Seasons

It's been busy.
Monday the kiddos and I ventured 3 hours south to retrieve Miss R from the airport. She'd survived floods, buses, trains and planes to arrive back in the states after a month long sojourn to Transylvania. You can read about it here: http://blindlyservinghim.blogspot.com/
Tuesday friends of ours from seminary arrived. Viking Man and MaryAnn did their doctoral programs together at FTS and she and Dr. Dan stopped by as they continue adventuring. This trip is by land yacht but a previous voyage was by ketch. You can read about it here: http://starreach.us/ They've also authored a book that they left a signed copy of, which I'll be writing a review of soon, but until then you can read about it here: http://www.amazon.com/Last-Reunion-E-Daniel-Nusbaum/dp/0595396143

We ate from the garden this week: new potatoes, strawberry salad, steamed broccoli, mulberry smoothies, spinach & Swiss chard sauteed in garlic. Feasts from the yard. The kitchen is trashed.

Rhonda Jean over at Down to Earth has a great post on taking a home audit: http://down---to---earth.blogspot.com/2009/07/biggest-kitchen-table-simple-home-audit.html. I woke quite early this morning feeling like I've been to task oriented and not taking time to play with Flower. To just sit with her, play with the kittens, engage on an emotional level. It's always what I feel most guilty about. Time, Tasks, Stewardship. We spent hours in the yard on Saturday but at the end of the day I found little Miss. Flower crying in the barn because she "hadn't seen me all day." And, truly, she hadn't. And I feel torn because the kitchen is trashed and people need fed again and people need nurtured and talked with and loved and yet the garden needs tended and the dishes washed and the meeting gone to.
And Dr. Dan and Mary Ann called back after they'd left just to say they thought our kids were beautiful and lovely and engaging and socialized par excellence. And that really blessed us. Cause our vision is to create a beautiful family culture and to some extent we are. But there is always more to do, but more importantly, more to engage with on a deeper level. And I am having a hard time fitting it all in and getting it all done. And the kids are growing and adult and launching and creating a new thing. All good. But the days are so fleeting. It's summer and a premium here because it's a short season and winter is the long one and feels to me that it's always lurking. I start to miss summer even while it's here and being melancholy in nature I have the same sense about the kids and our family. It's a good season and a growing season with all that entails, weeding, watering, nurturing, and soon it will be a new season.
As I audit and inventory I realize that I've got to manage tasks better so I can engage with people better. And with that, I'm going to wash dishes so that there is time later to befriend littles.