All things New

I sit outside my daughter's dance class.  This week alone, I swear she's grown 2 inches.  "Mommy, are there more classes after this one?"  It is only her second, but I can tell she's taken a shining to the powder pink.  The smooth, shiny Lycra.  The pointed soft shoe.

Just yesterday we glanced up only to find our front yard's big old elm tree sprouting it's first green buds of the season.  It got me thinking about tire swings, grass stains, red rover, and grandmas.  Mostly, though it got me thinking about beginnings.  About do-overs.  Fresh starts.  Reconciliation.  Redemption.  And this whole business of Spring.

Since I'm new at this mommy thing, I can't tell you for certain, but I'm beginning to wonder if parenting can be a whole lot like the changing of the seasons.

Of the joyous, carefree summer days.  In moments that catch you unexpected. Like a three foot majesty who alone in her pj's, with chipped toenail polish, and sleepy morning time kisses, can make you believe in angels, in heaven, and in the coming of true love.

Or the renewal of autumn.  The shedding of car seats, the discarding of soothers.  First steps, first days, and first dates.  The falling of memories, the scrap booking of leaves.

To the freezing of neighborhood ponds.  Personality traits solidified as the trials and tests of childhood refine and reveal in a ten year old's nature what you knew to be true at two.

And the swaying and froing of old tire swings and rubber boots under old elm trees.  As new growth presents itself, mother's worries and woes are pushed away as debris.  Composted.  Recycled.  Making way for greener pastures and expectancies of fragrant blossoms.  Perennial promises holding faithful and true.

Some days.  Most days.  I can't believe He's entrusted me with this sacred gift of tending and shaping her feminine heart.  I think about, but not enough, how He wants to speak into our seasons.  How He wants to speak into our hearts.  And while I want to shield her from those seasons that come with frigid frostbite.  Desert droughts.  And days of consecutive rain;  I know my anchor to His is the best and most crucial thing I can point her to.  Again. And again.  And again.  In the shedding, and in the freezing. In the blooming, and in the renewing.  In our seasons~

...Look, I make all things new!

~Revelations 21:5~