Introducing Arlo Walker Boggs

Hey Friends,

This is Odie coming to you one more time from the beautiful state of Virginia. Tomorrow is the beginning of our final week of this Virginia tour.

We are looking forward to Homecoming and revival this week in Elkton. It is always great to be with Pastor Brent Gabbard and all of our friends at Bible Holiness Church.

You are invited to join us for the services too!  If you are not close enough to attend revival, in person, at Bible Holiness Church. The services will also be on YouTube. 

Here is a link to the BHC YouTube channel. I really enjoy the online services at BHC! Bro. Matt Sponaugle and everyone on the tech team does a fantastic job!

Meet Arlo Walker Boggs

Today I want to introduce you to another baby cousin! I love all of my cousin's babies! I feel like I am more of an aunt than a cousin. Each one of them holds a special place in Auntie O's heart!

Arlo Walker Boggs is the newest member of our branch of the Boggs Family. We think he is a precious baby boy!

Arlo's pictures melt my heart! I hope you are prepared for a cuteness overload with all of these baby photos!

Arlo is the son of my cousin Victor and Emily Boggs. They welcomed their bundle of joy on Sunday, April 10 2022. 

Fun fact about his arrival: Arlo was born at 4:10pm on 4/10/22. He weighed in at 8lbs 1oz and 21in.

 

Arlo Walker Boggs is already on his way to being a big boy. I imagine he will be tall like his Daddy.

We are thrilled to welcome Arlo Walker to our family! I love the little guy so much! He already knows how to make me smile!

As these pictures show, 3 year old JoJo is happy to be a big sister. She is thrilled with her new role in life! 

It will be fun to watch her be a little Mommy to him. I know JoJo will be a fantastic sister!

Congratulations to Victor, Emily and JoJo on your new family member! We love all of you so much! I am excited to watch sweet Arlo Walker grow up! I plan on spoiling him every chance I can!

 

I will leave you with one more cute picture of Arlo Walker Boggs. I do not know if he is thrilled with the family's puppy! LOL 

Thanks for visiting with me today!

Odie

A Few Pictures From The Week

Today we have a few pictures from our week and a few interesting happenings to relay to you. I hope you enjoy!

The week began slow and deliberate. 

After revival through Wednesday, driving Thursday, mowing Friday, loading the dump trailer Saturday and preaching twice Sunday, I was ready for as much of nothing as I could squeeze into a day on Monday.😍 

The only productive thing that we did was meet my cousin and his wife for lunch at Ruby Tuesday's.

We had a hankering for Ruby Tuesday salad bar!

Bro. Gerald and Sis. Debbie Livingston

We had Ruby Tuesday's on Monday and Acapulco on Tuesday. My parents came to Odie's Tuesday and joined us for lunch from Acapulco!

Wednesday we met Bro. Jared Burris and his family for lunch at Acapulco. Bro. Jared and his family are from California but they recently relocated to Ohio. It sure was great to see them and spend some time with them.

At the very same moment, with no prior planning, my brother Steve and his wife Karen, were meeting with Jared's brother Benji, his wife Laura and some of their family for lunch in Wichita, Kansas.

How cool is that?

Steve and Benji had never met before Wednesday.

Steve is from Ohio and relocated to Wichita a couple years ago. Benji is from California and relocated to Virginia a couple of years ago. Benji is in Wichita with his family for his son's wedding.

Can you keep all of that straight? How in the world did my brother and I end up eating lunch separately with another set of brothers 800 miles apart on the same day at the same time?

Eagle-eyed readers will recognize Benji and his family from pictures the last few weeks in Virginia. Pretty cool, if you ask me.

Wednesday afternoon we mowed one more time before leaving the Lazy OD Ranch.

Wednesday Night

Thursday morning we hit the ground running and by 1:00 PM we had the house and barn ready to go.

We made the 442 mile drive to Elkton, Virginia in 7 hours and 13 minutes including stops. Not bad for us. I am hoping I bounce back quickly today.

