Envision spring, warm breezes and a walk along your garden path.

Now take in the delightful smells and the visual, incredibly created beauty all around you.

How does it make you feel?

Does it calm your busy mind?

Does it help you to appreciate the joys of wonder and the magical spirit of possibilities in your own life?

I have seen those possibilities come to life in all sorts of people this year.  When I show them my garden art stones I see their thoughts and imagination expand to more than just a stone.   While the person is looking dazed and staring into whatever, I often ask, "What are you thinking about?"  She smiles and with a little more coaxing, proclaims that there's too much to think about.  

What I saw was the wonder of creativeness with her own eyes, a way to have more beauty and peace in her life, and a way to give that magical feeling to others.  The possibilities are endless!  I believe that when we start thinking that way, our mind and spirit helps us to make it happen.  We can free our busy minds.  We can appreciate things more.  And we can do more things with our own lives to help us feel the joy of wonderment.  And we can give it to others.  Just look around, be aware, and soak in the beauty that we see every day.

At one of the Farmer's markets, I sold nothing that day and after I was done packing up, a woman with her very young daughter stopped her car beside me.  She leaned over and asked how I had done.  I told her and asked her the same question.  She said, "Not so well.  This was a very slow day." I asked her what she made and with a kind of dejected look, she said that she sells small cakes.  Then imediately her daughter, with a fabulous big smile, said that she really liked my 4 leaf clover.  Apparently they had come over and looked at my displayed stones, but I didn't remember them.  I may have been taking a break and walked around just like they had been doing.

Personally, I had made many, well received, special stones for people this year and had made a lot of newly designed art stones to display, but this 4 leaf wasn't my favorite.  In fact, I didn't even take a picture of the finished stone to put up on my website to sell.  Even though I was sure that nobody would buy it, I thought I would display the actual stone anyway, just to show the uniqueness and possibilities in concrete.

I hesitated, but finally told them both to wait a minute and to stay there as I turned around and walked back toward my van.  I pack my stones in 3 separate layers in my van, but the 4 leaf stone, for some reason, was packed on the top layer, easy to get out.  I quickly brought it back and showed it to her daughter.  She was seated on the passenger side of the vehicle.  I asked if this was the stone that she liked? Her smile and wonder reminded me of my own excitement when I was a child.  The feeling was overwhelming!  Her mother said that she didn't have the money for it, so I asked if she would consider an exchange for one of her small cakes.  Her daughter looked up at me and then anxiously to her mother and you could see her eyes light up with anticipation.  Her mother happily agreed and that bright eyed little girl, staring down at that stone, now placed on her lap, was full of her magical, beautiful spirit.  I exclaimed, "With those happy eyes you don't need any luck do you?  What's your wish?"  She just looked up at me, curiously smiling with her eyes, and looked back down again, staring and admiring her stone.  What she saw in that simple concrete stone was hers to contemplate.