Counting My Blessings - One Pumpkin at a Time

So Peace Day, Peace Week and Gandhi's birthday are over, but I'm still counting my blessings, big and small (a lot has been happening).

Something that may not seem like much has brought a lot of joy for me and my kids. Earlier in June we discovered a "volunteer" pumpkin plant in our little Chicago backyard.

Volunteer pumpkin plant spreading through our back yard.

It's a volunteer because we didn't intentionally plant it. It's origins probably come from an old Halloween pumpkin I threw in the garden to decompose a few years ago. Amazing how life is patient and persistent.

My kids and I would check on the plant regularly with anticipation. We didn't know what kind of pumpkins would show up. I thought they would be small since I usually put the large pumpkins in  the front garden to decompose.

It took a while - and spread a lot - before we saw the first pumpkin take hold. We could tell it was going to be big. And it grew quite fast. We had a lot of fun checking on it and wandering around to see if anything else was growing - but no such luck.

Then one day the big round pumpkin started turning orange! That was a great day of excitement. Why? I don't know if I can really answer this - for me I just love the outdoors and I love to watch life happen. I'm not sure why the kids liked it so much. I suppose it's a little adventure in the backyard - I remember having lots of fun in my backyard as a kid - so why not?

About the same time we could see that two other pumpkins started to grow. Was it a miracle? (Did I mention I have 3 kids?). My son, 5 years old and the youngest, immediately proclaimed the big orange one was his. Fortunately for me - I had a pumpkin for each kid.

This Sunday I hacked down the large pumpkin vine that had taken over a third of my yard, growing over my tomatoes, knocking over my wildflowers. But it was time. We put the three large pumpkins out in front for Halloween. Not sure if I can bring myself to carve them.

Even luckier though - additional small blessings - my brother had volunteer pumpkins in his yard...about 20 or so, not miniature, but a smaller version. So to our delight we ended up with three more.

I don't know why it was such a thrill - but there is so much satisfaction in the experience of watching something grow, change, and come to fruition. A miniature life-cycle in my very own backyard. And to share that thrill with my kids, to watch them get excited about growing pumpkins, well, that is a big blessing to me. After all, what joy is there in life if you cannot share?