Still Sunday December 8, 2013....

     I am still having a hard time wrapping my mind around the fact it's December already.  I still feel as though we were just hanging up the coats from last winter and here we are starting another winter.   I enjoy, oddly enough, the different seasons and taking care of the yard during each one.  In the Spring I'm grateful to watch the new flowers poke up, sometimes through a patch of snow.
     In the Summer I am grateful to mow the lawn and smell the fresh cut grass, I am grateful to plant a garden and watch it grow vegetables to feed my family. I am grateful to plant flower beds and care for them watching them grow and thrive in color and size.   I am thankful for the warm sun and the blue sky.
     In the Fall I am thankful for the brilliant colors on the trees and in the mountains.  I am thankful for the leaves falling as the temperatures drop and the rains begin.  Falling to the ground crunchy and smelling wonderful.  I love the crunch as you stomp through them and the smell of Fall and Halloween.
     In the Winter I am grateful for many things that don't have to do with the weather.  I don't appreciate the bitter cold, the wet icy snow, the chill winds and bitter long nights.   I am grateful for the splendid beauty of it all as it glistens in the moonlight.  I am grateful for it cleaning out the air and bringing the sun out briefly to warm my face.
     I don't know where the year went.  I don't know what I have done to make it worthwhile if anything, and I have decided in this quest to be happy I should probably be moving forward, so I also want to add a goal to the New Year of happiness.   I don't know what the goal will be yet but I want to accomplish something next year.