Lockdown reflections

A friend called me out on my complaining this week.

As most of you know I have struggled through lockdown and continue to struggle through the ongoing restrictions.  Phrases like "the new normal" set my teeth on edge and I want to throttle anyone to tells me that there is no going back to what we had before and that the virus will be with us forever. 

I enjoyed my life before lockdown.  I enjoyed seeing my friends and family, I enjoyed being able to do things spontaneously, I enjoyed socialising with other families, I enjoyed going to church and singing hymns. Living in our tiny house wasn't so bad when we were out of it most of the day at groups, other people's houses or visiting places, I have found spending more time at home with three children and an extra adult in the house all day (my husband working in our tiny bedroom) very challenging. I have had intense moments of cabin fever, wanting not only to run away from the house but to climb out of my own skin and just get away. But we've been trapped. 

That's how I've felt during lockdown: trapped. 

I have read often in messages from friends and on facebook that people have enjoyed lockdown.  All I could feel about this was envy and irritation. How can they find THIS enjoyable!! Don't they know how hard it's been for ME? How dare they say they've enjoyed it! 

And this is where my friend came in with her truth.  And I am so thankful for her insight.

"Your life was good before lockdown so lockdown is just a bad patch for you.  For the people who have enjoyed lockdown their lives were worse before and the lockdown is the good patch for them; and that's sad."

Lightbulb!

For some people lockdown has been like an oasis in the desert, compared to my relatively small shadow in the light, (apologies for the mixed metaphors).  There are people out there who have had to go to a miserable job everyday who have been furloughed or else been able to work from home for whom lockdown has been a huge relief and a rest, maybe they've got away from a mean boss or unpleasant coworkers and be able to relax and be themselves, there are people who have been able to spend time with their children that perhaps they never felt able to before due to school pressure, endless hobbies and clubs, and they have loved it.  There are people who have really enjoyed being able to spend time at home instead of  travelling away for work, there are people whose lives may have been so busy before that lockdown has given them the chance to pause and reflect on their lives. 

So while I have been busy moaning about how hard lockdown is for me, I should have been being thankful that my life was so good before and that lockdown in only temporary.  For me that bad bit is temporary, for other people the good bit is temporary.  Talk about food for thought.

I don't mean at all to sound patronising to people here, my life was good before but not perfect and I certainly don't mean to sound boastful or prideful about my life because it's not that at all.  It's gratitude, it's appreciation, it's thankfulness. It's feeling like actually I have got a lot to be happy about my life, as much as there are hard parts, like everyone else, overall, it's pretty damn good. 

Now there is no point in a moment of epiphany if one doesn't take something from it and change. How am I going to use this insight and make a difference in my life.  Here are some ways I am starting to make changes:

Stop moaning about how hard it all is, it's not as hard for me in lockdown as it is for some people normally, 

Tell myself that I enjoy cleaning and tidying for my family (fake it to make it!),

Make the best of the home we have, we are lucky to have one of our own despite how small it is, 

Enjoy my children as much as possible, I am fortunate to be able to home educate them, 

Craft a beautiful life.

                                          

My wise friend messaged me later and said this:

"Compare lockdown with food rationing during the war.  Families that were more well off, and could usually afford a wide variety of quality food, found rationing really difficult.  They were so unsatisfied with it because they were used to much better and much more food that that, and they tended to be the people that would buy stuff on the black market quite regularly.  However, the poorer working class families thrived during rationing because they were usually mal-nourished.  And so, they found that they were now getting more food than they'd ever had before.  A lot of them said "we've never had it so good!" By the end of the war the British nation was at its most healthy in terms of nutrition and cardio-vascular health as a result of rationing.  There was no gap in health between the rich and the poor.  Be like the poor people.  Proclaim to yourself: "we've never had it so good!"  Even if you don't feel like it."

                                          

Do you enjoy my writing and would like to read more?  Head on over to my Patreon account to read more of my insights, reflections and lightbulb moments:

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Some words for International Breastfeeding week

This post includes affiliate links.

It's International Breastfeeding week!  Hurrah! I hear you cry! 

