Saturday, October 24, 2015

Cemetaries and Birthdays

 
Last Tuesday would have been my grandfather's birthday.  So we gathered my dad and his mom and drove over to the beautiful Oak Grove Cemetery.
 
 
This was the first time we had been to the cemetery since my grandfather died.  My dad's younger brother is buried next to my grandparent's plot.


The day was absolutely beautiful with bright blue skies and leaves beginning to shed their summer green, and we wandered around the historic cemetery for a little while.


Somehow I had missed the historic significance of this cemetery.


Beautiful graves mark the remains of some of Conway's most prominent citizens since the city's founding in 1872.
 
 
And even though my hometown wasn't founded until after the Civil War, broken relationships were healed years later in Oak Grove Cemetery.
 

After we visited the cemetery, we celebrated Grandpa's birthday by enjoying chili that had been simmering in the crockpot while we were gone.
 

Of course, we had birthday cake and ice cream!  Sarah made the same birthday cake (chocolate cherry) that I made for Grandpa the last time we celebrated his birthday together in 2012.


So we celebrated life today, not death.  We celebrated by laughing and hanging out with Grandma and my daddy.  We celebrated all the good things we remembered about Grandpa and the ways he humbly poured himself out for the Lord and for his family.

 
And it was a good day.

3 comments:

Herding Grasshoppers said...

Love that history of post-Civil War reconciliation. Looks like a lovely family day, but where was your mom?

The Hibbard Family said...

Oh how precious, my friend. Love this!

us5 said...

this is so very sweet. i can see the blessing on your grandmother's face...