Comforts of Grace

The Ramsay family almost always celebrated the 4th camping when the kids were growing up.   Manapogo Park was (and still is) our favorite place to camp.  It boasts a large fishing and ski lake, beautiful sandy beach as well as activities and tournaments scheduled by the park staff.   Swimming, sun bathing, fishing, banana bikes, Friday night BINGO, and campfire cooking entertained the kids while encouraging Chris and I to escape our hectic work schedules and join their fun in the great outdoors. We camped often each summer, not just on the 4th.   Many tents and a pop-up camper were retired as our family grew.  We also learned to stay packed-up in colored, categorized storage tubs for grab and go weekend escapes.  It was fun and cheap entertainment for our large family and created many fond memories. Here's a clip from the Mom Archives of one 4th of July holiday over twenty years ago! Live as people who are free, not using your freedom as a cover-up for evil, but living

You will find as you look back upon your life that the moments when you have truly lived are the moments when you have done things in the spirit of love. ~  Henry Drummond Our daughter, Holly, and our three grandchildren.  It's been a tough season of life for this young family.  An escape to the ocean in April (a first for the grandkids) was rich in soothing therapy.  They were awestruck by the vastness of the sea, the crashing waves that carried in friendly juvenile stingrays, and sand that floated away under their feet with retreating waves. Haylee, 15, studied the warm, white sand on the beach of Destin, Florida while knowing an early spring snow was falling back home in Indiana. Kayne, 13, enjoyed learning the warm sand got colder during a digging exploration. One of the rare moments Miss Danika, 10, was out of the water.  She loved spending every minute in the ocean with her Mom, Papaw, and Kayne. What great joy it was for Chris and I to exp

I'm nudged once again to rekindle this little blog.  It was created to serve as a public diary for those who call me Mom, Nana, or simply Cheryl.  Oh, how I wish there were blogs back in the day when my parents, grandparents and in-laws traveled their earthly journeys.   I know without a doubt had the technology been introduced to them in their younger days ~ they would have used it.  What joy it could have been to revisit their lives with technology ease. I've been pondering all of my life changes in recent months ... I'm so very thankful for God ~ My heavenly Father and Creator of ALL things including the beautiful universe, my loving family, and me.  I thank Him daily for loving me, guiding me, and His blessings and healing miracles in our family. I'm so very thankful for Jesus ~ My comforter and teacher.  He understands the difficulties and evils of this world.  He continues to teach me the power and legacy of unconditional love.   I melt into His

... I know, since I last posted.  A lot of life has happened since then. At the time of my last blog post in June 2016, our family was still deeply grieving the unexpected deaths, 31 days apart, of my father-in-law and my mother.  Sudden cardiac arrests for both of them resulted in them leaving us just weeks before the holidays.  They were active parents and grandparents one day, then gone the next day.  Taylor's miracle testimony, at least for me at that time, was the salve for my grief ~ helping me to "remember" God is Good. I found it difficult to continue writing about Taylor's miracle when others, outside of our family, were experiencing unanswered prayers.  Death was their heartbreaking result.  My faith and trust suddenly brewed-up more questions than answers.  One of which was ... how does God choose who He grants a miracle to when others deserving of one, die?  With this puzzling question, it was just too difficult for me to continue the testimony.

Completely drained, confused and not knowing what to do or where to go next, we walked through the O.R. double doors and decided to return to Taylor’s ICU room to await his arrival from recovery. That room was temporarily home now. We were informed by the nursing staff when we arrived at his room, however, that he would be held in recovery for quite a while. As we waited in the quiet, empty ICU room, Chris said, “One of us should probably try and get some sleep in that sleeping room the surgeon reserved for us tonight.” I nodded in agreement, but knew I couldn’t sleep. All I wanted was to be near Taylor. “How about you sleep first and I’ll stay with Taylor,” I said, knowing my suggestion would not convince my husband. As suspected, Chris replied, “No, you sleep first and I’ll stay with him.” Since neither of us wanted to be apart from Taylor, we decided to at least check-in at the reservation desk since the surgeon told us the suite would soon be closing reservations fo

It was Thursday, June 15, 2006 and we waited for Taylor’s turn in the operating room to install the dialysis catheter. There were no changes overnight for hopeful signs of kidney function. I methodically checked the urine bag that hung at the bottom of his ICU bed as we watched, waited, and prayed for the precious return of what we called “liquid gold”. But, as was the case all week long, there was only about a tablespoon or two of a pale liquid that the nurses assured us was not good urine. The blood counts continued to show extremely high and rising creatinine and BUN counts associated with kidney failure. It appeared more certain he would need the dialysis as the kidney’s were refusing to function. By mid-afternoon, the operating room alerted the ICU staff they were ready for Taylor. He was wheeled down the hall in his ICU bed by the surgical nurses in green scrubs. They paused at the double entry doors to the O.R. so his dad and I could give him a quick kiss goodbye. T