                                              

Except I don't hear this cry very much at all. What I hear a lot of is "Breastfeeding week makes me feel bad because I couldn't breastfeed for xyz reasons".  

Now as an ex breastfeeding volunteer for the Breastfeeding Network (I had to give up due to childcare responsibilities) I have a huge amount of empathy for women who have struggled to reach their breastfeeding goals.  I understand the challenges women face, breastfeeding if often HARD, that is one of the reasons why only 24% of women are still breastfeeding at 6 weeks post-partum and only 1% of women are still breastfeeding at the WHO recommended minimum of 6 months. This is not because 76% of women didn't care, decided that breastfeeding wasn't for them after all, or didn't try hard enough. Studies reveal that as much as 80% of women wanted to breastfeed. The reason is a lack of support.  

This lack of support has myriad facets, here are a few:

• Lack of access to support,
• Lacks of funding for support,
• Lack of support and encouragement from family,
• Lack of breastfeeding role models,
• The sexualisation of breasts in the media,
• Financial power of the formula industry,
• Lack of knowledge and understanding about breastfeeding from medical professionals,
• Pressure to return to work,

Women are unsupported by family, friends, medical professionals, their employers, the media, and society generally, we are shamed for breastfeeding in public, breastfeeding without a cover, breastfeeding beyond what society considers an acceptable age, told we are disgusting told to breastfeed in toilets, and even told we are sexally abusing our children, (when it comes to being a woman and breastfeeding you're damned if you do and damned if you don't and I talk more about this in my Patreon post HERE) it's a wonder any women meet their breastfeeding goals.   

And right there is our reason for celebrating those women who did make it.  They made it in the face of adversity, they are the minority, and that should be celebrated. Most women didn't breastfeed beyond the first few weeks, formula feeding is the norm, (it's infant formula adverts we see on TV not breastfeeding adverts) just like most people didn't run a marathon and jogging round the park or even sitting on the sofa is the norm.  But this doesn't stop us celebrating those who did run the marathon. The same should apply to breastfeeding mothers.  (I realise this isn't the best analogy as breastfeeding isn't a race or a competition where there are winners or losers, but it's the best this sleep deprived mama could come up with!)

International Breastfeeding week isn't about shaming women who couldn't, wouldn't, didn't reach their breastfeeding goals for whatever reason, any more than Black Lives Matter is about saying that other lives matter less,  It's about acknowledging the massive obstacles women faced and overcame in breastfeeding their child. 

And breastfeeding week isn't just about celebrating the amazing achievements of those mothers who reached their breastfeeding goals, it's also about raising awareness about the lack of support, and demanding better, it's about acknowledging that mama who gave her baby colostrum, that mama who managed a week, the mama who sought out donor milk, the mama who pumped for 6 weeks or longer, that mama who used a SNS so her baby could get as much breast milk as possible, and it's about saying we (as a society) should be doing better, we (as a society) should be trying harder. Trying harder to help mothers who are struggling, trying harder to normalise breastfeeding and trying harder to flip the sexualised message the media sends us about breasts.

So if you breastfed, no matter how long for, breastfeeding week is for you (because any amount of breastmilk is a wonderful gift), just as much as it is for those women who did reach their goals. It's not the time to justify personal hang-ups, guilt or grief, it's about supporting, celebrating and educating. 

In a society where you are more likely to see a breast in a push up bra than with an infant attached, let us have one week to celebrate our amazing bodies.  Now is the time to celebrate our stories, to shout our achievements from the rooftops without worrying about making someone feel guilty. (Should those who finished the marathon not celebrate their achievement for fear of making those who didn't finish, or didn't take part feel guilty?) Do you think men would think twice about celebrating their breastfeeding goals if they could breastfeed? Not a chance, yet we women minimise our achievements to try to prevent others from feeling bad and it has to stop. We have to stop minimising our biology (again, I talk more about this in my " Embrace or Erase" series over on my Patroon HERE).

