Always Changing, Always Growing--My Garden and My Heart

Over the last month I have been spending a lot of time sprucing up our front yard.  This is the first spring that I have gardened (I usually wait until the summer for whatever crazy reason) and it has been so refreshing to my spirit and my yard to get an early jump at filling my garden with new spring growth.

Since I took these pictures we have mowed the lawn and picked weeds but I still wanted to post these pictures instead because they captured a moment.  There I was planting and digging around in the dirt as the clouds came crawling across the sky.  Just as I finished placing in the last bloom into the ground, the rain started to sprinkle.  It was a gift to my freshly planted plants as well as a refreshing mist on my heart for a job well done.

As I stood there admiring my work, I thought to myself that just like on the inside of my home, the outside of my home is always changing.  I don't know why I cannot let things just be, but I get new ideas, more confidence, and so much joy from changing things up that I have accepted it as a part of who I am.

I told myself that I do not have to keep the garden the previous owners put in.  I am allowed to have the flowers and plants that I want and I should not feel trapped to what someone else thought was a good idea.  It would never keep me from painting a wall in our home but for some reason when it came to flowers, it felt wrong to move or change things.  Instead I put out some of the plants I pulled out, put them on the side of the road, and the next day someone else got to enjoy, for free, my no longer needed bushes.

And in the midst of all of this I realized that my desire to always be growing and changing went deeper than my flowers and wall colors.  It was a part of my heart.

I never want to become stagnant in who I am.  I want to be learning, growing, and changing into a better version of myself.  I want to love better, be kinder, be willing to learn and try new things, as well as never get too set in my ways.  

This past month I have had some time to refocus my priorities and time and it has really helped me to be at a better place than I was this last year.  Not that this last year was bad or anything specific, but making a few changes--being willing to grow and be accountable to the person I want to be--has allowed me to lead a happier and more content life.  I feel like the real me again and it's not until I stepped away from that and came back that I realized I wasn't living as great of a life as I could I have been.

Another season...a new spring...to enjoy the beauty of new life and growth that often gets hidden in the cold of winter.  The red tree above is the tree I planted in honor of my mom being cancer free.

One of my favorite additions this Spring is the camilia trees I planted in front of our bedroom window.  It has always been a dream of mine to look out my bedroom window and see flowers.  It's a small dream but one that brings me great joy.

I can already see it peeking through our window and it is a reminder of the beauty in life I have to live.