Sunday, May 30, 2010

Memorial Day thoughts

Updated blog: May 23, 2015
May 2010: We were "off island" celebrating with family last week, and while at a shopping center received a poppy for remembrance of our veterans. So celebration of life and the freedom given through veterans' work and death  has been on my mind.

Instead of poppies, here is a rose in our garden 2010
  Rosa Altissimo climber
 ( we formerly misnamed Paul's Scarlet) 

The Flanders poppies, our former garden signature, are no longer; but the roses are in full bloom for Memorial Day weekend.   The heart shaped petals  remind me to be thankful for those who fought and died for our country's freedom, our safety and all that we take advantage of every day. I pray you, as well, might be grateful and realize your God given freedom in more ways than one.


"God demonstrates his own love for us in this: while we were still sinners, Christ died for us." (to set us free) Romans 5:8 NIV

Saturday, May 22, 2010

Shades of Purple in Plant Pictures

Echeveria with youngsters on steps to the potager






Chives in potager (and in our soup pots)
Spanish lavender taking over stone steps to lower level orchard

neglected nepeta on bank in front of house
Iris tenax on same bank (looks blue here but actually light purple)
Lilacs and lupines in the long border

It has been a busy week and I am without words...but that is what a picture is worth.
Hope your week has been filled with beauty and blessings.

Sunday, May 16, 2010

Bitter root Judgment

We called the well guy out last week. There were some problems he needed to resolve. For one, the water was extremely hard since he came last and shut off one of the wells into the system. My hair was dry and frizzy, my skin and lips were flaking and I was getting irritated. The water was also a little bitter.

Buddy from Coldsprings pump lifts the root from the tank (plum tree in the way)
When he opened the cover to the holding tank for the well, roots were swimming in it. So he drained it and had his helper climb inside to clean it out. The huge 6 foot root system perhaps from a fir tree 100 yards away had entered into a very small space below ground between the cover and tank. It searched out water.

Fir root after drying out

There are roots that take over our lives as well. We can’t always understand or see them, but feel the effects. Often it is a result of some harm done to you in early childhood which seems to repeat itself in differing ways causing continuing increasing trauma to you. It is often extremely hard to forgive those who have done great harm to you but it is necessary to ask the Lord to help you to forgive. The bitterness that sets in because of lack of forgiveness affects not only you but those around you who are being defiled because of your actions. Any trauma that feels like the original sends the response that was never aimed at the original perpetrator and soon people around you are judged when they had no intention of hurting you. So you perpetuate the situation and end up defiling others unintentionally as well.
Is there any solution?

Call Jesus to the well. He is the living water. Ask Him to show you the root of the problems you may be having. Where do you have anxiety, pain and no forgiveness? Ask for help to forgive the original perpetrator and others and bring your unforgiveness to the foot of His cross. He came to set you free.

Leave it there. Ask Him to put in you a new and right spirit. He is faithful and will make all things new including you and release you from the pain and suffering and cycle of trauma. Trust in Him to clean out the roots and its residue and put in new wonderful tasting water that calms and gives peace and renewal.

(derived from some teachings of John and Paula Sanford)

Hebrews12:15 “See to it that no one fails to obtain the grace of God; that no root of bitterness springs up and causes trouble, and by it many become defiled;” NKJV

Galatians 5:1“Stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free, and do not be entangled again with a ‘yoke of bondage.’” NKJV

"He who believes in me, as the Scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water." John 7:38 NKJV


Where do you need renewal?

Friday, May 14, 2010

Longest living herb in our garden

 
Marrubium vulgare, White Horehound
"What is the most unusual herb you have grown?" was the question for this week on "Garden Writers Today" Facebook page.
I decided on horehound even though I have a more unusual one for the weekly blog.
6 reasons our horehound is unusual?

  • The herb was the source of my favorite childhood candy in Nova Scotia

  • It was growing on the land when we arrived over 30 years ago, so I combined them into a terrace hedge.

  • The deer do not eat it and white crowned sparrows nest in it

  • Some think it is spelled whore hound and shy away from it. :-)

  • The antidote for my vulnerable illnesses, tea for colds and hard candy for coughs and pneumonia
  • Proving again"The medicine lies close to the source of illness," the Onondaga understanding mentioned by Robin Wall Kimmerer in Gathering Moss: A natural and Cultural History of Mosses

What herbs do you enjoy in your garden and how they might help you?

Sunday, May 9, 2010

Happy Mother's Day!

Nest in geranium hanging backet empty



Everywhere I step, baby birds. First a Spotted Towhee’s fledgling fluffy ball of feathers standing in the center of the stone steps to the lower orchard. Next a young robin, noticed as a result of the mother robin’s chip chip chipping. Next a fledgling junco in the grass at the head of the steps to the main orchard, fledged from the geranium hanging basket. I know I need to watch my steps for sure.

As difficult as it must be for mother birds to train the newly fledged, dependent on mother’s foraging for food but free to fly into danger with no tether, it is even more difficult for you mothers. We even more so must watch our steps every day and  pray.

Sunday, May 2, 2010

Sometimes our worst enemy is ourselves


Sometimes Our Worst Enemy is Ourselves

“Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.” I Corinthians 13:12 NIV

Robin  looking for worms

“Why is that robin pecking on our window? Asked my daughter-in-law when we went to care for our grandson with a newly broken leg. “He won’t go away.”

“They often do this in nesting season,” I suggested, “It sees the reflection of itself and thinks it is a competitor.” So when the robin started to peck again, I pulled the shades to cut off the bird-side reflection.

The next day, as I was playing with our grandson in the living room, two robins, one chasing the other, crashed into the window as we stood there with mouths open. The robins both managed to recover enough to fly high into the firs. Probably slowed down like our grandson. We watched as breast feathers floated to the ground below.

 I don’t think they will come back to that window again. Here is how I stop birds crashing into our windows  with "designer" vertical lines.

Here are some problems and how I stop myself from crashing:
  1. My attitudes and thoughts can send me crashing. Examine my thoughts and attitudes
  2. I can look at someone else and project my problems onto them. Realize they are holding a mirror to up to me.
  3. I often want to protect myself like the robin rather than be vulnerable as I should. Keep my eyes on Jesus, however dim, and my vulnerability and need for protection will diminish ("the things of this earth will grow strangely dim") and I can see myself as I truly am and receive grace.


 How are you your own worst enemy?
 What are you projecting on others that actually is a reflection of yourself?


 Can you come face to face with Jesus for help?