A Garden and Space

We went to see Discovery launch on Sunday. I'm such a dummy I forgot to email Leah and see if she could meet us there and get us any closer. I feel really blessed to live close enough to be able to just jump in the van and drive a couple of hours to see a space shuttle skip off into space. It's pretty cool. The couple next to us had a radio (great idea!) and so we got to hear all the radio transmissions and the countdown and everything. Next time though, I'm going to get with Leah. What a thrilling job that must be. She doesn't get as many cute little smiles and coos and hugs as I do though.

There was another couple there who were really enamored of my family. The Mrs. oohed and ahhed over Anna and counted my kids. "Four daughters?" she asked. "Nope, five," I told her. Her response was not the usual "my, you've got your hands full," or "you know how that happens, don't you" or "are they all yours" or any of the other dumb comments. Hers was, "Wow, then you are REALLY blessed, aren't you." I just love that. And I find that I get that kind of comment more than I get any of the others. And that is a double blessing.

The sunset was really beautiful that night. I was taking pictures of the sun going down over the city and some young guy comes up the the wall and starts snapping photos also. Then he says to me, as I'm still taking pictures, "It's a really beautiful sunset, isn't it" in this cheesy I'm-so-deep-and-artsy tone of voice. I didn't know if he was talking to me so I looked over at him and saw no one else, so I mumbled something like "...yeah...it sure is" and went back to taking photos. LOL. I don't get hit on very often. But I'm usually in close proximity to my handsome husband and at least one but usually five very cute daughters. I'm telling this story because it was really the first time in a long time that I've thought about how happy I am to have the security of Del in my life. No matter how bizarre my behavior, no matter how smelly I get from working in the yard, no matter what emotional roller coaster I'm currently on, he comes home to me every day and kisses me and tells me he loves me. I've never had to pretend to be something that I wasn't with him. I appreciate the steady love that has developed between us over the last ten years and look forward to seeing how it matures as we grow old together.

Okay, on to more surface things. Look at our garden. We've got four different types of tomatoes, corn, green beans, onions, cucumbers and a green and red bell pepper so far. There are a few other things we want to grow like sweet potatoes and maybe some other gourd so that we can have them in time to make baby food for Anna when she's six months old. The herbs we are growing are thyme, oregano, basil, marjoram, rosemary and parsley. And mint. It's been a lot of work and we plan to make it bigger for the fall planting season, but for now this is what we have.