Tulips in Bloom



I’ve silently cheered a thousand times for the rainy afternoon I spent planting 250 tulips bulbs last fall.   I have loved every minute of this beautiful display of spring color.


The cheerful border in my flowerbeds has been a gift.  Now I must get to work filling in the rest.  This week I added spring bulbs, and I’m also planning for some boxwood.

For now, I’m thrilled with my tulips.  To my surprise some of them have already sent up a second, smaller flower.


I wonder to myself, “How in the world did I live so long without flowers?”

Dare I admit I’ve already ordered 100 more tulip bulbs for fall planting?  I never tire of their beauty.


Truly, they are food for the soul.

Jennifer

Poppy



It’s been a rough couple of weeks, and I’m feeling down.  In the midst of this, and with the return of rain, my Iceland poppies bloomed.

I’d been watching them, waiting, their reverent heads bowed low and pregnant with petals about to burst forth.  And then they raised their heads and opened.  I went to look.

Unexpectedly, from deep within me came an ache I didn’t know I had.  It was a bittersweet feeling of being lost and found, of losing and finding.  I blinked back tears.

“Hello, old friend,” I whispered.

“I’ve missed you.”


Hopeful Homemaker

Growing



My little girls are growing up so fast.  It catches me off guard, sometimes, which is why I took these pictures last weekend.  It was just a moment.  I turned around and there they were, standing against an old brick wall, watching me.  They’ve grown.

As I reached for my camera, tears pricked at my eyes.

I wanted so much to experience motherhood as my best self.  Yet here I am in a stage that seems designed only to reveal the worst in me.  It is so humbling.

It’s also sad.  It makes me ache for them.  They deserve so much better.  And I ache for myself, as well.  I wanted more for all of us.

But here we are, growing up anyway.


Will someone please push pause while I collect myself?

HH

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