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| Grandson Quinn Showing Us His New Lunchbox |
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| Low Tide at Whitley Bay on the North Sea. Looking South. Our Place is at the End of the Seen Buildings and One Building from the Beachfront Road. |
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| Low Tide at Whitley Bay. Looking North. St. Mary's Lighthouse is Barely Visable. This Vantage is Close to Our Apartment. |
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| Low Tide at Whitley Bay Looking at the Main Seawall and Southward. |
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| Darrell Making Breakfast Pancakes in Our Nice Kitchen. |
Saturday. 20. Today was a ‘normal’ living our life day. One of my favorite quotes is “be thankful for boring times.” I’m not bored today. I’m living in peace. Morning routines of exercises and breakfast with Darrell. Walks on the beach. Laundry. Grocery shopping. Quinn call. Owen video.
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| Paul, Aileen,(married and originally from Dundee, Scotland) and Karyl (moved here in Sept 2022 from the Philippines to work as a nurse). Treating Us to Sunday Lunch After Worship. |
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| Darrell Holding His Walking Stick. High Tide at Whitely Bay. View of St. Mary's Lighthouse, About a 40 minute Walk from This End of the Beach, Near Our Apartment. |
Sunday. 21. Church at 11am. It takes us close to an hour by the metro. I teach 3 sweet kids in class today. I focus on prayer and learning about Daniel having a hard life and praying three times a day on his knees. Paul and Aileen take us with Karyl out for lunch. We visit long with them. Later Darrell and I walk on the beach.
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| View from Our Apartment Living Room in Whitley Bay. |
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| Colorful Shell on the Beach. |
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| A Rock with Fossils. Fits in My Palm. |
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| My Toes on the Beautiful Rocks at Whitley Bay. |
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| Sea Glass that I Picked Up at Whitley Bay Beach. |
Monday. 22. We slept until 6:20 am and it felt like we slept in so late! Lol! We have a Bao Bun sandwich from the local popular restaurant. It’s walk up and take away. We get our egg sandwich with sriracha and go to a bench by the ocean to sit and eat. It’s essentially an egg mcmuffin done very well. It’s on a Bao bun, light and fluffy Japanese style bread. Hashbrowns, egg, sausage, cheese and hot sauce. That’s pretty much all this place sells.
We walk on the beach, collect sea glass, cook salmon for dinner and have some good kimchi that we found at the grocery store.
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| A Common Lunch Menu at Italian Restaurants. |
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| Minestrone Appetizer and Calamari. |
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| Spring Flower. |
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| Spring Flower. |
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| Spring Flowers. |
Tuesday. 23. We go to Gosforth by way of the metro to get to the chiropractor (Jacob from church). We get great treatments, then go out for an Italian lunch. We buy some fresh baked and delicious sourdough bread. We go back to our apartment, get a nap, have dinner. We are online at 7pm in our study on Romans with the Tunbridge Wells church and others we know in the US. There is a 93 year old man named Sewell Hall who is a lifelong preacher and I think he’s amazing to be here in this group and encouraging and still teaching!
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| Walking The Coast Near Cullercoats. |
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| Cullercoats Beach with Kids and Dogs. |
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| Beach with Algae on the Rocks. |
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| Cullercoats Beach on Tynemouth Side. |
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| A View of Cullercoats. |
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| Tynemouth Beach with Abbey Ruins Above. To the Right is the Mouth of the Tyne River with Lighthouses Showing the Way. |
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| Darrell Adjusting His Shoe. Looking North from Tynemouth. |
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| Selfie with Abbey Ruins at Tynemouth in Background. |
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| On the Metro Ferry to South Shields from North Shields. |
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| The Metro Ferry Wake Looking at North Shields. |
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| Cafe At The House Desserts, Wraps and Savory Pie Display. |
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| Cafe At The House Lunch Toastie Display |
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| Tea Served in Proper Pots with Proper Cups! lol. |
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| Darrell's Pork and Pepperoni Toastie. |
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| My Toastie with Olives, Figs, and Spinach. |
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| A Walnut Cake. Very Dense and Buttery. |
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| A Shell on the Beach. |
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| A Dog Loving the Beach! |
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| This Dog in Action Fetching His Ball From the Ocean. |
Wednesday. 24. We walk up the coast to North Shields. Take the ferry to South Shields. Have lunch at a nice sandwich shop. Ride the metro back to Whitley Bay. I have a 3pm massage. Oh, it was soooo goood!! We spent time today shopping for and purchasing air tickets for September going from Huntsville, Alabama to Portland, Maine. This is going from grandkids in Alabama to grandson in Maine, and then on to our New Zealand Adventure.
