Pinecone Hearts

This morning was...

Braiding one daughter's hair into a crown braid

Throwing the other daughter's hair up in a top-knot bun

Making muffins because Claire wanted some

Watering the garden

Switching the laundry

Pulling out chicken for the crock pot

Running kids to play with cousins

Grabbing a few things at Costco

And now I'm finally plugging in to work for the afternoon.

Will stop at some point and throw chicken in the crockpot and wrap potatoes to throw in the oven. 

Gonna make gravy later, shred the chicken, make salad.

(Doing the home thing is my very favorite. It really is. I mourn the time when I was able to just be a mom full-time without having to work, too.

These simple tasks of tending, reading, talking, feeding, cleaning, and caring for my people are my very favorite things to do.

That being said, I feel so fortunate to work from home with a good job. 

And to work for good folks.

So lucky, and so grateful.)

On Sunday evening, we went to a couple of cemeteries, 

taking red geraniums to a few of our people.

We stopped at dad's grave first, and then at Huldah's, 

an ancestor of ours that crossed the plains.

As we made our way back across the cemetery, Isaiah wanted to make a pinecone heart like we'd seen by someone else's grave. 

So, as the sun's rays were stretching across the valley, we gathered pinecones and went back to dad's grave.

We arranged the pinecones into place there, and then gathered another bagful to take with us to my grandparents' grave at another cemetery up on the east side of Provo.

Isaiah arranged pinecones while Benji was shooting a gun (his hand). 

We sat in the grass at their grave and I told them about Vera's laugh and the way she shushes with her mouth at the end of it, and how I can still hear, right now, my grandfather chewing his tuna sandwich.

Random, right?

But I love these snippets of life we shared.

And as I look at us, it's beautiful and humbling to realize that we are the harvest of what came before -- and we wouldn't be without them.

Today, we hold them in---and love them with---

all of our pinecone hearts.