He Loves Me, He Loves Me Not

The first tiny daisy of the season. I walked by it a handful of times this morning and finally noticed it this afternoon. It looks as though someone had started to play a game of "he loves me, he loves me not" which made me smile... and sigh... and think...

Of course in my heart, I know He loves me and never loves me not. I won't lie though, in my head... some times it's rough and doesn't always feel like that's the case. It's funny when I think back on it, I never played the little game as a child thinking of it as he loves me vs. he hates me. I played it but in my head it was he loves me vs. he doesn't even know I exist. Ahhh, the days of middle school angst. :) At any rate, I saw the little daisy this afternoon and felt very reminded that yes, He does love me and never loves me not. Yes, He knows I exist, He created me! And I love Him too.

“Blessed is the man who perseveres under trial, because when he has stood the test, he will receive the crown of life that God has promised to those who love him.”
James 1:12

Today was another beautiful day of sunshine and warmth. Of course I'm crazy so I sweated it out in jogging pants and a sweatshirt. Really, I knew that I needed to just feel something other than sadness and defeat and I didn't care if it felt good or bad, it just needed to be different. My body is so sore tonight but it's a good sore, not the can't drag my body off the couch sore because my heart hurts so deeply. No, I worked in the yard today and kicked my own butt in the process. I decided that I really needed to spruce up the corner of the house where Karleigh had her wildflower garden last summer. Seriously, it was the second ugliest corner of the house. So, instead of feeling bad about it, I decided to do something with it. THIS is the kind of thing that if you don't like it, you can decide to change it.

Here's what it looked like around 10 am today:

And here it is about 5 pm today:

All of that was done with things that were already around the property no less! All by myself, thankyouverymuch! So, since there were some "wildflowers" popping back up, I dug those up and set them aside in little pots until I was ready to put them back in the ground (since I started with um, yah, NO real plan). This is a tough spot, it's low, it gets hot in the summer afternoons, the vent is ugly, it's just always been very blah but one of those places that you always see. Anywho, it felt like a little victory to get this done before the rain starts back in a very short while, and I'll take what I can get at this point. I still had a few plants left from... when ever it was that I picked them up... 3 weeks ago?! So I put in the purple erysimum, some hot pink primroses and some purple pansies. Don't look for the purple pansies though as I got them in the ground one day too late... or at just the right time if you're the rabbit who found them last night. No worries, they'll bloom again... I hope. Then I moved an azalea who was none too happy where it was before, some bachelors buttons from the field, some daisies that were growing under a red huckleberry bush and put the perennial wildflowers back in. We covered it all up with some bark that I had forgotten that we still had and we were good to go! Karleigh, of course, found a few little decorations around the yard that she wanted to add which was totally fine. I'm sure we'll pick up and add some more things as the seasons change but for now I feel pretty good about it!

Enough bragging about my conquests... check out the little man!
Oh yah, all on his own! No, he didn't write it upside down, I moved him around for documentation purposes. He doesn't look the slightest bit proud of himself does he?

There were victories and there were defeats today. Listening was not high on their list of priorities today however, and Karleigh discovered the natural consequences of ignoring mommy. I had asked her, several times, not to ride the (little three wheel Razor) scooter in the (loose gravel) driveway. She got her first real good skinned knee of the year. Of course, blood curdling crying started before she even hit the ground and yah, she was bleeding so I set her on the yard swing and got her a wet washcloth. When I got back out and sat down next to her to clean her off, she cried "Why, oh WHY could this happen to such a beautiful little girl!?!?" No, I'm not kidding. Of course I started laughing so Rylan started laughing which irritated Karleigh even more. I finally answered with "Why, oh why can't such a beautiful little girl listen the first time!?!?" Luckily, that made her laugh... there was only a 50/50 chance there. Good news is, she'll survive. This is them sitting in time-out together after being rude to one another (yes, I made them sit together since they weren't being nice)... looks traumatic doesn't it?

I needed today to be a good day. I woke up this morning with a dream fresh on my mind and even through all the yard work today, I wasn't able to kick. There were bits and pieces missing but the gist of it was that, somehow, we had a tiny infant girl. There was some sort of "drama" getting her out of the hospital as in she'd been in the PICU for a couple of days but was fine, we had to have the nurse sign her release papers. I know it was spring/summer by what she was wearing and the light in her bedroom, she was here in this house and Karleigh was standing next to me as I laid the baby down in the crib. We both commented on how tiny she looked as Karleigh took her bitty baby out to be safe. It felt SO nice and SO right. But as I exhaled one of those "all is right with the world" breaths, Jim came upstairs to tell me that my coffee was ready. As I wiped the sleep from my eyes I realized that today was the edd for my first pregnancy after we lost Eli. But come on! How are dreams like that supposed to help me "get over" the desire for number three? It was good to have the fresh air to relive and work through that dream and the thoughts of the 'could have beens'. Anyway...

Just before packing it in for the evening, I noticed that the trilliums were blooming. They totally remind me of Easter and are just another reminder that He does love us, He is there. He always has been and He always will be.