Stepping Into a New Season 🌿✨

As my husband and I prepare for retirement this coming November 1, I find my heart filled with gratitude for the years of service and the people God has placed in our path. Our jobs have been more than just a job—they have been a ministry, a community, and a blessing that shaped our lives in countless ways.

Now, a new chapter awaits. Retirement for me is not the end of meaningful work, but the beginning of a different kind of fruitfulness. I look forward to spending more time at home—embellishing our living space, making it warm and inviting, and bringing beauty into the little corners of daily life.

I am also eager to return to my garden, to put my hands in the soil again and watch life unfold season by season. For me, gardening has always been a reflection of God’s care and creativity—an act of peace, patience, and quiet joy.

Though my professional work is ending, I believe this next season will be just as full of purpose. As Psalm 1:3 says, “They are like trees planted by streams of water, which yield their fruit in season.” May that be true of this new stage in life.

Thank you for being part of my journey, for your friendship, and for your support over the years. I look forward to staying connected—and maybe even sharing a few stories (and photos!) of what blossoms in this next season. 🌸

With gratitude,

August

Hard to believe that blond August is about to leave us for another year. I am not ready for fall, or cold night and dark mornings, but I am thankful for a cozy home and for life. I like how Henry Ward Beecher puts it:  "The unthankful heart discovers no mercies; but the thankful heart will find, in every hour, some heavenly blessings"

In the garden, angels dwell and roses are blooming again in magnificent blooms of every color.  I am thankful for this re-creation of Nature, for not giving up and continuing to put forth its best colors.

Inside the house I keep a large array of houseplants that I care for and love. They are everywhere; each room keep some of them and each plant give its best to each rooms.... and my heart... my heart these days is like a white dove.  I keep quiet, waiting, hoping.  Gratitude means to recognize the good in life, be thankful for whatever you have, some people may not even have one of those thongs you consider precious to you.  Each day give thanks for the gift of life.  You are blessed.

August

I can hardly believe we are already walking through the pathways of August.  August is drinking in the sun and, the white Oriental Lilies are again spreading across the little garden where memories of yesterdays had lay down to sleep.

I know now that August is like the heron, who can only croak and wishes he could sing.  This is how it has been, and this is how it is this year:  Hot hot hot. 

I barely spend time in the garden any more.  Not like I used to.  This is because, in a way, I work long hours and when I get home in the evenings, I don’t want to do anything…  I do go out  to the garden each evening and do my usual rounds and salute my roses and little garden friends… then is in, until the following morning.

I find myself loving my indoors plants and enjoying caring for them more than I like spending time outside, as the years go by I find myself a different person.  Everything changes with the passing of time—your body changes, your mind changes, your thoughts and your likes and dislikes, and when you realize it, you are a totally different person all together. 

Hot as it’s been in this high desert, however, I am already regretting the departing of summer; already thinking of the vanishing of yellow black-eyed Susan’s and watermelon in the afternoons.  

Rose season

We had been out, camping this past weekend, and what a marvelous surprise it was coming back home to a newly reborn garden!  For what a spectacular and perfect outburst of blooms it had occur during just those few days we were out…

Roses filled the space everywhere, bird tracks were left behind for me to find and rejoice, and shrubs and vines had nurtured and propagated from one day to the next; filling open spaces and fences. 

The clematis are so beautiful this year, too.  I have planted a new one at the feet of that river birch that died this winter, with the idea of leaving part of its beautiful white trunk as a stand for this new clematis to grow on.  I can hardly wait to see this happening, although I now it won’t happen this year.  Everything in the natural world takes time… time to adjust and time to grow and I must learn to wait, as I must also learn to wait on the Holy Ghost  to nurture my spirit in faith and divine graces.

In the house, I’ve been changing things around as well, for it seems that spring calls for changes inside and outside.  So I hired a painter to retouch my ‘less than a perfect painting job’ I did a few years ago in our upstairs room. 

The white walls along the stairs were in deep need of a retouching job as well, for somehow we had used the wrong sheen/paint and the disparity had been driving me crazy for way too long. 

Everything looks so pretty and clean again!  Nothing like fresh paint on walls!

I decided to also paint one of the walls in the upstairs bathroom as an accent wall.  I painted the cabinets (did the job myself), and move one of my downstairs plants to that corner by the window.  A new shower curtain, and I’m loving how this humble bathroom is looking! 

Have a beautiful June everyone!