Find the Joy

Hello September! I'm so happy we finally got to the "ber" months! It's my favorite time of year. I'm encouraged and feeling better now that we are seeing that the end of summer isn't too far off.

Walking in the mornings has been so good the past week with the cool front we are currently enjoying. I realize it's September, though, so summer isn't over in Arkansas but the reprieve from the heat has been welcome.

I'm still tending my "tiny little garden" and it's still looking pretty good. The petunias, bless them, are a challenge because they require constant deadheading to keep them blooming. I may rethink having them in the garden next summer. 

Since I rent, I have all my flowers in pots, so I'll be replacing them with some mums and fall decor pretty soon anyway. I'll rotate the summer pots to my off-season "storage area" (behind the hedge right by the house). I will be sorry to see the vincas go; I received them for Mother's Day and found that they don't have to be deadheaded, and they are very prolific in blooming. They are annuals, though, so I can't keep them for next year.

Listen to me go on and on about flowers! Who knew I would learn to like gardening, even on a mini-garden scale? The thing is, I've found them to be an unexpected source of joy. Something shifted in me this summer, and I found myself arranging the 5 potted plants I managed to fit into a little area by my front door into a pleasing, joyful thing in my life. 

Know when it happened? 

When I stopped lamenting over not owning my own place and therefore unable to plant a real flower garden. That's when it happened. Truth be told, these 5 plants were all I had the headspace for in this season anyway. Five plants, creatively arranged into a part of the landscaping that had room for them. Five plants that don't have to be moved so the mowers can mow and trim weeds.

Five potted flowers. A source of happiness and a reason to smile in a season when it's been tough at times. By the grace of God, though, every morning I wake up, go for a walk, and come back to water my little garden if I didn't the night before and they need it.

I didn't start out with the intention of talking so much about my flowers, and the joy they cause. Somehow, though, it just seems right. Maybe someone reading this needs to find something to make them smile. I hope I've encouraged you to do just that. 

Maybe it's not flowers. Maybe it's the sun trying to peek through the clouds, or a funny face someone put on a tree on the walking path, or simply a calendar that you bought because you needed something pretty in your life. 

Find the joy. It's there. Be blessed, my friends.

Shout for joy to God, all the earth! Psalm 66:1 NIV