Everything is beautiful in its time Ecclesiastes 3:11

Life get’s all sorts of complicated doesn’t it.

Even with our best efforts, complications and chaos are business as usual more often than not. Yet they have a way of revealing what’s really important. They have a way of showing us how very little in the end we really control. We feel our smallness. We reach to God.

I’ve had a few of late – you too I’m sure – but through it I’ve noticed how much I’ve appreciated and enjoyed the simple and good things around me.  See springs been turning on the charm despite me, revealing it’s treasures without me doing anything. The ground has burst on open with life and I have done none of it – it’s all a gift that too often I  rush past.

A drive through the country – always beautiful but I wasn’t expecting this.

The canola blooms on mass layering  the fields in the most amazing vibrant yellow.

Even my garden full of weeds is smiling, showing off her good side with bright red and yellow blooms that I don’t even remember planting.

And these perfectly formed lavender pink roses my neighbor brought me in from her garden that smell so beautiful when I lean in close.

A new garden bed along the side of my house – new plants growing up and taking shape in a spot that’s only ever grown weeds.

 Heres where it started.

 But after much clearing and levelling (a while back) and lots of setting my iphone timer to twenty minutes it’s now on the civilised side of “getting there”.

I’d have loved to say the kids and I had a beautiful time planning and building this little garden together but truly  they couldn’t have cared less.

But these got their attention.

Spring chickens – we now have four baby Bantem Pekin chickens that are, as Ethan and Olivia tell me at least twenty times per day, “ soooooo cute”. We converted one of Ethans reptile cages by adding a feeder, waterer and  heat lamp to give them  a cosy place to grow till they’re ready to go into their big girl’s chicken coop.

We bought this:

But Ethan was dreaming of  this:

A palatial barn red chicken coop with white detail. We compromised, bought a  tin of paint (even though I vowed in a recent post never to buy another tin of paint) and here’s how it turned out.

Just simple pleasures – – – but I’m a big fan of simple.

When life gets complicated simple can bring a measure of the peace and rest we are longing for  and help us sense His sweet and steady presence right with us.

All I know is that life is exponentially sweeter with grateful pauses, with rest, with the release that comes with being small and knowing the wild. Amber Haines

What are you enjoying at the moment. Does simple work for you?

Tracey xx

If you’ve got a minute you can read my latest Women Connect post here

Linking up today with:

Wholehearted Wednesday, Works For Me Wednesday, Three Word Wednesday, Coffee For Your Heart, Sundays Down Under, Celebrate It Sunday, Home Matters Link Party, Coffee and Conversation, Fridays Blog Booster Party