A Happy Secret Garden

Sometimes someone knows me first and then meets Bethany.  They say she looks just like me.  Sometimes they know her first and then meet me.  They say I look just like her.  Either way I am flattered beyond all that is reasonable.
This morning I got up early to take Bethany down to Thanksgiving Point for a 6 AM orchestra YouTube video shoot.  Those in charge requested parent volunteers to come early and help with unloading and setting up.  This was the very last orchestra event of the year, and truth be told, I had not done my parent "required volunteer" hours yet.  Mostly to assuage my guilt, I got up and went.
We had a lovely, funny time together-- making jokes about me photo/video bombing the shoot by jumping off the waterfalls.  Anyway.  She's delightful and thankfully, Elinor's water polo scheduled has finally cured my fear/hatred of the early morning hours.
After I helped move a couple large tympani drums and the orchestra was getting settled.  I realized I had the whole of Thanksgiving Point Gardens to myself!!!!!  Are you kidding me?  I get downright grouchy having to share the gardens with so many people during the Tulip Festival---(I believe I have griped about this for the past couple years).
So I did my treasured morning walking in a gorgeous setting where I put in my ear phones and listened to my favorite book--Jane Eyre.  Oh my word!  I was in a happy place.

Last night we went to go see Raven Flynn star as Lily in Olympus High School's production of The Secret Garden.  PHENOMENAL!  GO IF YOU POSSIBLY CAN!  

And , I don't want to brag or anything... but her dress... we were with her when we found it "treasure hunting" at the DI in Boise on a spring break robotics trip.  So, yeah.

So I went to the "Secret Garden" in Thanksgiving Point and I listened to "A Bit of Earth" and "Come to my Garden" and Oh my heavens!  I was in a happy place!

I was very grateful to go to a happy place this morning, because as of late, I have been... shall we say... difficult to please.  Last night at the play Bethany told me I was being salty.
Guilty as charged.
The Secret Garden even inspired me to pull weeds from my planter beds in my front yard.  It's been years since I've done that.  Enough said.  I even thought about planting tulip bulbs this fall.  I mean, I've thought about it before, but it feels like an actually possibility this year.   Remind me to reread The Secret Garden in September.  That story speaks to me.
Mostly it tells me I am not a gardener... but that people can change and grow and the magic of believing something can happen, goes a long way toward making it happen.

I have already shared this picture, but I'm sharing it again.  Over the past nine months or year, Bethany has thought a lot about how seriously she wants to continue with her violin studies.   A couple of months ago, she was ready to stop playing altogether.  At the time of this concert a couple weeks ago, she had decided that while she would probably continue taking lessons and practicing, she was not going to continue with the Lyceum Orchestra.  So we thought it was likely her last concert.  She's a busy girl with lots of interests and talents and we supported her decision. 
She's been doing some really great practice this week and after one session she came over and said, "That was a really good practice...maybe I don't want to be done with orchestra... I think I will do it my senior year." 
She feels very good about that choice and while she realizes she will never be first chair and may not even move up any chairs in next year's seating auditions, she is doing it because she enjoys it, and she enjoys the people, and she wants to finish what she started. 
And that is a decision we can definitely support.
It's nice to know you are doing something because you choose it.  Not just because it's what you've always done.  If it took a year of mediocre progress to reignite the love, then it was worth it.