I Have a Houseful Again.

The children spent the school holidays in Durban with their dad. They are back now. I remember, when I was a young woman at college, my mom always used to ready my room with a small vase of flowers and a note welcoming me home. I didn't really appreciate it as much as I should have then, but what I learned most from being treated so kindly was the habit of making  a homecoming an occasion. 

So today, in anticipation of the children coming home, I turned down each child's bed, and laid three little chocolates on their pillows, ensuring that the vagabond dogs didn't help themselves to the chocolates. They did quite well off me this week. They polished off a box of marshmallow Easter eggs, and 12 guilty mini-eclairs I bought for myself from the Spar shop just around the corner. I can't blame the dogs for doing the work of karma, or preventing me from sinning with calories...

Next I bought some roses for the girls rooms yesterday. I was careful to pick a shade that I knew would go well in each girl's room. There are some really stunning colours of roses nowadays. I tried my best to arrange them, without using any of the principles of how to successfully arrange flowers. The arrangements were... amateurish to say the least, but the thought was there. I had lost the special florist sachets you are supposed to put in the water to make the roses last longer, so I searched the house for a Disprin.I had heard that if you pop a Disprin into the flower water it does the same thing. My searched turned up not a single Disprin, sorry flowers.

Then I decided to make a bouquet of flowers for the boys. I hunted for a small vase, the size of a shot glass.It wasn't my day for finding anything, so I turned up nothing. Eventually I found a small egg cup. Then I took a bag of whispers ( small chocolate covered malt balls) and some tooth picks. Bear with me you have to try to picture this. I stuck a whisper on the end of each toothpick and arranged my "flowers" in the egg cup, with some extra greenery from the previous floral experiments. I was quite proud of my Whisper bouquet and I was sure the boys would appreciate my wackiness. They did, and before long, they had plucked and eaten ever flower in the arrangement. The girls were equally thrilled with their roses. 

We've had some chats,some giggles and some cuddles...it feels goooooood!

It's wonderful to have all my children home. I read a wonderfully inspiring quote today. It goes as follows." To be upset about what you don't have is to waste what you do have." I have so much to be grateful for. So much of my thinking is around what I don't have, and what is unfair. Part of letting go of Roger, is realising what  an amazing, wonderful, full and blessed life I do have and using what I have to the max!