vintage by {h}art

the week closes...

and June has flown by. this weekend -staying home was so wonderful.

sipping a splendid reisling, having munched on the favorite white cheddar 'smart food' popcorn and i have Relyn's blog open (you have to go there! click on her name right there!) just so the beautiful music is playing -i would just live inside her blog if it were possible, ...and-sigh, thinking and thankful for rest, for answers, ...being able to just enjoy simplicity and thoughtfulness for a few days.

remembering another highlight of the week - in the midst of the 'sighing'- time spent with my daughter. she has a salon and gives a pedicure that will melt you into butter. that's the only problems with it... you sort of slide out of the chair... and she also gave me the most fabulous haircut. smile.

also... one of my favorite things in the world is that i can make her laugh. hard. and we laugh until we cry. before we went to the salon, we decided (since it was mid-afternoon) that we needed a java jolt. so we stopped in at Starbuck's... when we pulled into the parking lot we were laughing so hard that the very proper lady who was sitting and waiting in the next vehicle was looking very alarmed and trying to not watch us... fiddling with her sunglasses. that made it even funnier.

anyway, sigh... it was a wonderful afternoon. i defy you to find any daughter sweeter. don't even try. it would be in vain.

 

that's her. about 20 years ago... with her brothers. still that sweet. still. sigh.

another highlight... as i had been to visit the angels this week, apparently they too had come to visit our garden. here's proof. i found angel feathers early the other morning...

 

and another ... as if that weren't enough!...

 

one of this week's early morning walks {with said daughter}... admiring last year's ribbony grass... imagining what it has withstood! beautiful. what it's been through to survive ...wind, snow, rain, ... and still stand there so graceful and delicate.

and...

 

as we stopped for our Americano mid-walk we enjoyed the cosmos beside the outdoor cafe table... as did - 

 

little mr. cutie ...actually, he only wanted {practically demanded} a bite of scone. chowed down too!

and if all of that still {!} wasn't enough... today -

  

this double rainbow during rain- {another mercy}!

promises, covenants... faithfulness. evermore.

happily,

jpb

ps- photo a day project. not counting. pretty sure i'm keeping up. smile.

randomest things...

if randomest wasn't a word before... it is now!

today:

• i'm able to say that the agonizing worries of the last weeks are almost settled and i was able to see justice. now i need to add to that mercy. balance.
• today and tomorrow- i get to be home! i will be:
• gardening- transplanting the last of the seedlings. they're pitiful.
• keeping house
• scrapping the walls - a project on artist canvases which has been ongoing...
• watch a chick flick? or two?
• rest
• stretch
• heal
• be thankful
• laugh at kitty- right now she's coming down from a catnip high. she was out all night and is tired. a few minutes ago she was laying upside down here on the table talking to me.  
• take some photos?
• blog?
• bake?
• laundry
• dust? everything inside and out of our house, including our vehicles -covered with greenish pollen dust... and i think of Horton Hears a Who... how can i dust?
• etc!

today, in our little burg there is a fabulous antique auction, yard sales, a great garden center sale, a Quilt Show, and it's Art Walk!...but, i decided i'd just stay home and accomplish something... and not haul more home to deal with this time. are you proud of me? {i may go browse Art Walk tonight... just for inspiration, you see.}

gosh, what a week.

besides all of the material/relational things being dealt with - my body is a wreck. do you ever just feel like a train wreck? i do. i'm not complaining... just sayin'. i know it could be  much worse.

this morning as we were making the bed and i was groaning in pain from hurting neck, shoulder and back {s.i. joint -i abused it while transplaning some big indoor trees who needed much larger pots... bags of soil, etc. second story... } i said i felt like i was a hundred years old. dh said i must have a positive attitude... i said i do! if i didn't, i'd feel two hundred years old... !!!

being home is bliss. the weather is perfect. i'm looking out our front window toward the mountains... our little valley being the only thing in between... everything is green, few spots of snow left way up there, blue colorado skies, only 3 wispy little clouds in sight, birds conversing cheerfully, doors and windows wide open, fresh perfect temperature breeze... barely, ....i'm so thankful!

