Sat down to put pen to paper late afternoon and I turned over my tea glass, twice! Cleaned it up, raking all the ice back in the glass, and knocked it over again cleaning up the spilled tea. Probably too late to be drinking tea anyway. We don’t need to cry over spilt milk or spilt tea. We can’t change past events we just have to move on and not stress about them. Life happens, we can’t stop it. Just hop on board and enjoy the ride with all its roller coaster up and downs.

My cousin Blake told me they were having a family dinner once when one of his sister’s children knocked over their glass of milk and immediately started crying, apologizing profusely, afraid of getting in trouble for making a mess on the table. Blake said, “I told them it was just a glass of milk and we could clean it up and then I reached over and knocked over two other glasses of milk.” What a great way to look at life’s little milk spills that we all have from time to time. Life really is too short to worry about spilt milk so we need to clean it up and get over it.

Today was a pretty day. Pretty is defined as attractive in a delicate way without being truly beautiful or handsome. Well, I take pretty back and describe today as beautiful, a word I use probably in every other sentence but sometimes it’s just the right choice. Every night I look up synonyms for the word beautiful but ending typing the word beautiful.

Father Sky picked up his pastels this morning, lit his Cuban cigar, and sketched a dark blue ocean on his sky canvas with dazzling white clouds of foam undulating across the heavens. Some of the clouds were highlighted pale gray with smoke from his cigar. The breeze was lightly pinging one note at a time on the wind chimes, the world quiet and peaceful. I put my head back on the swing chain and let the sun warm my face. I was in my happy place, perched in my swing. I was rudely awakened back to the world by the fighting purple finches in the sunflower garden. Those little raspberry colored birds love a good squabble like old maid sisters love quarreling of over their breakfast biscuits.

Now I’m in bird watching mode. Counted 27 cardinals that I could see on the other side of the yard. One of the porch pillars blocked my view so I just quit counting. Didn’t want to get up out of the swing and scare them away with my counting. Must have been a day the cardinal parents all booted their babies out of their nests and were celebrating with a restaurant dinner. A few doves and the red bellied woodpecker joined the group later. A little brownish squirrel disrupted them as he frolicked under the feeders and jumped on the bird bath for a drink of water.

My Florida cousin friend enjoys researching quotes like I do and sometimes sends her own written quotes. She credited herself with this one today — “The umbrellas of life have many tiers.” I’d never thought of God’s love as an umbrella till I read her thoughts. She said, “I was thinking about God’s umbrella of love. When we take our first breath, he opens the umbrella and protects us all of our days and nights. We are calmed by his unconditional love. It is our choice to leave that umbrella open and give thanks. Our home provides small umbrellas of comfort. The trees offer an umbrella of shade. The oceans offer an umbrella of travel, food supply, and recreation. Our small towns offer an umbrella of education, involvement, and imagination.” Thanks for your thoughts. The umbrellas of life do have many tiers!

The umbrella symbolizes the canopy of heaven that shelters and protects us. God is an umbrella of grace and love opened over our lives to give us hope when trials and tribulations rain down. He can shelter us in his arms and hold us close under his canopy of faithfulness. Without our umbrella of faith, we’ll be miserable when life’s storms blow in. Our life’s journey is much harder without his shelter. We fall heir to God’s umbrella when we give our hearts to him through our prayers and thanksgiving.

Psalm 91 reads, “Whoever dwells in the shelter of the Most High will rest in the shadow of the Almighty. I will say of the Lord, He is my refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust.” God has not promised us sunny skies all the time and rain will eventually fall but under God’s protection, his umbrella of faithfulness will be our shield. Give your heart to Jesus and open his umbrella of faith over your life.

“When we gave our hearts to Christ, He acts like an umbrella to shelter us.”  — Christina Corbitt