In International Breastfeeding week I want to celebrate that I have breastfed three children, two through pregnancy, through mastitis, through poor latch, pain and years of sleepless nights, that I pumped milk for a friend's baby and that I am currently still breastfeeding my four year old.  I don't want to feel like celebrating my achievements might make my friends who didn't reach their goals feel guilty and resentful, I want to feel like they are standing right beside me, celebrating with me for their own achievements no matter how big or small as well as mine, and fighting for better with me.  And I want to fight all of the things I mentioned above that are barriers to breastfeeding so that more women can achieve their breastfeeding goals and feel like International Breastfeeding week is for them too.

If you're interested in reading more about how our society views women's breasts and how this affects breastfeeding, I would encourage you to visit my Patreon page HERE  and read my post called "Embrace or Erase part 1".

If you are looking for support to breastfeed you can contact The National Breastfeeding Helpline which is open from 9.30am till 9.30pm daily on 0300 100 0212

If you would like to understand more about breastfeeding, here are some books that I highly recommend:

Zentangle

Hi Friends,

I have been so overwhelmed by the support I've had for my new product which I just released this week, I have been blown away by the number of sales I had so soon after releasing it, it really warmed my heart and motivated me to share my example pages with you as I work through them.  I really hope they will inspire those of you who have bought my product and I look forward to hou sharing some of the pages with me online.
For those of you who have no idea what I am talking about; this week I released my "Mama Space Journal" into the world.  It is a digitally downloadable journal, specifically designed for mums, with 50 prompts to encourage relaxation, reflection, creativity and mindfulness. You can find out more in my Etsy shop.  Although I have written the prompts with motherhood in mind, almost all of the prompts could also be used by those who are child free.

Mothers and motherhood though; those are my passions.  My "why". Because I know what it's like to face the misery and majesty of motherhood.  I've been there in the wee small hours with a crying baby, feeling like I was the only person in the world whose child would not sleep through the night.  I've experienced the sore, leaking breasts, the peculiar discomfort of a changed body, the stepping into a strange new unknown version of myself. I also know the joys of motherhood, the absolute wonder of the gift of bringing life into the world, the power of it and how after giving birth you look around and wonder if anyone notices that you are changed.  And I know what I needed when I was (and still am) going through all this.  I needed someone to acknowledge how damn hard this motherhood journey is, how it wears you down to the bone, how it bares your soul completely naked and exposes the hidden parts of yourself.  I needed someone to say it's hard, but you're doing a great job. I needed someone to say what you are doing it worth something, that all your hard work is precious and important and seen.   And that is what this journal does.  It says you are awesome, what you are doing, raising children, it's monumental, it's THE most important thing you can do now those little souls are in your care but mostly it says mums need to be looked after too, mums need care and time to reflect on this epic journey of self discovery they are embarking upon. And it offers a small jewel of hope, a light in the dark, an opportunity to grab with two hands and make your own,.  A chance to relax, reflect, to capture the creative spirit that burns inside your heart since your body became switched on to creating when you conceived that child in your womb (or heart).  That is why I wanted to bring this journal into the world, because I love motherhood and I think it is important and I want you to love it too and know that what you are doing matters.  For all the discomfort and challenges it brings, there are also the moments of exquisite joy that make it all worthwhile.  Because you come from a long line of strong women, because women have always had to be strong, I want to bring this to you to acknowledge your strength and to help you to own it, to see the complex  and intricate web that has been woven through generations past and generations to come because of the gentle and loving power of motherhood. What you are doing matters, motherhood matters, and I am honouring that with this creative space that I have designed for you.  I really look forward to this journey as I work through the book in the hope that I will have some kindred spirits to join me through the experience over the coming months.

In this post I wanted to talk to you about using the journal and especially the Zentangle prompt.  Unlike some of the prompts which ask you to dig deep, the Zentangle doesn't require any soul searching, so it acknowledges that sometimes mamas get tired and what they need from time to time is a little mental escapology. Drawing a zentangle is a great way to do this and an un-daunting way to start getting creative as it requires little equipment, time or mental investment.  You simply pick up a pen and begin, which is why I decided to give a tutorial on this prompt first.

In an ideal world, when we approach a mindful or reflective journal or creative prompt in your "Mama Space Journal" it is good to get into the right head space.  This means child-free, quiet and time.  If you are lucky enough to be able to get these three things that is so great, you'll really be able immerse yourself into the prompts (if you haven't don't worry I will talk to you about that later.)

