Gratitude and Growing Things

Sunlight on zucchini plant

Morning Glories, blue and night-blooming

Garden plot, raised beds we built this year

Original garden plot two years ago

Zucchini blossom


Something I'm trying hard to do the past few days is to be grateful. After my motherhood/wife rant the other day, I realized I really need to re-examine. Not just my need to get out of the house, but to be grateful when I'm here and for all I have. Is it perfect? No. Will it ever be perfect? No. Can I live with that? Yes. I'm so fortunate. I have so much.

So, here is one of the things I love and am grateful for this summer. My garden. And my yard. It is still a bit of an unorganized mess. I have to keep reminding myself that anyone's yard I admire has, 1. taken years to evolve to that point, or 2. they have unlimited funds and have paid someone to do the work; therefore missing out on the joys of building something themselves. I do not have unlimited funds, and I like the being involved process too much to just pay someone to do the work for me. So, slow and steady. And it helps to be comfy with the wild mess we've got going on in our back yard. And remember my yard as a young child, which also was not perfectly manicured, but I loved running from fruit trees to grape arbor, swinging in the tire swing hung in the walnut tree, wading through the creek. My yard now is not perfectly manicured. It has some issues. But I tell ya, stepping into my backyard early in the morning and slipping out and around my plants as the dew clings to my summer feet, well, that is just a feeling I must be grateful for. To have S. run around from fruit tree to garden and climbing into her fort. I wanted that for her - and maybe a little bit for me, as well. Seeing the blossoms or fruits on plants that I so hopefully put in the ground just a month or so ago, praying they'd take off, well, when they have - it is so thrilling. I have to run into the house and tell C. and S. that, "The zucchinis have blossoms!" Admittedly they are not as thrilled as I am, but they humor me. And C., after a humdinger of an argument two weeks ago, said that one of the things he likes about me is that I garden. I'm not sure if I garden per se, but I enjoy pretending that I do. Just another thing to be grateful for.