Easter 2022

We went to church early. Our gracious neighbors always include us in their family's annual Easter egg hunt, and we stayed for a dinner with them of homemade authentic Italian foods including lasagna and eggplant rollatini. I brought over my parachute and lead the grandkids in some games.  The girls came home with an abundance of candy- and even cash! (We have the best neighbors.) We are very humbled and thankful that they would include us in their family celebrations.  

Annual Spring Clean-Up

We always pick a Saturday and work together to clean out the flower beds and put down new mulch in spring. Doing this with kids was rough at first, but we've gotten better each year. This year, the kids actually worked cheerfully and without complaint. The forget-me-nots we planted when we buried our pet button quail after she died have multiplied and now, they are literally covering the front yard. The grape hyacinths are blooming, along with the first dandelions, so Adele made the first bouquet of the season. The tiny oreganos that line our flower beds are also coming back to life now, so as we racked the beds, their fragrances filled the warm air around us. It's still too early to plant any annuals besides pansies, so we usually wait until Mother's Day at least, if not all the way till Memorial Day, to choose flowers for the pots on the decks. 

21st Anniversary

Dwayne and I celebrated our 21st Anniversary last week. Now we’ve been married as long as we were alive before we we’re married. The last few years are not Instagram worthy. God knows the unfiltered truth; and we are no longer under any delusions about ourselves, which is a grace in itself. Turns out we are just average, maybe even wicked. We’re no exceptions; we need God’s grace, maybe even desperately. But marriage is a good, it is a constant, unrelenting grace, maybe especially when it isn’t easy. In the words of Andrew Peterson, “When I lose my way, find me. When I loose loves chains, bind me. At the end of all my faith, till the end of all my days, when I forget my name, remind me.”

Memory Master 2nd Adult Proof

One of our beloved friends and children's pastors, Pastor Flower, agreed to give Adele her second adult proof for Memory Masters. So my husband took Adele and they all met up for breakfast at Mothership, a bakery and cafe also owned by another dear friend from church. They had breakfast and then Pastor Flower sat aside with Adele and gave her her second Memory Masters proof/ test. This is the one after the parent proof, but before the tutor and director proofs. Adele passed! Dwayne bought home handmade treats from Mothership, and we cut them into bite sized portions and shared them in celebration. 

Composition Notebooks

Avril: Mom, how many composition notebooks do you think I can buy with my birthday money?

Me: How much do you have?

Avril: Thirty dollars

Me: They're available at the Dollar Store, so you could certainly get more than twenty. 

Avril: Will you take all my birthday money and buy me composition notebooks? I'd like the write stories in them. 

Me: Sure!  

Nature Sketching

We took another walk around Putnam Park the other day. 

This time, we took our sketchpads and found a picnic table to sit and sketch. It's not easy! 

My Sewing Tin

In December, I started hand-sewing binding on a lap quilt I had made some years before. 

To store my thread, needle, pins, etc., I took up one of the decorative Christmas tins we had out with all the other Christmas decor. 

I never liked this tin much, honestly. 

It was given by a friend, held a gift from that dear friend, so in a way, the tin was also a gift from that dear friend. 

I'm desperately sentimental, so I have a difficult time ridding myself of anything given to me in love. 

So I kept the tin out of obligation even though I had an almost visceral response to it's ugliness, at least at first. 

But this last Christmas, I found this tin was just the right size for my hand-sewing supplies. 

After Christmas, I just left my sewing supplies in there beside my chair for convenience sake. 

Months went by. The quilt is still "in-process," so the sewing supplies remain there. 

The other day, one daughter shouts from the kitchen where we both are to another daughter in the living room, "Will you bring me the 'Ho-Ho-Ho' tin?!"

The other daughter shouts back from the living room, "Sure!!"

A few moments later, the other daughter comes in and hands this to the one daughter who asked for it. 

The one daughter proceeds to take out what she needs for the project she's working on like nothing significant had even happened. 

I laughed out loud.  

I had inadvertently created a sewing kit! 

And I made it out of an old tin! 

I'm just like every other old lady sense the dawn of time!  

Only I have to say, my sewing kit is not a generic "cookie tin" or "Mom's sewing kit."

No. No. No. 

It is called the "'Ho-Ho-Ho' tin." 

All three Ho's are spoken out in turn.  

That's a kind of perfection you can't even plan! 

You've just got to live your way into it. 

I love my daughters! 

I love what they call this tin! 

And now I love this tin!