Livia, after face-painting this morning, requested a blog post where people try to figure out who she is.

Do six year olds ever get their own blogs? If so, who would read them?

Is this what happens when a web developer and a blogger have offspring?

My girl loves to paint. I think I’ve said this before, but she’d roll her whole body in paint if I let her. (New summer activity perhaps?) If I give up my timetable, and my desire for cleanliness, and my pursuit of easy, simple activities, then painting, Liv’s choice, is perfect. Why is it so hard to do that as a mother? To set aside my own interests in order to do something my child absolutely adores?

Friday was a relax-at-home kind of day and painting fit the bill for afternoon entertainment. I opened the craft cupboard and there garage sale picture frames sat, looking all boring in their wood frames. An hour later they were coated in orange, teal and a glorious hodge-podge of colors, the last precisely replicated on Livia’s ten fingers.

Prairie Box points, let’s say 220 of them, to the first person who correctly identifies what is going on in this picture.

I’m reminded this morning to slow down and take a few minutes to breathe in the new colors of our garden outside. It’s the peonies, sitting on our dining room table, releasing ants for dog and kiddo to catch, that make me appreciate this moment. This day, May 26, rolls around only once a year and while the date is of no importance, the moment where peonies, pincushion flowers and the little princess spirea are blooming is significant. Gardens change in seasons. Certain plants bloom at certain times and it’s fitting to enjoy them at their peak.

There’s a beauty in planting a garden from scratch. We walked into our home in December 2001, greeted by very little grass in the backyard and a whole lot of ugly. There was an empty dog run taking up a ridiculous amount of space in our small city lot. A tall privacy fence blocked our yard from the four cute children next door. An RV had been parked almost up to the back door and the dirt in the “parking spot” was saturated with oil and other nastiness. Our front porch, formerly existing as housing for any and all clutter owned by the previous homeowner, was cordoned off to outsiders and bore a sign saying, “No Solicitors!” There was no front garden to speak of.

So we moved into the place knowing that our new neighbor (and pastor and friend) loved to garden. Since I worked with him in the church office, he was constantly asking me when I wanted a few transplants from his gardens. I’m pretty sure Brad ended up in the yard with a shovel and a plant or two, and that’s how we got rolling.

The delight in going from a yard of nothing to a yard of something is that we can look at every plant and recall something about its origin. The south side of the house sees the bee balm that Brad unceremoniously deposited in the earth. It has taken a beating (there was that one summer I didn’t water it hardly at all), but still produces gorgeous purple flowers that both bees and Beccas appreciate. There is the unbelievably healthy variegated dogwood bush in the backyard that Jeremy and my dad planted. It was so small in the beginning; hard to believe considering how huge it is now. We trim it back every year to prevent it from taking over the universe. More recently, I’m seeing a second wave of perennials as they move around the yard. Sometime in the last eight years—I can’t say exactly when—Jeremy became quite the gardener and began his work as Master Gardener around here. Since then he has planted, and now transplanted, numerous plants. There’s the salvia, sedum, grasses and black-eyed susans now bordering the alley in the furthest point in our yard. They all began in different locations but have been divided and then transplanted according to the Master’s will. The peonies, which make me happy beyond explanation, came from a cardboard box at Sam’s Club. Only two bulbs (if that’s what you call what I found in that box) turned into the glorious plants that shoot from the ground each spring. And then there are the plants I can’t even name because Jeremy picked them out and planted them on his own.

There is something deeply satisfying about the garden. It’s an investment in both one’s spirit and one’s future, and it’s rewards are seemingly endless.

Excuse me, I spy another healthy black ant on my table, another escapee from the petals of the pink peonies in front of me.

My computer contains so many images of Katherine looking gorgeous that it’s kind of ridiculous. I’m pretty sure Katherine doesn’t have the ability to take a bad photo!

I had been looking for a model to take around town and Katherine is at that point in life where she needs senior portraits—it was a win-win situation. Plus we truly enjoy each other and the conversation with her (and her sisters) is always a pleasure. Thanks, Katherine, for a great photo shoot on Sunday!

I like this image of Livia in her summer sundress. She looks so carefree, so young and sweet. I want to capture moments like this as she grows.

The funny thing about the shot is that she’s pretending to be a crab as she walks down a hill in a Phoenix park. See blurry proof, complete with crab claws, below.

Kids are awesome.

Like I mentioned before, Arizona is so cool because it is so very different from home. For example, we do not have palm trees in Nebraska. Say nothing of the fact that 99.9% of Lincoln front yards contain grass, not rocks or gravel.

Our backyard also does not contain a trampoline. My child loves trampolines. A friend recently acquired a tramp (with a net!) and I’m considering sneaking into her yard on a regular basis to let Livia burn off some steam.

Finally, we do not have orange trees in the backyards or front yards or even side yards of Lincoln, Nebraska. I’ve forgotten how lovely it is to see oranges growing on trees around town. When I was a kid, and we were moving from Georgia to California, we prayed for an orange tree in our yard. Oddly enough, I can’t remember whether we had one or not. What I do remember is praying hard for pool, which we did not get. Later on I found out that Mom had been praying against the pool. I then learned that mothers have a special connection to God. ; )

Meet my beautiful and talented sister-in-law Chelsea. Check out the earrings—she made them!

And I’ve got to say, after a few minutes of simply sitting next to her in her car, I wanted to get a tattoo.

Chelsea has one of the most enthusiastic and fun spirits of anyone I know and hanging out with her is always fun. It’s hard to leave a sister behind, but I suppose that just means we look forward to our visits with her even more.

Howdy, friends! We just returned home from a family vacation to Phoenix, Arizona. We had a wonderful time hanging out family while soaking up some Arizona sunshine. My favorite thing about heading that direction is that the geography is so very different from here. I love landing at the Phoenix airport amidst the vast brown landscape, broken only by enormous outcroppings of rocky hills and mountains. It’s like landing on the moon after being in the green spring of Nebraska.

Our first morning on vacation found us exploring the Boyce Thompson Arboretum with Jeremy’s cousin Jeff and his family. We started early enough in the day—on a cooler day no less—and it was still hot. But the unique beauty of the area was really something to behold and my camera found plenty to capture.

Purple cactus. How cool is that?

I always thought I’d be *that* mom who did cool things for her kid’s class, cool things like go on field trips. Yet I must confess that the idea of going on field trips with preschoolers (much less volunteering in their classroom) sounded pretty awful. I am profoundly grateful for the awesome women who teach my child’s class—God bless ’em—they are some kind of special.

After the first field trip this year, Livia caught on and realized that other mommies drove them to the destinations. And she wanted her mom to do it, too. So, on this last field trip of the year, on Livia’s birthday no less, I joined the kids.

And I had fun. Imagine that.

It was Liv’s birthday and the destination was the Pioneers Park Nature Center. Totally fitting for my nature kid! Despite the fact it was cold and really windy, the class had a great time and I had fun getting to know her classmates a bit better.

Kindergarten field trips, here we come.