That wraps up our week. We are looking forward to Homecoming on Sunday at Bible Holiness and revival all week.

Thank you for stopping by today.

Davy

The List Is Getting Longer

A few years ago I called my Dad. I asked what he was doing and he told me he was sitting in his barn going through his phone. His intention was to go through his contacts and delete a few numbers of friends that had passed away.

He found that he had way more friends in that category than he initially suspected and could not bring himself to delete some of those numbers. In the midst of the sadness, we have had a good chuckle about that through the years.

In the brief few rotations around the sun since then, I have a bunch of names and numbers in the same class. I have trouble deleting some of them too.

Unfortunately, another dear friend was added to the list this week.

In 1989, I drove Bro. Kim Meyers to Oklahoma so he could preach an Easter Fellowship Meeting for his brother in law, Pastor Al Hunt. That trip proved to be one of the best decisions in my life. That weekend I met several men and families that have been incredible friends to us.

It is amazing how many people we met that weekend that became and still are a huge part of our lives. Many of them have shown up on Mile Markers on a regular basis and still do!

One of them that has not shown up here as much, but has played a huge part in our lives is Pastor Al Hunt. After a very long string of illnesses, Bro. Al went to Heaven this week.

Bro. Al has been too sick to Pastor for several years and has barely been able to get around. Therefore we have not seen him as much lately, but he is no less a friend.

Bro. Al was my friend when I did not feel like I had very many friends. When pleasant phone calls were scarce and visits from friends were even more scarce, Bro. Al called and came to visit us. He also invited us into his pulpit when invitations for me to preach were rare as hen's teeth. 

I say something like this nearly every week. "I appreciate your Pastor inviting us into his church. It never gets old to me to receive an invitation. I remember the day when almost nobody was calling."

When I say that, I think of Bro. Al, who kept inviting me when I could hardly preach my way out of a wet paper sack. Bro. Al put my name and face on revival and fellowship meeting flyers when it probably cost him more fellowship than it gained. I told one of his sons this week, "I have never and will never forget it!"

Bro. Al's relationship with the Boggs family was not based on gaining socially or financially. It was based on the same thing that all of our great relationships are based on. Bro. Al took us as his friend and we accepted and loved his friendship in return.

We have all had friends that pulled back ever so slightly when it appeared our friendship might cost them a little social standing. We can not help but take note of that. But thank God for true friends like Bro. Al Hunt that love for Christ's sake and never even consider the cost.

Wow! What a friend! You are already missed, Bro. Al! Thank you for your friendship. Thank you from our hearts. 

I will have trouble deleting Bro. Al's number and I hope to hang on to the memories until we see him again face to face.

While I was preparing this Mile Marker, I received word that another friend, Bro. Scott Ryland, passed away this week after a very long battle with cancer. God help!

The number of friends on the other side is growing by leaps and bounds.

Thank you for reading today.

Davy

A Word For Wednesday - What Have I Done To Deserve This?

It is time for A Word For Wednesday. A Few minutes ago, I posted A Word for Wednesday on our YouTube Channel. Please give it a listen and leave us a comment here or on YouTube.

What Have I Done To Deserve This?

For the second week in a row, I am speaking from W. E. Sangster's devotional, Daily Readings.

What have I done to deserve the bad things in my life? That is a common question. Mr. Sangster says that to balance that question, maybe we should ask instead, What have I done to deserve the good things in my life?

If you enjoy this, please subscribe, thumbs up the video and share it with someone.😍

It is always good when you join us on Mile Markers. Thank you!

Davy

The Blessing of An "Easy A"

When I was in high school I was looking for the exit from day one. As one songwriting poet said, "Every front door found me hoping, I would find the back door open."  That is not much of an exaggeration at all.😎

Even though I took five math classes and four history classes, I took the bare minimum of English and science classes. Like I said, I was looking for the exit.

