Isn’t it great when you come across something fun unexpectedly? That happened to me yesterday. I was in Wal-Mart returning an item, and while standing in line at the Customer Service Desk, a small flyer caught my eye. It was a promotional flyer for the Vancouver Sidewalk Astronomers, a group of people who have made astronomy either a career or a hobby. They all own telescopes and they bring their telescopes to certain locations to give people a peek at the planets, the moon, star nebulae, etc. Matthew has recently had a big interest in outer space, especially the moon and MARS. He learned a lot about the solar system this year in school. And I want to encourage this interest.
So I realized that this group of freelance astronomers would be hosting one of their “star parties” right there at Wal-Mart, from 9-11 PM. So I took the kids to it. We had such a great time! It was the first time for the 3 of us to see anything in space with a BIG telescope. One of the men had made his own telescope, and it was impressive. He told us all about how he made it and how long it took, etc. etc. It was quite educational for Hannah and Matthew (and me!). We saw Jupiter and the orange bands around it, and 4 of its moons. We saw Saturn with its rings and moons, VERY clearly. We saw the moon up-close and personal---I could not believe the detail I could see, and how CLOSE it was!
On the way home, we called my Mom in Texas and she asked Matthew if he saw the man in the moon. His reply was, “Well, no---we could only see HALF of the moon, so we didn’t get to see everything on it.”
I think our little space tour spurred a desire to SEE MORE and do more things like that…planetarium, here we come!?! ;-)
I love Psalm 19 and especially the first few verses. Psalm 19:1 was written on the front of our science building at BJU. I always would read and appreciate it while walking through those double doors into the building. And I walked into that building A LOT. Here's the verse: “The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament showeth His handiwork.” How true it is.
5 comments:
A friend of mine found a real digital telescope at salvation army for 13 bucks!
Kenj
Catching up here...
I took Astronomy at BJU, and a couple of our labs were outside to look through telescopes. I remember the first time I saw rings and moons and galaxies, it brought tears to my eyes. God is so big, and yet he loves me so much.
And I know this has been said before, but yesterday I was thinking about how our world is out there hanging on nothing! Our God is Awesome!
Kenj
I think Davida got lost in the stars. We need more of your interesting posts! Are you getting ready for school again? I've always wanted to look through a real telescope btw.
Hey, y'all-thanks for commenting! Well, Sho-I didn't quite get lost in the stars! :-) I wish! Truth is I got lost in LIFE! ;-o I haven't even STARTED getting ready for school! -gulp- I've been having a good summer, but Mark has been through a very difficult past few weeks with his back condition (it's been worse lately--completely debilitating). He is alright, but he's been in so much pain, and it's just been rough. I won't go into detail here, but I'll just say we've seen better days. :-( PLEASE PRAY for healing and that he can get some medical help. I've been applying for disability aid for him and things like that, so he can be followed by a medical doctor and maybe get some pain treatments. His condition may be long-term (it's degenerative) so it's not something that just heals in a few weeks. And that can be depressing. Please pray that he will have strength to get through this time without "losing it"! Only God can sustain us in certain times of suffering. I can be there to help him through it, but I can't GET him through it...you know?!? And I can't heal him...only God can do that too. Thanks for praying.
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