During lockdown it has been especially hard to find time to myself so I can absolutely empathise with mums who are feeling burnt out and overwhelmed because that is me right now. I am snatching the odd moment between my husband finishing work and cracking on with dinner every few weeks and I have insisted upon one Saturday afternoon to myself every two weeks.  My husband takes the boys out for the afternoon on those days so I can be home with all my art materials, my laptop and everything I need to work and get creative with painting, drawing and writing.  I also use my evenings (when the boys are down early enough and when I have the energy after a long day) to work on my creative projects.  Ideally I keep the TV off so I can fully focus on what I am doing. I know some mums who get up before their children to get some alone time which is also a really good idea, just doesn't work for me in this season, but maybe it would for you.

If you manage to get some periods of quite time to yourself you might like to begin by following a guided meditation.  I really love the meditation that Lucy H. Pearce writes in her book "The Rainbow Way" (affiliate link below), she helps us imagine ourselves moving into a special private creative space all of our own.  I really love this meditation (and have written versions of it for my retreats and my "Affirmation Card e-workshop") because it sparks our imagination and inner creative spirit, which is exactly what we need for a creative act.  It also encourages us to imagine a support figure to help us when we go into this creative space.

I thought this was rather a nice meditation that is free on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NSqEYFsF3w8

And this one which is a little bit shorter: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X5dNHrYCYMw

Or if you only have 5 minutes there's this one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TODtU3FKIMU

If you are relaxed before you begin you'll get so much more out of the creative activity. Maybe I'll upload one of mine onto my Patreon page some day.

Once you are in a relaxed space you are ready to begin.  Take up your pen and begin to create patterns, let your mind relax into the lines as you create them and let them flow from the pen.  If you get stuck try looking at some pattern examples so you're not blocked thinking about what to do and can let the lines and patterns come naturally.  Here are some examples on my pinterest page.

If you aren't able to get extended periods of quiet alone time to meditate and really focus on your zentangle, don't worry, you can simply add to your doodle whenever you can snatch a moment.  You'll still benefit from a small moment concentrating on the lines and shapes you draw, just do what you can when you can, perhaps before the kids are up, or while they have breakfast, if they watch TV you could do some creative work then, or when they've gone to bed.  I have been know to go and sit in my car for some quiet time during lockdown, just to get away from the noise and mess of the house. With kids you sometimes have to be creative with your time, but there is usually a way.  I have found that all together  I end up spending not an insignificant time each week on Facebook, so managing my time on apps like this and Instagram also frees up moments during the day when I could be creating.

Anyway enough talk, time to get creative, check out my little sped up videos below to inspire you:

    

 

So I hope you find these little videos helpful and you feel inspired to have a go at this prompt in your journal if you have purchased one.  If you would like to grab a digitally downloadable version for yourself check out my Etsy shop HERE.

Of course you don't have to buy the journal to have a go at drawing zentangles, you can grab any bit of paper and get going.  However the beauty of the "Mama Space Journal" is that all the prompts come together in one place, so not only are the kept together but you have a record of your creative journey as you complete all the prompts. In time it will become a valuable and precious document that you can treasure and look back on in the future to mark progress, reflect on memories and just to delight yourself with the wonder of seeing your own creativity manifest itself upon the page.

Corona encouragement

Just a quick message from me to tell you in the spirit of trying to do something productive and helpful in these trying times instead of withering away with anxiety I have made some affirmation cards, please feel free to print them off, cut them up and use them for your self, stick them round the house, pop through a letterbox, tape to a lamp post, etc etc whatever you like. 

7 years a mama

This month my eldest son turned 7, not only does it make 7 years since his own birth, but it also marks 7 years since I was born a mother.

People usually forget to consider the mother's birth-day when the children's birthdays pass but I think it's an important thing to honor, especially with the first born.

For me it is a significant moment every year as I reflect on how far I have come and who I am now as a person on this journey of motherhood and life.

Motherhood has changed me so much.  It has expanded my capacity to love far beyond anything I could ever have imagined pre-children. It has also stretched my capacity for patience and self-control and has taught me how to sacrifice myself for the sake of others.