Every year I was on the lookout for "filler" classes that would earn credits, but would be an "easy A". In my 10th grade year, I signed up for Sociology thinking it would be such a class. I had the same teacher for Civics the previous year so I was familiar with his teaching style. 

Sociology was quite an experience that was everything I signed up for and more. It was taught by a flaming 1960s radical who hated Ronald Reagan, the president at the time, with intense hatred that I had never been exposed to before.

He did his very best to transport our young skulls full of mush to 1968. In the process, he challenged me to think critically and to know why I believed what I believed. Believing something because it was the way we were raised was not enough for him and he unwittingly elevated my reasoning skills while trying to conform my mind to his views.

It was an "easy A" and I still think about things he taught to this very day. I also enjoyed the friendships I made in that class and even though we gravitated in different directions the next year, I was bettered by those friends.

Another year, I signed up for a full year of typing. Not because I wanted to know how to type, but because typing was taught by a football coach and classes taught by coaches are always easy.

This coach spent at least 75% of the time each day outside the class and that worked great for all of us slackers. Every day started the same. "Get out your typing books and type such and such lessons. Remember to look at the book and not your hands and try to increase your speed while decreasing mistakes."

Then he would leave the room and come back occasionally to make sure we had not burned down the school in his absence. We had not, so the coach was satisfied with our performance. Like I said, "Easy A"

We were not typing on computers, but on typewriters. I think they were IBM Selectrics. Even though I goofed off most of the time, I surprised myself by learning to type and to type pretty fast.

That "easy A" typing class turned out to be one of the greatest things I carried with me from four years of high school. Other classes have been useful. I have benefited from Latin, English, history and especially algebra for 37 years.

But nothing from high school has been more profitable for me than learning to type. I can not imagine not being able to type. I type many thousands of words each week in letters, emails, Mile Markers, YouTube descriptions and sermons.

Living my life as I do would simply not be possible if I had taken Chemistry, Advanced Calculus, Advanced Placement English or anything less useful than typing.

I am thankful that my desire for an "easy A" pointed me to the football coach's typing class. I am not advocating a quest for mediocrity, but IF you learn a useful life skill in the process, you may rise above average eventually.

OR it may be another example of God guiding my footsteps by His providence and goodness when I did not even have enough sense to know it. I will take that explanation and thank God for His kindness to me. I am so glad that I learned to type well.

Thank you for reading my typing today.

Davy

The Weekend Dispatch 4/25/22

We must be cramming too much activity into these weekends because we sure have a bunch of pictures to show you. AND I am way ready for this weekend to end in a lazy Monday morning too.😍

Our main activities began on Thursday, but we had lunch with old and new friends at Wood Grill in Harrisonburg, Virginia Wednesday. We met Bro. John and Sis. Ann Gabbard and also Bro. Jonah and Sis. Tonya Dodd for a terrific meal and wonderful fellowship.

Thursday we drove the Jeep 438 miles home. We stopped for lunch at Golden Corral in Beckley, West Virginia and we took the only pictures from the whole day there.

Friday was yard mowing day. This picture may give you some idea of how tall and thick the grass was.

I mowed most of the yard twice with the rider and the front of Odie's house three times. KJo sprayed six gallons of weed killer on the gravel areas and did the weed eating and clean up.

We visited with my parents and sister for a while and also KJo's parents for a while. It was great to see them all.

My nephew Jonas dropped by too!

We MAY have had takeout from Acapulco twice Friday and Maybe one on Saturday and again on Sunday.

We rented a three yard dump trailer for Saturday. The guy dropped it off Friday evening. We had debris from various barn projects completed last year. We loaded it Saturday morning working kind of leisurely. It was nice to get it all in the trailer and throw in a few more items along the way.

Sunday morning we sang and preached at Dodds Church next door and Sunday night we sang and preached at Dryden Rd., our home church. We enjoyed both services and it was very good to see everyone. We had not been to Dodds since before Thanksgiving and our last service at Dryden was during revival on December 30.

That pretty much wraps up our weekend.

Thank you for hanging with us all the way to the end.

Davy