Today was a really good day. This morning Bryan and I made pancakes and I put homemade pear sauce on them that I made yesterday – it was so yummy. Over breakfast we were chatting and came up with a fun idea for a photography project that we are going to do (even if it ends up just being the two of us doing it). Basically, the idea is to have a few different photographers who all commit to taking one picture a week of “life in Prague” for one year and then we will post the pictures up on a web site. Bryan’s been working on creating the site all day. I’m really excited about it and feel like it will be a fun project that will be challenging, but not too overwhelming.

Then I spent some time catching up on some blogs and looking at photography sites and getting inspired. I love the blogs I read and it was so great to spend some time reading through posts from this past week. I also spent some time reading on of the many yoga books I have to read for my certification program. The one I was reading today deals with anatomy and yoga – it was so interesting.

Then on the way to church we walked past this dumpster and sitting next to the dumpster was a big box of books. I love books, especially old hard cover books, and there were so many beautiful books in this box it made me sad to see them just being thrown away. So, I took 17 of them. It was my first excursion in “dumpster diving” and I loved it. I was soo excited to get all these beautiful old books for free and to rescue them from being thrown away. I love the idea of reusing something that someone else discarded and think that the metaphors that can be drawn from this are so beautiful. I’m planning on using these books for decorating and making my own journals out of some of them. I’m thinking I might have to start checking out dumpsters more often…

Then we had church and discussed the last supper together. There was a lot to talk about in this story and we had some really interesting conversations. I’m sure that we could have gone even deeper in some of the things and even though I have read this story and heard it literally hundreds of times I still walked away with a lot to think about.

Then I came home and got to talk to one of my best friends in the world, Laura Johnson. It was so truly lovely to hear her voice and laugh and commiserate and share our lives together even from thousands of miles apart. My favorite quote from the conversation: “We’re so dynamic. We’re like two elements that when you combine them they explode. We explode!” Seriously, I laughed through so much of the conversation and it felt soooo good! I love my friend, Laura.

Now I’m going to eat some chocolate and hang out with my wonderful hubby. Maybe I’ll watch some Pushing Daisies. I’m thankful for days like today – days filled with creativity, reading, beautiful books, good food, redemption, salvation, deep conversations, laughter, and sharing life with good friends. Thank you, Lord, for today.

Rejoicing in the journey - Bethany

Photographs by Beth Stedman