April 2026

We came back to Tennessee on March 26, having spent nearly 3 months in the warmer climate of Florida. We are blessed to be able to travel and get away for a while, but it’s always nice to be home again!

While we were in Florida, we noticed yet another chip in the windshield. It seemed that Safelite had twice provided “we-come-to-you” service while we were on the road. Jim called their 800 number and was told that Pegram is just too far for them to come to us! So, Jim drove Acey the 24 miles to their shop… On the way back, he was behind an uncovered dump truck…. Thankfully, nothing came flying off the truck, and Jim passed him to avoid another windshield repair!

We trekked up to Clarksville to celebrate Amanda’s birthday. We had a delightful family time with delicious food at Clydes of Clarksville.

We went to the Maundy Thursday communion service at Stephens Valley Church. “Maundy” comes from the Latin word “mandatum”, or commandment, reflecting Jesus’ words “A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.” (John 13:34)

Paul wrote these words about the Last Supper on the First Maundy Thursday that are usually read during communion: “For I received from the Lord what I also passed on to you: The Lord Jesus, on the night he was betrayed, took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, “This is my body, which is for you; do this in remembrance of me.” In the same way, after supper he took the cup, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood; do this, whenever you drink it, in remembrance of me.” For whenever you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.” (1 Corinthians 11:23-26)

When we participate in communion, we reflect on the sacrifice of Jesus and his commandment for us to love and serve others. We remember the events of Maundy Thursday; when our Lord Jesus was betrayed, to be tried and crucified the next day on Good Friday.

  On Good Friday our church had a Tenebrae service (a service of shadows) that told of the sufferings of Christ using Scripture, song, silence, and darkness — it was a somber meditative time that helped us to identify with the darkness and loss felt by Jesus’ followers as they experienced his suffering and death. Mark 26:36 – 27:60 was read.

On April 5, the Easter Sunday worship service celebrated Christ’s resurrection. The message from Luke 14 was a bit different, focusing on Luke’s account of two disciples on the road to Emmaus when the resurrected Jesus walked alongside them, rather “incognito”, until he broke bread with them and they realized he was the Christ! As expected, the service was well attended; and our Tennessee family was all together once again!

On the 13^th, Chuck and Linda went to a Preds hockey game! Jim had been prepping for a procedure the next day and couldn’t join us…

We lost to the Sharks 3-2 – but it was fun to see live hockey again! And the Preds won’t make it into the playoffs this year.

Chris volunteers with Nashville Steam – they are restoring the NC&StL No. 576 steam engine that sat in Centennial Park for many years. They held an open house on the 18^th, so we went to check on their progress.     

Here is the tender – they must have the wheels elsewhere…

And the steam engine!

Once we got to the shop, we could see the engine.

Here’s Chris with many of the Nashville Steam volunteers.

Chuck and Chris were standing by a part of the engine Chris worked on – he needle scaled, cleaned and primed an area.

There was a display telling some history of the 576 engine:

Linda and Chuck often went for a morning walk, usually 3 miles. Sometimes the horses and donkey came up to the fence to see us.

When we extended our walk another mile, we saw many transmission towers carrying high voltage power lines to our area.

Most Fridays we stop in at Yazoo – with Chris and Chuck – and have dinner out.

It had been a year since Linda was taken by ambulance to the hospital (as a result of taking ibuprofen; she had some bleeding ulcers) So, on the 28^th, she took a batch of cookies to the EMS station.

Jim put the new bird feeder pole up – it’s about 20 feet from the deck which hopefully will cut down on the mess the birds made when the feeder hung off the deck!

And of course, the turkeys still hung around our place – the Toms like to show off and impress the ladies…

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Chris had been working on transferring the website to a server at our home – so this post is a bit late being posted… If you ever want to be dropped from (or added to)  our new blog notification emails, please let us know!