 

here is one of this week's high points...that beautiful healing time spent one morning... in a favorite place, where one may glimpse angels walking by... {wink!} it was like a peaceful oasis in the middle of chaos...

and ...so, i must get back to it... the list. the piles. but happily... home.

hope to add more here throughout ... {this blog needs work}!

jpb

{this journal}

is so random... and so is life. have been thinking so much about time, how it's spent... how much i waste... how to spend it best...

and-

...this was the scripture that came to my in-box just a few minutes ago:

So teach us to number our days, that we may get us a heart of wisdom. Psalm 90:12  

and-

...i also liked this from yesterday:

Time is the price you must pay for intimacy with God.

today, my 3 sweet cousins celebrate their mother's life; and somehow go on to start fresh without her. 

we weren't all 'very' close -but the one my age is a kindred spirit for sure. they have always live a thousand miles away. we've spent time together a few times over all these years. we used to write funny letters back and forth as teenagers. and lately, she's been through a lot...

i just felt such a heavy heart today, thinking about their task/privilege. wishing i could have been there. my morning obligations over, i took a little lunch and headed out of town to SPEND some TIME in the beautiful, old cemetery... where i love to sit in the quiet -and also photograph those angels... 

there was No One there except for a dozen or so deer resting under the huge, old trees. and God. and a fat robin that scolded at me when i pointed my camera in it's general direction...

i love that cemetery. there are massive old pine trees, weeping willows, cedars, and many, many very old lilac bushes. they were all planted so long ago, by a family member i imagine- near a headstone. they're well groomed, those old lilacs. bare and twisted right now. 

 
{this is a summer photo of the cemetery...}

so i sat in the quiet, and thought of the service going on... so far away... 

and i walked around looking at gravestones, thinking of how each one represented a whole life- and how important each one was. some are unmarked. unreadable. it was Someone. a lot of Someone's who lived in Our Town in the 1800's. what was that like? there are a lot of baby graves with lambs or birds with broken wings... and the angels.

 
 

it was quiet... and it was good. and life matters, even though it's sooo daily sometimes. take time.

'every day is a journal page, every man holds a quill and ink, there's plenty of room for writing in, all we do and believe and think. so will you compose a curse? or will today bring you blessings? fill the page with a rhyming verse, or some random sketching? teach us to count the days. teach us to make the days count. lead us in better ways. somehow our souls forgot... life means so much. life means so much. life means so much. every day is a bank account, and time is our currency. so nobody's rich, nobody's poor... we get twenty-four hours each... so how are you gonna spend? will you invest? or squander? try to get ahead or help someone who's under? teach us to count the days... teach us to make the days count... lead us in better ways... somehow our souls forgot. life means so much....'

'every day is a gift you've been given... make the most of the time, every minute you're livin'-'  {chris rice}

jpb

{my angel obsession}

 I know the man whose grandfather carved this angel from marble. She is so, so amazingly beautiful. There are others too. I can't stay away. I love to visit them in different seasons, different times of day ...see what the light is doing with them. It'll be time to go see them again soon, camera in hand. -jpb

Home and Back to Reality...

It's nice to go away, have fun and laugh, eat too much; but it's even nicer to get home to family. Especially when one hears about 3 deaths in 2 days. The first, a twenty-one year old girl from a wonderful, big family who had been home for a wedding, headed home ...and that was it. Our daughter is twenty-one. I can't even begin to imagine. My mother taught me that 'sympathy' means 'same path' - so I never tell someone I can sympathize - unless I really can. Then we hear that our former mayor, a mere 50 years old, hometown highschool football hero... just gone. Just a few minutes ago I hear of another young local girl found in her bed... she's gone. Her mother another acquaintance of mine and many other friends...

Life. Live. Warm. Hugs. Moments. Love. Believing, knowing that God knows; has measured out the number of each of our days. Praying for the comfort of all of those involved.

My favorite scripture: 'The secret things belong to the Lord.' ...from the book of Deuteronomy. We cannot know everything, we should not try to. That's what the gift of faith is for. Trusting Him in these things... sigh...

I believe that every breath we breathe and every beat of our hearts is carefully, lovingly measured out by Him. And He is Comfort for those who call on Him. 

I have a lot of friends suffering. One is having surgery tomorrow. Others are healing slowly. Some are pouring themselves out -caring full time for a loved one. I'm thinking of every single one of them today... knowing personally that 'the valleys are what we climb up to get to the mountain top' ... and then we don't get to stay there either... darn it... we all just need to be there for each other... wherever we or they are in this journey.

Thinking of you all and you know who you are...

jpb