No baby yet

Just sittin and waitin for God's timing for Eleanor to be born. Due date June 1, but everyone thought she would come early. In the meantime, we are getting to know Maggie, our first granddaughter and helping where we can. Blog for now, just not as important as the above. (will try to add pictures later this week)

Headed south

Mt Shasta I-5 California

We headed south as did our new grandbaby; however, we arrived but our daughter and son-in-law's baby has decided not yet. So blog and baby delayed for now.

You've got a friend

Note and flowers found in my purse

To have friends, you need to take time for them to listen and care and go and see them. We took a break from the moving and catching up to visit with old friends in Seattle one of which travelled across the country to see and gather us together. I need to do this more often and plan ahead. As Neil and Chris and Dylan went to the ball game, another friend offered to drive me back to the ferry and drop me off. As I was waiting for several hours for the ferry and on the hour's ride I thought about friendship and the importance of it and was disappointed in myself for not keeping up with more friends. On the ferry just before our stop, three girls came up to me whom I know on the island, I didn't realize they were on the boat. They mentioned that they were putting flowers and notes by people without them knowing it, "random acts of kindness" they said. Some people were sleeping and they put it on the shelf beside them by the window. They were excited and I went with them as they showed me a few places where they put the notes. It was fun to see them enjoy making someone's day better. It was not until I got in a neighbor's car who drove me close to my house, that I saw a scotch broom flower sticking out of my purse. I looked at it inquisitively, thinking "Now where did I get that?" I am always finding surprises, unaware of what I am doing sometimes when I am engrosed in another activity, so I didn't think much of it until home and emptying out my purse I found the note. "You got a friend! Take these flowers home, Random Acts of Kindness." I have been smiling ever since.

Thank you Lord, for using the island children to cheer me up, make my day, and remind me of your amazing friendship and constant kindness.

""He called a little child and had him stand among them. And he said: 'I tell you the truth, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.'" Matthew 18:2-4 NIV (since we are also thinking about children these days, ready to head to CA for the birth of a new granddaughter.)

Happy Mother's Day

Mother's Day came and went - as did we, back and forth and I never got the blog done. Even the pad I write on is missing so no blog this week. Perhaps it is time to take a break. We will be headed to California soon for the birth of our next granddaughter, Eleanor.

Not finished yet

Band tailed PIgeons arrive

Birds are in the air, everywhere I look. First I notice the swallows, violet-green, band tailed pigeons, white crowned sparrows, house finches, goldfinches, the wrens and many more have returned. It is a wonder they do not collide, but then they have their master air controller. They don't have free will like us, they just follow God's direction. Us however, it took since last summer's swallow and wren departure 'til now to clean out the nest boxes, left untidy for nine months. And now it is our nest, house, that's untidy from carrying our stuff north with us when we have no room for it.

These swallows remind me to enjoy the moment. I've been too busy inside cleaning, organizing and and trying to find places for and getting rid of stuff, working long hours to take much time out for pleasure. I did get together with some women on the island. I also paused long enough to capture the return of the swallows. Watching them reminded me that some things don't change in this changing world, God's sufficiency, care, and direction of his creatures who are programed with it, or for those like us who might not forget to ask and once in a while surrender our free will to the master controller. I'm thankful that God is not finished with us yet.

"I desire to do your will, O my God..." Psalm 40:8

Where does your will and the will of God clash? What keeps you from asking and surrendering?

One week runs into another

Dylan looking at the native buttercups in the field

We spent a lot of time this week with a friend here, trying to organize pictures and furniture and make the place safe for Dylan our grandson and dog Pappy and his Mom and Dad who came to cook for the "community thank you" for the firefighters and EMTs.

While they were cooking, I got to spend time with Dylan and Pappy. Here's Dylan out in the field checking out the wild buttercups that we held under each other's chin to see if we liked butter on this day together.

We watched a movie, about Thomas the train and Dylan got on his spiderman mask and persona when he sees something bad like the mean locomotive and takes it off when he doesn't . As you can see by Dylan's maskless face, obviously these were not the bad buttercup I was talking about last week.

cleaning up

"Buttercups" oil by J. Mat Miller

The "good" wild buttercups

This week I decided to get outside to clean up the pampas grass that was dragging its feet all over the patio while I was busy elsewhere. Every gust of wind dislodged sharp edged blades, spewing them across the patio and down the stone steps, a danger to anything in its path. As I cut and cleaned I thought about the Spotted Tohwee that hung around this area and hoped I would not disturb a nest. I got carried away and after a half hour of pulling out the dead grasses and cutting the old flower stalks, I looked up to see right in front of my eyes a perfectly formed grassy nest with four fresh green and reddish brown mottled eggs. I quickly stepped back, grabbed some of the cut Pampas flower stalks and lodged them tightly in front of the nest hoping to return it to invisible. I prayed it would be protected and not abandoned because of me. Here I destroy what I should not.

Yet in the same week I recall that I keep what I should not. For a long time there was native buttercup in the shade by the long flower border and I left it there because I liked the delicate yellow flower. Someone mentioned to me that I should not have buttercup in the garden and I stated that it behaved itself and never went anywhere else. That was until the seed landed in the fertilized and watered garden, taking advantage of my business elsewhere and spreading very rapidly.

I don’t know if this was the same type as the former, they certainly behaved differently, but this Ranunculus repens L., an immigrant from Europe, has healed itself in. As hard as I tried to shovel it out, I couldn’t help cutting off roots which clung to the clayish soil and wouldn’t let loose. Slugs made their home in the leaf clusters and nodules sent out new shoots to make more plants. I read that seeds stay in the ground for years, waiting for opportunities to flourish and take over. Who knows what I have left behind for future invasion?


While I was busy elsewhere, it had taken over 8 feet of the front of the bed into the grass another three feet in places. I guess I need to be more diligent and watchful. Now between it and the bindweed, the other non native immigrant, I have to destroy the lawn and lay waste the border for a season, taking plants out to put in pots and poisoning the rest if it persists.

It is a familiar theme, getting rid of and keeping stuff, as we try to consolidate. I guess I can’t get away from it, even following me outside. As hard as I try, I seem to do the things I don’t want to do and don’t do what I ought.

“...For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out.
For what I do is not the good I want to do – this I keep doing …What a wretched
man (woman) I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God –
through Jesus Christ our Lord!” Romans 7:18, 24-25

I guess I need a season of laying waste, watching out for what might crop up unwanted in me, getting rid of it quickly out of my life before it takes over and not be so busy elsewhere for awhile.

How about you?