Blossom and Thorn {Best of the Season, Installment 3}

The best of the season is certainly found in the strawberries blooming in the garden, the dogwood blossoms turning to leaf outside my kitchen window, and the azalea bushes looking about as tropical as anything I can hope to see in these parts, but with the coming of this lovely season of spring has come an unwelcome guest, and four out of five in our family are currently suffering from a nasty flu that brings with it fever, congestion, stuffy noses, coughs, and more doses of ibuprofen than I care to count!

This flu has coincided with some of the most gloomy, wet weather known to spring, and so between the twain, I have had my hands full with trying to keep my spirits up while I dispense pills, comfort feverish children, turn couches into beds, and try to keep the house limping along with clean laundry and food on the table.

So far, I have managed to escape the scourge myself, and I know that despite how careful I try to be, with hand washing and drinking cups of echinacea tea, it's the Lord's mercy that has kept me well to date!

It feels like spring is happening "out there" while life is muddling along "in here," but today when I traipsed outside with my camera to see just what was blooming, I found that indeed there is quite a bit of beauty to admire on my own doorstep, and it made me grateful once again for those lovely things called perennials that come up and bloom with out my aid or input, for if it was up to me and my efforts this year, I am afraid all I would have to show would be a sea of mud.

Since this post is to highlight the best of the season, here are a few other things bringing spice to our days:

Elasa's last day of school this past Friday coincided with the day that Wesley was off work sick, and in no condition to celebrate, so in an attempt to make the day special for Elasa and the boys, I took the children out for lunch to Chick-fil-A. They enjoyed their meals, but probably the fact that this restaurant has a small indoor play area was even more appealing on this rainy day! After a couple hours at the restaurant, we went to Hobby Lobby and Elasa picked out a small "bug playground" for observing captured bugs for a year-end prize. Of course the weather was such that no bugs could be found to enjoy the new playground once we got home, but I am sure that soon enough we'll have more bugs wanting to play than we know what to do with!!!

I joined the latest and greatest trend by treating myself to an adult coloring book and a new pack of coloring pencils at Hobby Lobby, and it has been fun to work at some of these intricate pictures and create some beauty and diversion in the midst of this haze of germs going on around here! I am no artist, but anyone can color, so this book feels a little like going on a bit of an artistic adventure with very little effort on my part! The fact that coloring is suppose to be "therapeutic" is an added bonus, I suppose, and should make me feel useful even while I indulge in an activity that feels just a mite childish!

A wise man by the name of Isaac Hayes says, "If you enjoy the fragrance of a rose, you must accept the thorns which it bears." and I find that to be quite true of life right now...

There is much to enjoy and look forward to, but it comes with rain and growing pains and sickness by times, and accepting that will be the greatest step to peace.

 And peace will always be the best thing we can hope for in any season.