7 years ago I was the centre of my own world, my husband and I did as we pleased, answering to no one really.  We went on lovely relaxing holidays, we did nice things together like going on bike rides and strolling leisurely round National Trust houses and taking afternoon tea in quaint cafes. I went out with my friends and had a job where I was able to measure my success and know when I had done a good job. I had a clear separation between my work time and my own time.  I was a teacher, so the dependable school bell transported me through the day in chucks of time where I was either with children teaching or doing my own thing.  I arrived, the bell rang, the children came, it rang again and they left, I had a break, the bell range again, more children, then lunch, followed by more children and finally home time, which marked no more children till another day, and an evening where I could do my own thing (as an art teacher my marking was significantly quicker to complete than say that of an English teacher).  In my free time you'd find me working on my own art and craft projects, trying to sell through my Etsy shop, writing blog posts, doing craft fairs and entering exhibitions and competitions

Life was very predictable, I knew what to expect, what was expected of me and I knew where the rewards and treats would come in.

Very quickly after my first was born, life couldn't have been more different I went through a huge adjustment and learning curve.

The first challenge was the lack of the hourly bell.  As mad as it sounds, it threw me massively to be under the control of this tiny unpredictable human who had no time scale, deadlines or countdowns.  I longed for the predictability of the school routine, but shunned the child training guides that would have satisfied this craving, in preference of a child led approach.  This was the first step of self-sacrifice.  I was choosing what I felt was best for my child rather than what would have suited me more at the time.

Fast forward 7 years and two more children and I am in a place where my life is almost completely at the mercy of my children.  I choose activities I think they will like, my schedule revolves around them and their needs, naps, snacks, meal times, bath times, play dates, home ed groups.  Even weekends are dictated by the moods of the children and what they can or can't cope with on any given day. A trip to a playground or walk in a woods is a likely most weekend, like dogs my children need regular walks.  I have totally lost my life and given it to my children. Gone are the bike rides in favor of walks to the park, gone are the leisurely National Trust strolls, replaced by raucous romps round National Trust gardens and whistle stop tours of the house with regular cries of "don't touch that!" and "that chair's not for sitting!". Elegant afternoon teas are a thing of the past, in favor of picnics on blankets, with any restaurant experiences leaving us sweaty with the stress.

I realise I am not painting a very pretty picture of motherhood here and that it won't be like this forever, (I hope one day to eve be able to enjoy an afternoon tea with my sons!) it is hard work most of the time, and yet, I feel so much richer as a person for the experience.  I never knew how it could feel to have your heart leave your body and split into three new hearts.  My ability to experience compassion and empathy for them  is sometimes painful.  It's makes you wonder why we do it!
My ability to hold my patience is so much more than when I was a teacher, (which leads me to believe I would be a far better teacher because of this experience of motherhood.)  And my ability to sacrifice my own desires for my children sometimes astonishes me. I could not have imagined how I could have tolerated one, two, sometimes three extra bodies in my bed at night, hot and sweaty, wriggling and twitching, moaning and crying all night long, and yet I have learned to contort myself into the most unique positions in bed (sometimes even evacuating myself altogether) in order to accommodate them.  Who knew I could sacrifice my last piece of chocolate or cake for two big eyes so sweetly asking for a bite.  Or given up on nights out with the girls, restaurant meals with my husband, time to ourselves, in exchange for being there to breastfeed my babies and toddlers.  I really never knew I had it in me!

I have very little time for my own work or creativity now.  Evenings snatched here and there to write a journal article, the odd afternoon to plan a retreat or make a painting.  The great irony is that pregnancy, childbirth and motherhood have awakened in me a vast and unquenchable desire to make, create and write and teach.  I have an abundance of creative ideas, but a painful austerity of time!  I think often on how I could have been so much more productive all those years ago had the ideas and motivation come to me then, when I had so much free time (though hilariously, at the time, felt I had hardly any!  Little did I know!). It's some sort of bitter twist of life that the creative urge and abundance of ideas has come so strong now when I have so little time to fulfil it.  I wonder why that is?  Will it stick around once the children get older and I have more free time again, or will it disappear along with the sweetness of toddler-hood and early childhood?

