transformation

Years ago my front yard looked very different.

John and I have lived on this plot of land since our oldest son Matthew was 4 months old. That's 27 years in July.  When we moved onto this land it had a single wide three bedroom circa 1960's trailer, complete with roll out windows and shag carpet.  It was a wonderful home for a long time!

We set about making it ours not too long after moving in and buying it.  We put in fences to keep our future kids in the yard, pulled out some trees and filled in some holes and made a few flower beds.  There is a picture I shall have to post of me in the front yard with Ryan, its all grass and not much of anything else.  Later, when Aaron was two, that would make Matt 8, we bought the house we live in now and set about putting it in, redoing the landscaping and making it a much better place to live.  We didn't have much money so couldn't afford to do much and that meant getting plants and trees from people we knew.  We have a blossoming cherry tree and a golden chain tree from our old land lord, Tom. We have a lilac from my mom, hydrangeas from Elsie, a cedar tree from Matts second grade outdoor school and a noble fir from our friend Mike.  A few years ago, I think five to be exact, we redid the outside of the house. We had put a lot of time and money into the inside, getting rid of all of the vinyl covered wallpaper and redoing the floors in laminate so it was time to do the outside.  John and our two sons Ryan and Aaron worked an entire summer, actually started in March with Matt helping tear apart the old back deck, and redoing the entire place, from front to back. It was quite an adventure and trial but well worth it.

Our front yard had had a section in it that held a pond, a rock path and a lot of flowers and plants, some, like the trees I mentioned, held sentimental value.  I get attached to strange things!  John used to bring me home things from work, sometimes there would be a note in his lunch, once there was a tiny bunny in his lunch pail, and sometimes there would be a flower. One time he brought me home a trillium.  It is known as a wild Easter lily.  I had all sorts of flowers like bleeding hearts, wild iris and even a dogwood clematis but none of them were as special to me as that flower, that Easter lily. He knew how much I loved them and so, in front of all the guys he worked with, he dug up a flower and put it in his lunchpail and brought it home to me.  I cried like a baby when I opened that lunch pail   When we redid the yard we couldn't find that easter lily bulb and I was heartbroken that it got lost in the plowing, digging, machine work that was done around our house.  After awhile though, I forgot about it, until it was time to start putting flowers in the new flower beds.  Then one day John came home from work. By this time he had long since been working for and then with his brother so no big guys overlooking his act of love. I opened his lunch pail to empty it, that same lunch pail by the way, and there laying on his various plastic sandwich bags, lay a blossoming easter lily, a baby trillium.  I stood and wept as I looked at that flower and he looking on with a ridiculously pleased smile on his face.  It didn't bloom right away so I was afraid it had died.  Then, a few years ago, as Kaylee and I stood in the kitchen talking, I looked out the window and spotted it! A fresh white blossom!!!!  I began to cry as I was reminded once again of my sweet husbands love in remembering how precious that flower was to me.

I have begun to realize more and more, in this time of change, just how much I am loved.  Just like that flower that reminded me of my husbands tender love for me, his sacrifice of pride in getting that first plant for me, I am being shown over and over that the Lord cares so much for me, for my heart, for my transformation, that He won't leave me alone.  I can look at that Trillium and feel the love of my husband for me the same way I can pull out the Lords words to us and feel His love pouring out for me over and over again.  It is too marvelous for me. What a blessed woman I am.

The miracle of Easter continues to stir in my heart and by the way?  That Trillium has TWO blooms on it now!  I love that.....if you want to see what it looks like...its the pic at the head of my blog!

The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases, His mercies are new every day!!!!