HAPPY MONDAY!

First of all...I hope you all had a fabulous Mother's Day! My house is so full of flowers it looks like an indoor garden. There are flowers from my children, flowers from my husband, flowers from my in-laws and flowers from my niece and her fiance and a small clay pot planted last weekend by our Sunday School children (they planted about 70 pots) that the kids handed out to ALL the women in church yesterday, whether they are a mom or not. What a wonderful Sunday it was. Two celebrations in one...the celebration of Pentecost and the celebration of Mother's Day!

We spent the afternoon at my brother and sister-in-law's on their hobby farm. My whole family was there for the day...my mom and dad, both my brother's and their wives, my two nieces and my one niece's fiance. Parker and Faith absolutely LOVE it at Uncle Chuck and Aunt Kathy's! They have two horses...although it was much too muddy to ride...two cats (that Faith likes run around outside to look for) and lots of space to run and play! Their favorite...and mine, too...is the golf cart. Parker and Faith so enjoy zooming around the farm (with an adult on board, mind you) and exploring. We saw rabbits, geese, lots of other birds, got up close to the horses in the pasture, and just zigged and zagged our way around the land. For Parker, it's really an adventure...he gets to drive. He's a great little driver, too...although he had Grandma, Aunt Kathy and me hanging on for dear life during a couple of his wicked-sharp turns! Then he'd laugh because he thought it was so funny that we were afraid of him tipping us over! Faith just went along for the ride every time someone went out for a little spin. There were games of lawn darts, polish golf, bean bag toss and hide-and-seek. I don't know what my brothers do in all all the out-buildings but they can find more stuff to keep them busy in the barn and the shed. We ate way too much and enjoyed the warmth of a sunny day with cooler temps. It's where we usually spend Mother's Day and it's always so much fun. Parker and Faith were SOOOOOO tired when we got home. Poor Faith could barely function. They are still both extremely tired today. Getting Parker up and in the shower was a challenging way to start the day.

Now it's Monday. It's another sunny day and I'm looking forward to a day at home...I rarely schedule anything for Mondays...that's catch-up day at the Johnson house. I'm still pumped from a beautiful Pentecost celebration at church and the wonderful Mother's Day at the farm. Today is my day of calm before a busy week, especially my Friday and the weekend. My husband is the youth chair at our church and this coming weekend is Confirmation. It starts with a dinner on Friday night for those being confirmed and their families. Another lady from church and I will be preparing the meal for the evening. Saturday brings two baseball games in the morning for Parker and then the Cub Scout graduation ceremony Saturday afternoon. This is normally an overnight camp out, but Scott isn't sure he and Parker will be participating overnight since Scott needs to be at church bright and early Sunday for Confirmation. Today is the wind-down from a wonderful Sunday and the calm before the rest of the week's storm. It's my day to refresh.

I hope you have/or are having a wonderful start to the week. I hope you get a chance to just "be" for a few moments...or all day if you have the chance (but let's get real...we're women...how often do we get a chance to just "be" for an entire day?). However, I hope you get a chance to refresh and renew your spirit for the week ahead.

Peace.
J