7 years a mother, wow!  I have come so far.  There are many more grey hairs now much more baggy skin, an aching tiredness like I could never have known, and a love so strong it sometimes brings me to my knees and forces tears from my eyes.

Someone once asked me if, knowing what I know now about motherhood if I would choose to do it all over again.  And I thought about this question.  Would I choose the pain and discomfort, the tiredness, the absolute invasion of privacy, the sacrificing of my body and time, the stress and the upset, the crazy-making noise and constant demands on me...

Yes I would!

I would choose it again, not just for the three amazing humans that I have helped to rise and who I get the privilege to know, but also because of the person that has birthed inside of me, the person who has grown and expanded.  I am part of a bigger thing now, it all starts to make sense, this life here on earth, my purpose has become much clearer.  I would never want to go back to that selfish, narrow minded person that I didn't even know I was before, I feel like an upgraded version of the person I was before, like I had a new update installed which is not a good way of describing this strange expanded knowing and understanding I feel now, but it is the best I can do (I really am very tired you know)

So yes, in spite of how hard this gig is some days (most days) I would do it all again in the blink of an eye, without hesitation, for I would never have known the feeling of creativity that comes from creating life.  And although I won't get to see the results at the end of the year as I did in teaching, there will be no assessment sheet on how well I am doing as a mother, I really won't know for a good 10-15 years if I did ok at it or not, I know that perhaps the results are immaterial after all, because perhaps the results aren't the children at all, the results are me.  Did I learn from it?  Did I change and grow?  Did I become a better human because of it?  Yes, yes, YES!  I surely did, and will continue doing so and I look forward to seeing the human that I become in 10-15 years time as much as the humans that they become.  Because those 7 years ago when a boy was born, so was a mother, so I am only 7 years old after all.

The Baptism of Jesus Sunday School Lesson

This is a lesson I created for a Sunday Schoool lesson but it could work equally well in a home ed environment. (This post containes affiliate links)

The Baptism of Jesus is a really great story to tell to children as there are so many intersting physical elements to talk about; there's John the Baptist's hairy clothes, all scritchy and scratchy, and big bushy beard all wild and fluffy, there's his diet of eating locusts and honey all crunchy and sticky (yuck!), there's the water splishing and splashing and there is the dove flapping and flying.

In this Sunday School lesson I decided to focus on the dove for the meaning of the story.  I kind of worked backwards on the lesson plan; I started searching for ideas for how I could deliver the lesson by searching through fine art images of The Baptism of Jesus, there are so many beautiful interpretations I highly recommend taking a look.  This led on to me looking at stained glass windows that featured an image of the story, I looked at both traditional and contemporary designs.  I thought it would be really nice for the children to create their own stained glass window but to simplify the idea for the 3-5 age range I was teaching, I thought the could use the image of the dove.

This led me to consider where else in the Bible a dove features and what the meaning of this is.  I thought of Noah's ark and the dove delivering a twig of olive leaf showing that the people had been saved from the storm, also sacrificial doves that were used to save people from their sins, and then of course the dove of the Baptism story which showed that Jesus was sent to save us from our sins as a living sacrifice.

I thought about how I could introduce the story's focus on the dove by asking the children what birds meant differed things, I thought we could discuss ideas like owls making them think of the dark and night time, robins for Christmas, and parrots making them think of pirates!

I planned to read the story of the Baptism of Jesus, I used this version below, but you can use any version so long as it mentiones the dove:

 I then planned a short prayer to read at the end.

The class would have gone really well if I hadn't forgotten to take the sticky-back-plastic that I needed for the stained glass windows!!  This epic disaster was thankfully averted by a roll of extra wide sellotape which I found on the side somewhere (thank you God!)  I really like using the stick-back-plastic in this way as it eliminates the use of glue altogether making it a nice clean activity.
If you have more time or older children you could get them to cut all the parts of the craft out themselves.

