Sparks Lake Sparks Lake is a large, shallow, trout lake located on the northwest edge of Mount Bachelor, and is the first of the high lakes you see from the Cascade Lakes Highway west of Bend. The views of South Sister, Mount Bachelor, and Broken Top are breathtaking. Breathtaking is putting it mildly. It’s a huge big shallow lake that you can see the bottom clearly. Mount Bachelor looms around the entire Lake. It was snow capped when I went. I got to go with two very special in my life. It was a birthday gift from them. The peace of the lake was uncanny and the sun beat down on us as w ..read more

God promises us that no matter what happens He is with us. He will always be in the boat with us. We will still go through trials that’s just part of life. Many trials I’ve been through have made me into the woman I am today. Would I change that. I don’t know. What I went through was horrendous but it’s given me the biggest heart and I so understand those children that have trauma in their lives and I understand. I also know what they need and it’s amazing to watch those children transform. I love that I can ask the right questions and be able to help make someone’s day a whole lot better. Ye ..read more

Love and trust are the key elements you need especially when you work with vulnerable people. Without trust you have nothing and you can’t move forward without that. Sometimes it takes a long time to build that trust. They want to know that you will be there for them no matter what they do. This brings me back to my childhood and how I distrusted adults. They had proven over and over again that they could not be trusted. Love does win over that theory. I loved school so much even though I didn’t learn much. I came to school to get away from the crappy home I was in. I loved it but it was ofte ..read more

Dementia makes your loved ones almost become a stranger. It strips one of who they used to be. It’s such a crippling diagnosis and it’s very hard to watch what it does. I feel sad and I cry often because I’m watching dementia take away a person I love so much. I see glimpses of the person every now and again but it’s so far and few between. I’m watching a person I love with all of my heart slowly disappear. I never imagined that this would ever happen. It’s not just with the person I know and love but I’m seeing more and more people diagnosed with dementia. It tears apart families and it’s es ..read more

Reposting this blog written by Ann Voskamp . I love how she’s written this. Her words are beautiful https://annvoskamp.com/2024/03/holy-week-pilgrimage-into-the-narrow-way-that-expands-your-heart ..read more

So many changes lately it’s moving so fast that I can’t keep up with it. My family has been part of a community for 45 years. A lot of change has come in those years. This beach I know it so well and it’s part of my home. How many times I’ve walked in it looking for sea glass, rocks of all different shapes and sizes. Sitting on the logs and watching the people go by. Seeing the forts children have made. It’s so peaceful here. I’ve walked out so many times with my favorite person. A community where I went to high school in. That was a long time ago. A home in a hill that was my first home whe ..read more

Yesterday I was so touched by such love and tenderness. Growing up and not having that love and craving it so much was something I did. I didn’t get it at home with my parents so I sought it in other places. Even as young children we just want our families to love us. Imagine being 5 years old and your mom and dad both are caught in addiction and your living with a relative. One of your safe spaces becomes school because there are people that you can trust. I loved school because that is where I learned about love and how beautiful it is. Imagine seeing a very loving family and all you want t ..read more

7 years ago I forgave my dad for all that had happened to me growing up. It was the root to that held me in bondage to my addiction. Since forgiving him I have had 7 years of freedom. Even though it’s hard to forgive those that have hurt you for me it ended up in freedom. It also does not mean you will ever forget what happened. That is etched in my brain forever. A few years ago I connected with him and some of my siblings two in fact . The one sibling that I wanted to connect with does not want to. That’s been hard for me but I’ve not spoken to her in 35 years. Correspondence is sparce but ..read more

I googled this and this is a staggering rate. Traumatic brain injury is the leading cause of paediatric trauma death and disability worldwide, with concussions comprising 80% to 90% of all TBIs. An estimated 200,000 concussions occur annually in Canada, with children and youth affected primarily. Holy cow I had no idea how high that number was. Since banging my head really hard on New Years Day I’ve learned a lot about concussions and had no idea that woman can get symptoms later then men. Men get their symptoms right away. I did get some obvious ones right away like the headache, some d ..read more

Ever since I was a little girl I was told that I wasn’t going to amount to much in my life. I heard at home I was stupid or that I would never succeed. At school I always thought I was stupid because I couldn’t concentrate on my studies. Part of that was because I was hungry and the other part was truama. We know now that with truama you get stuck at a younger age and most of the time your in survival mode. Learning is not a priority. I learned when I moved from Ireland to Canada that I was indeed smart. My brain had never been challenged in anything, so I had to teach it how to learn. Everyt ..read more