Seeing what's right in front of me...

So this past week we received a fun letter from my nephew Chase. His class is reading the famed "Flat Stanley" book and sending out their own "Stanleys" to have adventures--so Chase sent Stanley to us. He went with us to walk the kids to school, to Carter's flag football game, to the park, dipped his toes in the pool (which is slowly starting to warm up--hooray!), and as you can see from this pic--he smelled our orange blossoms! Part of the assignment was for us to write down some things about Arizona and it really made me start to think about where I live...

I don't think I can do it justice, but I will try to describe how it feels right now in Arizona. I just went outside to shake off last night's popcorn blanket and there is a light cool breeze blowing...clouds are scattered throughout the sunny skies. The breeze gently lifts your hair and then it hits you--this amazing combination of blossoms and flowers. We have two orange trees, a grapefruit tree, and a lemon tree in our backyard and it smells like heaven. I LOVE walking the kids to school each day because we pass by this beautiful tree that has cascading purple blossoms on it--they look like a mix between bunches of grapes and soft lilac flowers--and they smell incredible--as my friend Natalie says--a little like grape kool-aid. I sat out in the backyard today and looked around and just breathed. Talk about aromatherapy....

And I wondered...how do I not see this everyday? I live here and can walk past beautiful flowers without so much as giving them a glance--or I rush to my minivan without pausing to breathe in the frangrant air. How do I miss the blossoms, the morning calls of birds in the trees...the chatter of kids playing at the park--the wind rustling the branches of the swaying palm trees, the quick smiles from my kids when I bring out the popsicles...

So I guess I should be saying "thanks for the homework Chase!"--it helped me to sit back, look around, and really see what's right in front of me...