When we arrived home late Tuesday night we were greeted warmly by our house and about 5 million weeds. It was a jungle in our yard and flower beds. So before we even unpacked on Wednesday we spent about 5 hours just trying to reclaim the yard. We already knew the moles had taken over but we had no idea how bad the weeds would be in just 7 weeks away.
In fact when someone asked Jenna what we grew in our garden and she promptly responded “Moles,” she was accurate but she also could have said “and weeds.” Good grief. So here’s a picture of last year at this time when I planted our front flower bed and a picture of Jenna in front of the flower bed so you can see how tal
l they are. This was after weeding in case you can’t tell. 
And here’s a picture of our garden box in the back. Underneath all those weeds are about 30 strawberry plants (because those too multiplied by 5 from last summer). 
The weeds actually remind me of my spiritual life. If I go too long without time with the Lord or let my sin creep in, pretty soon we have a nasty mess to clean up. And often when the “weeds” do creep in we’re surprised and think “how did that get there?” But God is not surprised and He loves us and gently prunes and weeds so we can once again flourish and be beautiful. If we let Him do the work that needs to be done that is.
Gardening is hard work but it sure is worth it. I love that I get to live in a place where it’s green and beautiful and the flowers flourish.