It's alive!!!

When talents were handed out in Heaven, there were several lines that I skipped.

Gardening was one of those.

As far as green thumbs are considered,

Mine is a varying shade of black.

I'm not kidding.

Take, Hostas, for example...

a few years ago, I had a friend dividing her hostas, and offered to share.  

Hostas.

Easy.

I mean, seriously, they are the one plant that you can't kill, right??

Well... I killed it.

Which, now that I look at it, is a type of talent.  When it's touted as the one plant that is un-killable... then being able to actually kill it is some sort of (sordid) talent, right??

Fast forward 2 years, one slightly productive, and one miserably failed garden attempt,

and we move into a new house...

which is surrounded by...

Hostas.

Yep.  

The unkillable plant that I can't seem to save.

The owner had said she wanted landscaping that was hardy and low-maintanance.

She didn't count on 'ole black thumb buying her beautifully surrounded by hostas-house.

We went through season one, and they actually came up... and lived!

(Thanks only to the fact that we also inherited an automatic sprinkler system from them)

Open season two...

And while the rest of the world's hostas are starting to come alive and bring forth their green pointy starts,

Mine were still, well...

Dead.

To add insult to injury, at a meeting, one of the women was talking about how she was going to need to divide her hostas the next day.

Good grief!  You mean some are so robust that they need to divide this soon?!  She kindly offered to share some of her off-shoots with me to re-start my crop.

Sure, that's just what I need, more of a plant to which my black thumb is toxic!

The next day, I went out to admit defeat, and pull my dead hostas from the ground.

As I wrapped around and pulled, 

To my complete surprise... underneath all of the dull deadness...

I found:

My very own, fresh crop of Hostas!

I'm not a murderer after all!

(and have since learned that 'everyone knows' that you are supposed to clear away the dead stuff every fall...like I said... skipped that talent line in heaven!)

I was going to wait for my kids to have them help and learn a little gardening, but I was just so excited pulling off dead to reveal a fresh green start, that I did them all (except for one) right then.

As I did it, I kept thinking about how much like life that is...

Maybe what we think is a worthless and dead part of us

Is just a piece that is patiently waiting for us to clear away the gunk

and reveal a fresh new start.

I love spring!

... so what inside of you is waiting to sprout??

The heir or the spare...

Wow - I have got to stop following the Royal frenzy.

It's been great to get caught up in the 'modern day' cinderella story, and fun to see the Royal family pull out all of the stops to celebrate the marriage of the prince.  But one thing really caught me up short and has been nagging at me ever since...

As the couple was riding off 'into the sunset' (or, rather,  helecoptering off into the morning),
the newscasters were commenting on the fact that once they returned from their little weekend getaway, Kate... er... Princess Katherine... would then be expected to step into her role in the royal family...

which was first and foremost

to provide the 'kingdom' with an 'heir' and a 'spare'

What??!  Did I hear that right?  They actually said that out loud?

For some reason, the word 'spare' really rubbed me wrong.

I mean, how would you like to live your whole life knowing that your entire existence... the reason you were brought to the earth... was to be a 'spare' part for the royal family.

Give you whatever titles they want (seriously, where do they come up with the titles anyway?  Duke and Duchess of what, exactly??  Is there even a rhyme or reason to the name giving??)... Poor prince Harry knows that his whole purpose, according to the 'higher ups' ... is to be the 'understudy'... the 'first runner up'  if you will, to "in the event of the inability of the real heir to perform his or her duties as the real prize winner, then you get to step in and take their place.

But if not, well, then let's see... ummm... you can maybe be an earl of something??

... and then it got me starting thinking in the whole eternal realm of existing...

And I suddenly became grateful that we are not sent here to be 'spares'

And our children are not sent to us to teach them how to be 'spares'

Every single one of our children has the potential to be a fully functioning, 100% pure heir to the kingdom of God.

That thought did two things to me:

I gave me an immense sense of gratitude for a Father in Heaven who's love knows no spares.

... and an overwhelming sense of urgency to dig in a little deeper and try a little harder

to teach my children the real value of their worth.

To teach them that they were not sent here to train for a 'just in case' position.

They are here to learn how to really and truly become full fledged heirs to the most Royal of all Kingdoms.

And that makes all the difference.