How fast time flies when you are surrounded by laughter and friends.
Today I dropped @Grindan off at the airport. Her flight home to her two sweet children and her wonderful hubby was to leave at 5:00pm.
One of the thoughts occupying my brain was how originally @Dreemsteem was to come at the same time for a visit too. She should have also been on the car ride back to the airport. For personal reasons, Dreemsteem was not able to make it this time. Life happens for reasons we do not understand at the time.
It can be sad and frustrating when things do not work out as planned. Circumstances also happen for a reason. If Dreemsteem had visited for the last five days, she would have been flying back home into a torrential rain storm.
The rains are so horrible that the excess water has already washed out whole roads near her home, leaving a gully of mud behind. The thought of the danger she would have been in flying back home today makes my skin tremor. Thank goodness Dreemsteem is home safe and sound with her family.
When thinking about having my friends here for five days, I wanted to plan something we could do together on the cold Wisconsin days. I wanted our hands to have something to do because I knew our mouths would be open and jabbering for five days. I spent some time looking around where my fingers and google took me. I landed on a book called 365 days of Art by Lorna Scobie.
The book came with 365 number pages of art prompts. I loved that some of the pages had been partly filled with bright colors. It looked like an excellent book for beginners to someone 110 years old. It is a book meant to relax. To doodle in. To take a prompt and if you do not feel like making art that day, do a bit of journaling if you care to.
It is a book you can use over a year or three to document a day in your life. The next time you went looking for a new page to create, you would remember how you felt while doing other prompts, you came across.
I purchased the three books, which arrived in less than 2 days. A few days later, I discovered that Dreemsteem could not visit. I quickly wrapped her book up and sent my husband to the post office to mail Dreemsteem her present. I wanted her to know she was missed. I wanted her to still be able to enjoy the gift I got for her.
As fate would have it, Dreemsteem received her book the first-day Grindan visited. Grindan had already looked through some pages in the book and picked the parrot page for us to color first. It was a perfect first page!
I called Dreemsteem to let her know what we were doing. I was so happy she could play along. Grindan and I sat at the dining room table and started to talk and color. It ended up being the perfect first-night activity to do. We jabbered back and forth while each, in our own ways, started coloring in our parrot.
My phone rang sometime later, and Dreemsteem's parrot was looking at me! I smiled and was so happy she decided to play along!! I love how hers turned out. How she followed the prompt exactly. It made me smile and feel loved that Dreemsteem could still be part of the trip.
Dreem's Parrot
I soon realized my parrot would take more than one night to finish. By the night's end, Grindan had her book on her lap, and she was giggling. She would not let me see what she was laughing about, which made us giggle more!!
Soon Grindan finished her parrot and showed it to me. I burst out laughing because it was so perfect! It was perfectly perfect down to the cigarette hanging out of its mouth! I loved how different each parrot was turning out.
Grindan's Parrot
I still had a long way to go on mine, and being around someone all day and talking was wearing me out. I found myself napping during the day. Grindan was a dream and helped me in any way I would let her she could.
We did a lot of fun things while Grindan was here, but I will leave those memories for Grindan to tell you if she wants.
I finally finished my parrot and showed Grindan. I loved how all three are the same yet different, just like we all are.
My Parrot
The photos show how one idea can turn into three; there is no right or wrong way to go through life by being yourself. Each of us brings a unique perspective to everything we do.
Can we learn to accept our differences as something positive? My heart says, "YES!"
All photos are mine unless otherwise stated.
