hello summer!

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Well, hello summer!  You have arrived!  A month of baseball and sunshine/rain and splashing in the pool......bug bites and bonfires and butterflies and blooming things.......oh, sweet summer we have waited so long for you!  

Last night we had a moonlight swim party with bonfire for Jeremiah's baseball team after their last game.....and we deposited Claire's first "real" paycheck.  She asked what medicaid and federal taxes were.....oh dear child.....welcome to the working world!  She works in our local little mall in a flower/gift/coffee shop.  :)  

I'm sitting outside tonight at suppertime, enjoying a meal prepared by my sweet uncle and listening to lawn mowers and cars and dogs.  It FEELS like summer even if it's a cool evening....and I just really wish it could last long enough for me to learn to cook with the fresh basil and parsley and mint in my flower box....and the kale I bought at the farmers market.  Three months of summer is too short.....

Roger took the kids"over the border" to buy some fire works tonight and Josiah is asleep for a late nap.  I hear a local ball game in the distance with cheers.  Our team must be ahead.....and I'm in my back yard with the dogs and the pool and the flowers.   The kids don't really know what to do with an Iowa July 4th.  We usually go to South Dakota to Roger's parents because its a nice weekend with them and fireworks are legal there.  (he he he) but we opted for a stay at home weekend this year to slow down and take a few breaths and ready the camper and our souls for our road trip in 2 weeks.  

Fourth of July weekend marks the half-way point of summer for me.  Its a bittersweet holiday.  I have only been able to gorge myself on strawberries and cherries thus far this season.....and oh what a glory it has been.  Still to come are peaches......apples.....sweet corn......and then we salute summer for another year and lean in to autumn with all the magic and wonder it holds.

But for now.....

Baseball is wrapping up for us in the next week.  The pool is wonderful.  My family is healthy.  My fridge and my heart are full.  My feet are tanned.  My camper is ready to be cleaned and stocked for a Kredit trip of a lifetime......and I think to myself.......its a wonderful world.

No, seriously.

It is.  

Even though I live with the hard stuff of life every day and will always know about the widow, the orphan and the poor among us who need the true religion......I can declare tonight that my God.  MY GOD, He  Is Good.  He is Faithful.  He is Just.  He is Omnipotent.  He is sovereign.  He is funny.  He is relational.  He is forgiving.  He understands.  He smiles.  He accepts.  He appreciates.  He wonders.  He marvels.  He lives.  

The presidential campaign for the USA may be a 3 ring circus right now, and the law to accept gay marriage may be a controversy......but all else that is good and right and pure and lovely in the world remains so....and I will savor it and celebrate it and write about it because I know it pleases my Lord and it pleases me.  

Hello Summer!  Lets hang out awhile longer, ok?

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