Girls!

There are lots of wonderful girls in my life these days.

One of them is living in my house.  

Notice the very intelligent piggy skulking beneath the high chair.  She knows that Honey Bunny takes great delight in flinging her food after she's had a suck or two on whatever Mommy decided was kid-friendly enough to try.  Lettuce (the rib not the leaves) was a big hit for both of them last night.

But there are bigger girls who bring me joy, too.  

I snuck away for a couple of hours yesterday to visit Grandma's Garden.  The green buckets in our hanging garden are starting to sprout seedlings.  From the delighted cries of Grandma LOOK!  It's growing!!! to our shared wonder at the magic contained in a tiny seed, it was a pretty wonderful morning.

Not everyone was content to admire the seedlings, though.  There was a major redecorating project taking place, centered on the painted stones made by the 4th grade earlier this year.  The stones move around from raised beds to the mandarin orange tree to the buckets on the fence, depending on the whims of the scholars that day.  

The tree stump sits there, haplessly allowing itself to be chalked and water painted and climbed upon.  (I hate Shel Silverstein's The Giving Tree; I see no resemblance here at all.)  Yesterday, it was the site of the creation of a Rock Garden (capital letters, please).

There were others involved in its design.  They were too engrossed in shifting the tiny scarecrows and pumpkins from one bucket to another to pose for a picture.  I moved myself to the left and had four scholars who were happy to share themselves and their creation with you.

I've said it before and I'll say it again:  it is impossible to be sad when kids are smiling at you.  I highly recommend it as an inexpensive form of therapy.