Because My Life is Just THAT Interesting To You...

I have been blessed (I'd say "lucky", but luck had nothing to do with it) to have two wonderful church families. My first was in California, and they were absolutely super. Love you guys!!!!!! Which is why I feel so fortunate to have moved smack dab into another great, nurturing little group here in Plentywood, MT.

One challenge to socialization for the Plentywood congregation is how scattered we all are. Our pastor lives 1 1/2 hours to the south. Some of our members live 45 minutes to the west. Some members are right in Plentywood. We are 30 minutes to the east, and some members are almost 2 hours to the east. We don't do a lot of spur-of-the-moment gatherings! But last Sabbath, we were all planning to be at church, so an after-church outing to the local dam was planned.

I'd only been to the dam for the first time 2 weeks before, but it is a nice place with picnic shelters, little stove thingies, boat launches, and lots of up-an-down hills. It was a much nicer day this time around, too! Our first visit coincided with Prairie Hurricane Day, a holiday celebrated with great frequency in these here parts. But on this particular day the weather was gorgeous and warm, with enough of a light breeze that we wouldn't get confused and think we were in a completely different state.

We piled out of the cars, and Noni  almost immediately discovered she was low on camera battery. I felt for her, I really did, but couldn't share mine lest there not be enough for me also. My heart secretly glowed with virtue for having been wiser than she in my preparations. Until I pulled my camera out and saw that my battery was almost gone, too. So much for virtue.

The first flowers of spring were blooming---prairie crocuses. Everyone ooooed and aaaaaawed over them, including me; when I was little, I thought crocuses were stupid because they bloomed out of plain dirty ground instead of green grass. After a couple of years with real seasons, I'm as excited about those little harbingers of spring as anyone else.

I  had make close, personal acquaintance with the grass to get my shots, all the time hoping my battery wouldn't die. I'm still picking prickles from my skin, but at least I didn't inadvertently land on some of the cacti hidden in the grass. That would have made the church social memorable for ME, at least.

We all had such a nice time, it's a pity we don't take the time to fellowship with friends more often. Life is too short to spend slogging away all the time and never noticing all the beauty that God surrounds us with. Sometimes I think that a lot of our gloomy, stressed modern outlook is because we ignore the joy that God pours into our lives through the little things like flowers, a child's laughter, and the blissful feeling of lying in the grass with the sun shining on our faces.

At the beginning of March

On the last day of March