Happy Fathers Day!

Here's a photo of my dad and mom before they were married~

Here we are the Smith Family...

On this day that we honor Fathers I'm thinking about my dad. He was a great guy, charming and dangerously good looking, usually tan. He worked third shift for a period of time. He'd come home in the morning and go lay in a hammock in the sun and sleep the day away. I always marveled at how tan he would get, he'd call it being brown as a berry! I thought it was funny when he said that. He loved to garden, called being outside in nature his church and the place where he connected most with God. He loved animals, fly fishing for trout in his secret trout brook, music and he played guitar and harmonica, He smoked a pipe sometimes that smelled good. He was always friendly and people liked him. He could draw and write and loved to read.

Yes, he was a great guy...I miss him~

He died 15 years ago, he would have been 70 if he made it to his next birthday.
Even though his death was sad it did bring him freedom from mental illness that he suffered with in his later years. He was at times a tormented soul...so beautiful yet so tortured. He did accept Christ before he died thanks to my mom's relationship with Jesus. She would sit at the kitchen table every morning and have a quiet prayer time and read her bible, sometimes the she'd tear up with emotion at what she was reading, it was moving which really had an effect on my dad. He saw the realness of Christ in her life. He's in heaven today...probably fishing :)
This blue bottle contains some of his remains...he was cremated and I keep some his ashes in this bottle. My heart also contains a part of him, it holds the love and memories I have of him but I like that I have a part of him~ Ashes to ashes dust to dust..I love you dad :)