Building the stuff that lasts

 

My Dad emailed me the two pictures above this past week or so, he found them on my Grandpa's iPad.  They made me smile, and brought a tear to my eye.  This summer was interesting and lessons of real love and forever families were a major theme as we said an unexpected good-bye to my Uncle Jim and then a week later a good-bye to my Grandpa Joe.   I have tried and tried to write a post dedicated to him and to all that he means to me, but how can you sum that all up in words?

Well, I thought about my Grandpa a lot as Luke built us a table and a bench.  Luke has always been a handy guy, and we did spend the first months of our marriage building their families cabin, but I don't think that it was really until my Grandpa's funeral, and seeing his garage and hearing some stories that he really decided that he wanted to build some furniture for us. After heading home from Picture Butte, Luke talked about how cool it was to see my Grandpa's garage and to see the tools he worked with.  I do love that we can see the fruits of his labors in his home, his walking sticks, our knitted coats etc.  He not only left a great legacy, but he also left physical proof of his existence for us to treasure.

So, after a few weeks of meals on the couch, Luke got to work.

In about 48 hours we had a table and a bench (still need to be stained).  I am so impressed with his skills and excited to see what future projects there are to come.  Luke did the bulk of the work, but it was fun to be working and helping where i could with him, and what better way to spend our time together than creating and refining our talents together.  That was something I loved to do with Grandpa, work with him, or even just watch him refining his talents.

Tracen seems to already be following in their footsteps.  He loves going to Lowes and helping Luke get the supplies he needs and 'going to work' just like his Dad.