The Rose Garden

At an early age I saw a challenge I couldn't resist: Walking the post that surrounded my mom's rose garden. Imagine round vertical posts steps set up in a half moon with the tallest post in the middle and the shortest posts at the ends. On one side of the wall of post is sedum with lots of bees and on the other prickly rose bushes with fragrant colorful flowers.

It became part of my adventures around the acres surrounding my parents house. The post were a narrow bridge that connected two kingdoms and if I fell to either side I could become hurt. If I lost balance, I always fell towards the rose bushes narrowing escaping deep gouges in my skin. The minor scrapes sure beat shot in the arm for my allergies to bees stings.

Over time it came to a point of how fast I could conquer or what could I balance in my hands on the uneven row of posts.

What I learned during these challenges was to face my fears, be creative in applied thought, to accept adventures that come your way and take away learnings you can utilize in the future.

The Pond

One of the best things about our house growing up in the summer and winter was the pond at the far end of the property. Here is where I learned to swim, canoe, fish, dive, ice skate, make boats that float and train dogs. I also met some neat creatures above and under the water. The pond was filled with blue gills, bass, cat fish, crawfish, turtles, frogs, toads, ducks, geese and other things. I would give names to all my new little friends. Almost everyday I would visit and swim for hours. My parents almost thought I was part fish from the amount of time I spent in water each day.

The neat part about water, once you learn how to swim and float, is you are now exposed to another world that lives within our world contained by the ground walls. If you learn to float, it makes you feel weightless and allows you to imagine what it would feel like to be in outer space. When diving in the water you discover another way to move in a direction without walking or touching ground. You also discover how precious

air is to your body for life and there are somethings you just can't take for granite. Just like how water is precious to fish for life.

Next time you take a leap into a body of water, think about what it provides you and develop an adventure around your experience. Did you be come a mermaid or merman? Did you help a baby fish escape from a big fish? Did a duck carry away frog eggs on it's feet to another body of water to help develop another world? It is up to you.

Queen Anne's Lace

Summer brings some of the most beautiful flowers, but to me the best is a field full of wild flowers. Bright periwinkle, magenta, purple, pink, yellow and white blowing in the wind on a peaceful day. Even if it wasn't a peaceful day, your mind could get enchanted by the swaying of flowers in the wind.

I would pick the color flowers and make bouquets for unique crowning ceremony. It took the most special wild flower of them all to create the crown: Queen Anne's Lace.

A flower that is made up of a bunch of mini flowers into the form that looks like lace. The design also lent it to be a beautiful crown to celebrate winning back territory from mean shadow people for the night riders that protect the evening skies or present a new princess for one of the secret creatures that protect the different earth elements. The Queen Anne's Lace to me was a great symbol of something that looked beautiful and delicate, yet strong and durable. Even the smallest dis formed Queen Anne's Lace was beautiful. With this being said, the crown was a symbol of beauty, strength and passion to treat all things equal and with fairness.

Next time you pass a field, ditch or a small patch of wild flowers, think about the beauty that these simple flowers bring to our surroundings.

Dogs are a girl's best friend

Growing up I had several best friends...Sugar, Bear, Snowball, Ace, Prince, and Amus. Not the most typical names for best friends, but they were not the human best friends people expect you to rattle off. Together my best friends and I would run through fields, play in the play house, dig through snow, fish in the pond and, my favorite, take naps in the cool grass in the warm sun. They never tried to tell me what to do, but knew when to snuggle to make me feel better.

I learned from my best friends the responsibility of keeping time (feeding time), ability to trust and use all your senses. Always found it amazing that I always new what my friends wanted without a word ever being spoken. It was the eyes, body moments and facial expressions that told their needs. I think it is key in growing up to learn to read your surroundings.

Today the little things mean so much in a world that moves very fast. I take adventures with my best friends...Buddy, Chloe & Shamus. We walk through the neighborhood finding rabbits, birds and bugs. Play freebie in the yard and take long naps in the sun. They make me alert about my surroundings with a twitch, sniff or growl. All done from the heart not requiring much but love and a good home.

Learn to take an adventure with your best animal friend and don't forget to thank them with love and a good home. If you don't have an animal friend, then image the adventure the one walking by you with their best human friend is having and smile.

Night Tag

At night in the country it becomes quite dark, unless the moon is out in a clear sky. The clearest thing you can see on a warm cloudy night is a lighting bug. Due to the lack of vision you start to rely on other senses: Smell, Touch & Hearing.

Relying on low vision, touch, smell and sound the game of night tag becomes a fun way to learn to appreciate everything we take for granite during the daylight. The way night tag works is there are set limits in which the players can roam in a defined outdoor space. There can be one person or a team divided from the group to catch all the other people hiding in the dark. The first person caught is the next catcher or gets to select the team of catchers that will work with them. This game can go on for hours.

Learning not to be afraid of the dark through a simple game allowed me to develop fun night adventures that expanded my days and my imagination.