Summertime

Now that I am officially moved out of my classroom, have helped with interviews for possible Lee teachers, and have turned in my classroom keys, summer has begun.  My garage is full of books upon children's books and files upon teacher files.  I hope you weren't planning on coming to visit me this summer, because my guest room is basically full of 'guests' from my classroom.

Summer is my time to be productive.  I'm not much of a 'relaxer'.  I have a hard time just sitting.  Not that I am a social butterfly, because I definitely am not.  I just like to work.  Today I literally had the best day.  I intentionally woke myself up at 6:30, got Jude and I up, dressed, fed, and out the door by 7:30.  I was the very first oil change of the day at good ole Wal- Mart.  I accomplished some of my leftover grocery shopping from yesterday (I never remember everything I need).  We were home by 8:45.  I unpacked the groceries, and dug up all the hedge grass on the side of my house as seen in the above photo.  By 10:15, I had finished that project and then had gotten Jude and I to our neighborhood pool :)

After a couple hours at the pool, we came home.  He ate lunch, took his nap.  I cleaned up a few things, did my quiet time, and took a nap.  He woke up and we went to the library.  He picked out 2 train books and a dragon book.  Of course.  And I found the book I believe my teacher book club group will be reading for June.  Score!  (although I am also reading a book of my own choosing.  Anyone else out there read multiple books at a time?)

When we got home, coffee was necessary.  I brewed a pot and did some laundry, got Jude dinner, got my dinner ready.

If you saw my IG post yesterday, I mentioned that I drink tea on the regular.  Today I brewed a wee pot of pomegranate black tea, which incidentally is probably my very most favorite.  Unsweetened, of course.

After dinner, I got back to work on my garden.  I watered my plants that I have in pots, as well as my hydrangea I bought this weekend.  I should have taken a pic of it, as I am ridiculously excited about it.  I love them, but it's so hot here.  I think I found the perfect place to plant them though.  It's pretty shady and the soil there stays fairly wet.  If it continues to thrive, I will be buying a few more!

Jude and also planted some ivy and flowers along the side as seen above.  Not pictured will be the lattice I will need to buy in order for the ivy to have something to climb.  Jude loves to help with gardening, although I mostly just let him fill up his watering can.  It will be fun as he grows to teach him to care for things.

On the right side of the picture above you can see all the random plants I have.  I found a packet of wildflower seeds in my garage back in March and decided to just plant them and see what happens.  It's a big of a mess, and I have no idea what to do about it.  Some of them are pretty like these.  Some of them just look like the weeds they are.  I'm not really sure what I want to do with it, and I'm not one to act quickly, so who knows what I will do with it.

What I do know is that I am enjoying gardening.  I like working and cultivating things and seeing how they turn out.  I like pruning and trimming rose bushes (although I have a lot to learn...).   And I can't help but think that this is a bit of a worshipful experience since our first job was to cultivate the earth.  In fact, gardening was our job before the fall even happened.  Heck, our first home was right in the midst of a garden.  It's interesting to think about.  Like it's where we belong.  It's also interesting how fulfilling a good day's work really is.  It's a good reminder that we aren't created to just take take take all the time.  We were created to do something, whatever that something is.

Whatever you do, do it heartily, as to the Lord ~ Colossians 3:23