Flowering Fridays: Preparing for Blooms

Easter lily bought on sale at Home Depot this week

This is how this week back from our vacation has been for me: feeling like there is no time to stop and smell the flowers.

I know it's just my mindset that says I'm too busy, that I'm behind, that there isn't enough time.

But it's the story I've been living in this week as I settle back into home (errands, email catch up, buying and researching replacements for the vacuum and washer and dryer which both broke, the car into the mechanic to replace a broken hose, a day of illness for my daughter (and a slight un-ease for me, too)…

(Sheesh. I'm overwhelmed just reading my account of it!)

So here it is Saturday morning. There was no Flowering Friday on Friday for me this week, a week when I felt there wasn't much time for anything. Be it yoga, meditation, adequate sleep, or kind connection with my husband.

So today I'm going to pause and make some time to garden on this beautiful 70-degree day.

My perennials are all sprouting. Some like the daffodils are already blooming. And others — the day lilies, the iris, poppy, phlox and many more — are preparing to bloom.

My task this morning is to clean away all the dead leaves and stalks from last year. To clean it all away and make way for these new blooms.

As I work this morning, my intention is to also to clean away this old way of poverty thinking about time. This old way of thinking that incessantly says that what I do isn't enough.

I want to weed out all these thoughts that deaden me. These thoughts that berate me for the 500 emails in my inbox this week. For the lack of blogging and Twittering. For not working on my new project at all. For not getting everything off my "To Do" list.

Because really there was much that happened this week.

Even some wonderfully fun things: A day of process painting with friends (more on that soon). A plant-buying spree at Home Depot. Dinner with my brother and Grace. Using our wonderful new LG front loading washer-dryer set. A new haircut. Some new lovely frocks from Anthropologie.

And much more.

The fact is that I got done what I chose to do this week. And I am trusting that is enough.

So today I'm preparing new soil, and making way for something new and vibrant to bloom in its place.

And as with all gardens, this new kinder soil of my mind is something that will take constant weeding, fertilizing and watering so these new thoughts can fully take root.

But I'm willing to put in this effort because I know that growth and blooming thrive when the dead stalks are cleared away. And it creates the space for this kind of thought:  there is always time to stop and smell the flowers — I just have to make the choice to do so.

Tell me, what thoughts or habits can you cultivate today to prepare you to bloom more fully in your life?

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Flowering Fridays is a weekly look at flowers through the lens of what they might teach us about flowering fully in our life. Past editions are here.

Flowering Fridays: Among the Flowers

If you are looking for me, and can't find me, I probably left and moved to New Smyrna Beach.

You can find me at Garden Arts on Flagler Avenue, tending to the plants.

I'll be the one in the back, smelling the gardenias and marveling at the pitcher plants.

If you'd like, I could sell you a yellow hibiscus or some tomatoes or a passion vine.

There are plenty of plants to take home and love. So many shades of green. So many different shapes. So very many lovely flowers.

It will be a good life.

Yoga in the morning at either Ocean View or Ocean Lotus. Then, a day spent working among the plants. Evening walks along the beach.

Oh, I'd fit some writing in, too. And time to kayak the St. John's River. And a break or two for soft-serve at treats on the beach.

(That's my dream. Or at least the dream I have every time I come and visit here.)

Tell me, what's your dream life?

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Flowering Fridays is a weekly look at flowers through the lens of what they might teach us about flowering fully in our life. Past editions are here.

Flowering Friday: Cross-Pollination

There was something blooming at the Milwaukee Art Museum on Thursday night.

Design by Pam Borgardt/Milaegers, inspired by Boating on the Yerres by Gustave Caillebotte

On display was Art in Bloom, an annual — and brief — exhibit that, according the museum's website for the exhibit, "features art-inspired floral displays." Given the fragile nature of the flowers, the exhibit only runs through this Sunday. (If you aren't in Milwaukee, check your local museum — many museums around the country sponsor this kind of exhibit annually.)

Design by Judy Newman/Elmbrook Garden Club, inspired by Triple Profile Portrait by Lucas de Heere

It was so fun to see how the various designers connected with the art to inspire their creations. And it got me to thinking on how really nothing we create is truly original.

Everything that we create is influenced by myriad influences. And yet what we create is our wholly our own — our unique expression, our unique synthesis of influence and individuality.

And even though there isn't anything proverbially new to say, our expression — be it art, a book, or the way you "be" in the world — is vitally needed. Because you are an original and no can express what it is you express.

The first place winner was this above design by Denise Gehrke, Waukesha Floral & Greenhouse, inspired by Northwood III by Kenneth D. Snelson.

I, for one, find this perpetual cross-pollination and hybridizing to be inspiring.

I get inspired by something you do. I create something from it that is uniquely mine. And then someone else creates from that. And on and on and on it goes.

Design by Green Tree Garden Club, inspired by Crying Girl by Roy Lichtenstein

I find that once you start to look for inspiration. You find it everywhere.

Because really everything — anything — can be inspiration.

Design by Milwaukee Organic Gardening Club, inspired by Ruin by NAM June Paik

To begin seeing inspiration everywhere is part of being present and being connected to the true flow of life, which is always growing and always expanding.

Design by Christopher Dobs/Urban Sense, inspired by Poppies by Georgia O'Keeffe

I invite you to look around you today and look for the inspiration.

It could be in art. Or in Target. Or in something you child says to you. Or in way the light dances on the countertop.

Take a moment to notice the inspiration.

Design by Deb Karpfinger/The Flower Lady, inspired by Big Head by Karel Appel

Then tell me, where did you find inspiration today and how can you use it as a springboard for your own creations?

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Flowering Fridays is a weekly look at flowers through the lens of what they might teach us about flowering fully in our life. Past editions are here.