny girl, my dad has been my hero.      

 I admire my dad for many reasons.   Obviously, although he was ill most of his adult life and spent much time in the hospital, he still worked hard.  My earliest memories of my dad are of him reading to me.   Every night, he would sit next to me on my bed and read me a book.  I still own some of those bedtime story books we read together.   Since he was not able to attend college which was a great disappointment to him, he insisted that both my brother and I finish our college degrees because he knew that education was very important.   He was our best supporter!  Additionally, he hoped I would become a teacher and encouraged me in that endeavor.  Some people called my dad stubborn.   But I called him determined.   He was so stubborn that he lived to be eighty years old!  All my life I will remember my dad and how he loved me, taught me determination and was my champion.