I think we could call this, ‘the day the street woke up’. A bit of warm weather, the merest whiff of spring, and everything and everyone comes alive.
The day started with sunshine coming through the window. I love that on a Saturday when the day is ours, and with a quick bleary-eyed glance at The Weather Network app, supposed to be warm – and by warm I mean 16℃. I was torn between getting up and going or reading for a while. Generous Justice by Timothy Keller has me gripped. More on that one day soon.
Still, the days are cooler to begin with so the street doesn’t get going until mid morning. Our two youngest girls with their friends down the street continuing to draw their mega-hopscotch that they began yesterday. Tim, trying to mend the dishwasher while wanting to be getting on with things outside, decided that we should go and buy some topsoil for the vegetable garden, which leads to the need to get hold of a wheelbarrow to move the soil (about time after begging and borrowing our neighbours’ barrows for four years). When that was done the afternoon was filled with clearing pine needles, moving soil, cleaning pots, re-potting seedlings, planting some more seeds and setting up the trampoline.
There’s noise. Hockey being played in our neighbours’ driveway, men wielding chainsaws in back yards pruning back trees or chopping them down, someone else scattering seed on their front lawn, others sorting out their trailers ready for weekend getaways, barbecues lit, children who we don’t even know bouncing on our trampoline, laughter and talking. Not even a mention of, ‘I’m bored’ – well, apart from eldest girl stuck inside writing an essay on the invention of the telephone. One neighbour came over to congratulate the girls on their hopscotch efforts. We are blessed to live in a friendly neighbourhood.
It’s like we’ve all been ploughing through the winter with our heads down, in our own little worlds, weighed down with the cold days and then a little change in the weather and the weight is lifted. We spill outside in celebration. Perfect timing for a Saturday. Even if it is just for today, we’re glad it’s spring.
Emma's English Kitchen 