To see a world in a grain of sand, and heaven in a wild flower.. ~ William Blake

I don’t know how I managed to kill the beautiful magnolia that had graced my front yard for the past twenty years. But the optimist in me saw it as an opportunity to choose a tree of my own.

My search began on the internet. I then quizzed my tree-hugging son, Patrick, about branching patterns and flower colors and the ability to live in a watered lawn environment. After much deliberation I settled on another magnolia- the deciduous kind that flowers early in spring and leafs out after a spectacular show of color.

You have probably seen this tree in beautiful shades of pink and violet. But I was curiously drawn to the description of the magnolia with a delicate butter yellow flower. Now that it is in bloom, I am remembering why.

Much needed weekend with my Bestie!

Do you ever feel like you have to escape your life and find someone who can help you make sense of the chaos and confusion that is creating cobwebs in your brain and taking up all available grey matter? Is there anything better than a best friend to help you put it all into perspective?

She’s not going to like this picture and she’s going to kill me for posting it! But she’s my best friend and she will forgive me. That’s what best friends do. This is me and my bestie in our hotel room with my iPad. We are stalking people we went to high school with on Facebook. How fun is that? By day we are mothers with college degrees and respectable jobs. We each have raised three high functioning children and we own our homes. We go to work everyday and people think we have it all together.