Tribute to an Amazing Friend

I had been lamenting the fact that I was not likely to have a garden this year because despite all of my wonderful plans, life with baby was not shaping up to allow me to do the work that needed to be done to get things weeded and planted.  I made the mistake of mentioning this to a friend of mine last week, and being the amazing person she is, she snuck into my backyard while we were gone for the afternoon and weeded 5 of our 6 garden boxes.  She tried to do it anonymously, but it wasn't hard to figure out who did it.  How many people do you know who would willingly weed 5 garden boxes that looked like this?

Pretty scary huh? Now, thanks to this amazing friend, we have 5 boxes that look like this,

and are full of all sorts of wonderful spring vegetable seeds, just waiting to sprout and bring joy to our table for the next several months.  

I can't say enough words of praise for this friend.  She is constantly looking for ways to serve others and doing it.  She is an amazing example to me.  After she did this for us I came across this quote from Marjorie Pay Hinkley that summarizes the kind of woman I think she is and the kind of woman that I want to be. “I don’t want to drive up to the pearly gates in a shiny sports car, wearing beautifully, tailored clothes, my hair expertly coiffed, and with long, perfectly manicured fingernails. I want to drive up in a station wagon that has mud on the wheels from taking kids to scout camp. I want to be there with grass stains on my shoes from mowing Sister Schenk’s lawn. I want to be there with a smudge of peanut butter on my shirt from making sandwiches for a sick neighbor’s children. I want to be there with a little dirt under my fingernails from helping to weed someone’s garden. I want to be there with children’s sticky kisses on my cheeks and the tears of a friend on my shoulder. I want the Lord to know I was really here and that I really lived.” Marjorie Pay Hinckley