Stories from my garden

Derek and I bought our first home in the summer of 2016.  The first thing we did was buy paint! A 5 gallon bucket of paint! We painted the walls which made our home really our home. We had never painted walls before, so over the last year we've painted all but one wall in our house. And that one wall has limited time left to contemplate it's beige state.

Before becoming homeowners I had never grown a vegetable or flower. I had planted some annuals for Mother's Day gifts, but never tended a garden, sowed a seed, or considered the acidity of soil, the hours of sun in a particular spot, or the heritage of seeds. That has all changed. I watched, pregnant with my daughter and eager to dig in to the soil, a full year, tracking the sun, tracking the first and last frost, tracking the flowers and shrubs already in the garden, making my plan, second guessing it, and then committing my husband to some instesive physical labor.

First to go was the ornamental plum tree, a.k.a. The mullet tree, from our front garden patch. It was such a hard decision that I debated with myself, chop it down, leave it up, try to prune it, that can never be pruned! But, alas, after a year or talking myself into it, the tree came down and the flowers bloomed! Bearded iris that didn't get enough sun in the shade of the tree sprung up with gusto and bloomed beautifully! Creeping myrtle that really was creeping slowly, stunted, started marathon covering the ground with purple flowers and evergreen foliage. Bachelor's button that wasn't amazing in the first place seemed to grow a foot higher than the previous summer. But left behind was a big brown, dirt spot too shaded for anything to have grown previously.

This has been the absolute best barren area of my life! Where there was nothing, there are some many things growing now! There are plants from friends, family, volunteers from the bees and a family hobby "taking root!"

My daughter awoke for the Royal Wedding...at 130...A...M! She seemed to feel very strongly that we should be awake and eager to watch the bride and groom and all the many fascinators.  There were tears... but not at the beauty of the bride or the sweet music or the passionate oratory from the Reverend. No, the tears involved a very tired baby struggling to communicate her needs and wants and hurts. And this is such a true illustration of how I act sometimes, too. Where she is struggling with tummy issues that leave her in pain, I deal with heart issues that ultimately lead into pain when not fully submitted to a gracious Heavenly Father.

My uncle posted recently that prayer is an act of telling God that we aren't okay with our current character and heart orientation. Instead of prayer being the time where we ask for blessings, its a time of acknowledging that our character has not been made fully perfect, and is in dire need of God's intervention. I find myself in need of this daily as a mom and as a wife. Instead of screaming out my frustrations in the day to day grind of feeding, snuggling, cleaning little ones, I want to besiege the Lord for a deeper understanding of Grace and to let that understanding change my heart and inform my mind and command my actions. In this I know I will find hardship and trials. But it's there that I will have strength and heart to love and snuggle my daughter at 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 a...m...

Either way, wataching a royal wedding with my little girl in the middle of the night turned out to be a pretty sweet moment that I'm sure when I've had more rest will be a treasure to remember.

Is this thing still on??!!

Googled "Anlee"'s name today...really meant to google the local cupcake shop, but was having a mental moment and googled the name instead. Found out Anlee is a popular Japanese anime character... then found our family blog! And took a trip down memory lane readying about our history...friendship, dating, marriage, kids...then the season when we didn't have interest. So, is this thing still on???