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| In Newcastle Train Station. To the Right is the Yellow M for the Entrance to the Metro. Picture Taken From Centurion Bar Restaurant Where We Have Eaten Snacks, Coffees, Breakfasts and Lunch. |
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| The Berwick Upon Tweed Train Station. |
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| From Berwick Train Station, Downhill and Through a Beautiful Garden to the River. |
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| View of the 19th Century Bridge in Berwick. |
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| View of the 17th Century Bridge in Berwick. |
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| Looking Down the Tweed River |
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| Berwick Rail Bridge Viewed From Old Wall. I Love It! |
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| Up On The Berwick Wall |
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| The Newest Bridge at Berwick and The Oldest Bridge Behind. |
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| Ramparted 16th Century Walls of Berwick. |
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| On the Ramparts of the Berwick Wall. |
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| Up Above the Berwick Wall. Maybe This is an Old Torch Holder (? not sure). |
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| View to the Sea with The Tweed Lighthouse Entrance. |
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| Nice Flowers Next To The 17th Century Ammo Building. |
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| Berwick Community Gardens in Foreground. Yellow Field in the Background is Rapeseed. |
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| Mouth of the River Tweed. |
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| Seafood Pizza for Lunch. Lunch Prices are 2 pounds Less Here Than We Have Paid. |
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| A Main Street in Berwick. |
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| Historical Story at the Train Station. |
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| Darrell with a Soldier Who Looks Like Captain Hook. |
Thursday. 25. On this beautiful day we take the train to Berwick Upon Tweed. I learn about it online as we are traveling. It is pronounced “Bearick”. It is the farthest northern town in England, on the coast and fought over with the Scots often before the 1400’s. We enjoyed our day and our tours of the town and various museums.
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| The North Sea Coast at Whitley Bay |
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| Nice Coast Near Whitley Bay. |
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| Flowers and Rocks on the Coast. |
Friday. 26. At 3pm we meet up with Karyl at a pub near where she lives. She moved here from the Philippines to work as a nurse. We enjoyed a 2 hour visit with her. This week is her 30th birthday. I closed my Target account today because of the press information about their pro-rainbow coalition marketing. We won’t be shopping there for now.
Nomad Notes. I am looking for a picture to share and I can't find how to get it from there to here. Oh well. Technology and using the computer and the smart phones has been a difficult task for me through the years. I spend time trying to figure out what direction within menus and saved files to look for information and stored photos. I'm really glad for all that I have learned and can do with this stuff. It's truely amazing. Darrell helps me A LOT with technology.
This week I've been thinking: I get tired. I get cranky. I get weepy. My experiences with my moving emotions are that my emotions are constantly moving and do not always align with my current experience. It can be the best most beautiful day ever, and I'm not feeling it. It can be a messed up day for me or someone close to me, and I'm not feeling bleak. In contrast, I can feel super-good or super-not-so-good (very sad). My balancing mental practice is prayer. My prayers are reinforced through my faith and ongoing study of the Word of God, the Bible. I want to continue to study the people of faith who God approved of in the Bible. It is this connection to my humanity that allows me to act with responsibility in my life and in my decisions. Life is hard and there is grief and pain. On the flip side, there is gain, pleasure and joy. Through ease or difficulties there are promises of God's care, support, and renewal of life.
As I've been studying for and teaching the kids Bible class this month, I've looked at personal responsibility to God. I gave them each a notebook to write in and use as their own Bible Study Diary. I taught them some new songs that were straight scriptures, and explained that this is an easy and enjoyable way to learn scripture and remember it. I shared Ezra 7:10 about Ezra setting his heart on God's word: to study, to practice and to teach it. We talked about meditation in God's word meaning to focus your mind on thinking about the word. This is different than meditation that seeks to empty your mind. We discussed looking to faithful Bible people and how they acted in tough life circumstances. It's Daniel who had a practice to pray 3 times daily on his knees and speaking out loud. These are details that were new to these kids who knew about the Lion's Den. I enjoyed singing, praying and encouraging them to think about their ongoing personal study of God's word. I am the one who studies and prays in my life. I am the one who takes action to do good and to be thankful. I am grieved over people who do not take these actions, yet I am so encouraged by people I know who do take these actions. Other people's actions for faith have shown me that it's possible to live godly in an ungodly world. It's possible to be wronged, have less, to lose, to be hurting and to be faithful and thankful to God. It's possible to have a life with more, to be healthy, to 'win' and to be faithful and thankful to God. It's hard to obey and it's hard to not obey. I choose obedience everyday. This is the life of a hero to me!
1 Peter 5:7 "casting all your cares on Him, for he cares about you"
Hebrews 12:1-2 "...since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us also...run with endurance the race that is set before us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith..."
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