If you would like a copy of this lesson plan you can download it bellow,  I have also included the power point presentation of artworks that you can use.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1uUmIRpeULskmkqmUGW8wy0QKQPRUFkyZ/view?usp=sharing

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1fSfxuns3BgQjuVqeKQ604L-ep31DvN7v/view?usp=sharing

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Romancing the Soul

A while ago I read a book called "Captivating" by Stasi and John Eldridge (I highly recommend it for any women who want to know themselves better and any men who want to know their wives better), it's a book the really resonated with me and helped me go deeper into my relationship with myself and with God.

In the book the authors talk about how Jesus romances us. Now that's a funny concept isn't it, we often don't see Jesus as someone who would be trying to allure us and bring us to him.  I don't know about you but I have sometimes felt like he is quite a distant figure, someone we should be trying to emulate, but far too perfect to get near to, but it's true; Jesus wants a personal relationship with us and just like a good potential husband, doesn't force us into that relationship but intimately and gently and gloriously woos us.

I had forgotten all about this part of the book until a friend enthusiastically reminded me of it recently, she explained how she had seen some beautiful Autumn leaves and she thought about Jesus alluring her to him with their exquisite colours and textures, drawing her eye to their beauty.

The idea is that Jesus gives us all sorts of gifts as a way to bring us to him, to romance us, just in the same way as when you are dating someone and they bring you flowers and jewellery or chocolates, little things to let you know you are special and that they care a lot about you and that you deserve beautiful, lovely things.  These dates might become marriages and (in my opinion) good husband will continue the romance throughout your lives together by surprising you with little things he knows you like, not always a physical a gift, sometimes an extra long hug, or doing something nice together or just doing the dishes. Jesus is just the same.  Just as a peacock shows off his beautiful feathers to attract the peahens, so Jesus shows us his beautiful creation to attract us to him. He wants us to know him and draws attention to himself all the time in the beauty of nature and in little every day surprise moments. Once you have found that relationship Jesus doesn't stop romancing us. He keeps reminding us daily how special we are to him, that he thinks about us and that he want's us to love him as much as he loves us.

It was on my morning jog that this idea was fully brought to life for me today.  The Autumn leaves covered the footpath ahead of me like a beautiful seasonal collage, and the light shining in the trees illuminating them from behind like a canopy of  stained glass, lit up the footpath.  I was enchanted and suddenly had the thought to thank Jesus for this beautiful sight that he had given me.  Seeing my enthusiasm for his gift, the presents continued!  The footpath opened out into a grassy area that sloped uphill away from me, and I had to pause to admire the glory of the scene for longer.  The dew on the grass glittered and hundreds of spider webs sparkled in the sunlight creating a blanket of delicately shining jewels and silvery lace.  It almost looked like frost.  Ahead of me, another gift, the sight of a Jay hopping about in the grass.  Jay's always make me think of my Nanny, as she once gave me a beautiful turquoise and black jay's feather that she had found in the garden and saved for me. A delightful memory to fill my heart with joy. I continued on round the lake, enjoying the warmth of the Autumn sun and the beauty of the light and trees.  As I began to head home someone walked past me who must have recently been smoking a cigarette.  You might be surprised to hear that I enjoyed the smell!  There seems to be one or two brands that remind me of the brand my Granddad smoked and I was instantly transported to my Granddad's breakfast room where he would sit puffing away and I, as a young girl, would curl the smoke around my fingers as it gently rose from the end of the cigarette.  Another fond memory, a gift that Jesus knew I would enjoy.

As I approached home I noticed a beautiful little snail with a yellowy shell and pink skin crossing my path ahead, it shell was almost translucent, I stopped and picked it up, moving it to the safety of the leafy verge.  An opportunity for me to show kindness to another earthly being.

Later my husband spotted an old wasps nest in the bushes near our house. We retrieved it to dry out and look at later.  How special I felt that WE were the ones who found the wasps nest waiting there in the bushes, we will have the privilege of admiring it's intricate structure and papery layers. God fills our world with beautiful things to romance us and bring us close to him.

So, how has Jesus been romancing you recently?  Have you noticed it?

Try to take note of the little gifts he brings in the week ahead and know he is trying to get your attention and bring you close to him. He is a generous a loving God who knows you intimately and loves surprising you with little gifts that will make you smile and remind you of his love for you.