When I was little we had a sand-box in our backyard.

I LOVED our sandbox!  Every hour in that rectangular box brought me great JOY!

And I spent hours there.

Sometimes alone & sometimes with my sister

and sometimes with the most recent stray-dog I’d brought home!

For some reason though I could never keep track of the sand-shovels.  They often seemed to be MIA.

(This may or may not have had something to do with the stray-dogs.)

The missing sand tools never deterred my time spent digging and building in the sand though. Because the dilemna was easily rectified by using the large silver tablespoons from my mother’s kitchen!

It may have taken longer digging through the sand, tablespoon by tablespoon, but this mattered not to me!   Although it did seem to matter a great deal to my dear mother who  didn’t seem to quite understand, “why her spoons were never returned to the kitchen drawers.”

(This may or may not have had something to do with the stray-dogs.)

My fascination with the sandbox was in the hours of “discovery” it provided!  What wonderful castles could I build? What treasures would I unbury?  And while the dogs often pawed or wagged over a coveted sandcastle creation, they  were great contributors to the number of treasures they would bury (there) for me to unearth!

(Thankfully, none of these items resembled items a cat may or may not have left behind.)

During the month of January God took me back to the sandbox.

But this time it has been a heart-space I’ve been sifting and digging through.

And not unlike the rectangular sand-filled-box in the backyard I have been uncovering surprise treasures and wonderful looking creations are being built, there in its chambers,

tablespoon by tablespoon. 

So many of the treasures unburied were found in the January Silence  I observed, just as my gal-pal St. Faustina Kowalska taught me reading through her Diary. I cannot wait to share with you the mercy given & what has been renewed in me as a result.  But before I do I want to touch on a very important matter…

Sometimes, when we are reading blogs or magazine articles or books we can be wooed into believing, “this life I am reading about is so verily perfect…”  But hopefully we will remember  no life is perfect.

Even the spiritual life.

It’s bumpy.

And lumpy.

It stretches you and sometimes you are rather tired & worn-out from the strain. And the shovels or spoons you may need to dig-out, around, or through are no where to be found!

(I wonder if stray dogs may or may not be sent straight from heaven.)

Fellow blogger Rosalie Contrite, under the guise of appearance & beauty explains this quite wonderfully in her recent post,  Let’s be honest: social media isn’t reality.

Certainly my own spiritual life doesn’t always look pretty and I do not ever want to portray otherwise.  But these lumps, bumps, and emotional bruises are so verily worth the growth created and the many treasures received as a result.  Because often times that’s where the Joy lies! That’s where we discover all the sifting and digging and messiness reveals the great treasure the Creator always desired we’d unearth!

 I hope to have the opportunity to share some of these newfound treasures & creations.  Just remember it’s not a perfect life I’m looking to share, simply one thats ultimate goal is to share its JOY with you…in all the many ways it has been unearthed!

And sometimes that just may happen…

tablespoon by tablespoon!! 

(And I do so verily hope there may or may not be stray dogs involved!)

No matter shovel or spoon, what will you unearth today?

hugs n’ blessings for discovered treasures and Joy create!