Yesterday I was looking ahead to my birthday, which is today.

I reflected on the past, thinking back to various things that I’ve experienced in my life. I also focused a bit on Noah – building an ark in a desert – where it didn’t rain. What a legend!! And, today, I’m, thinking about a barren field. You can read that here – “Some Pre birthday reflections”

This year, the field above has been the most stunning yellow colour, when the rape seed flowers came out. Later, they died off and were eventually cut down by a combine harvester to harvest the seeds. And, then, the field was worked on some more and ended up looking like the picture above. It doesn’t look especially pretty right now!

In fact, right now, it looks like an utter barren wasteland. But it really isn’t worthless, regardless of how it looks because, in time, more seed will be planted so it can grow a new crop.

How it looks – now – doesn’t paint a full picture of what this field went through over the past twelve months; it doesn’t reflect what it is going to go through for the next twelve months either. It is – literally – an incomplete picture, which doesn’t tell the whole story. Not at all!

My cards from my family

As a family we’ve made each other home made cards for a VERY long time. The four below are mine from my birthday today. I’m not going to sway who made which card – that’s personal. But, each one is as unique as the person who made it and the relationship we have.

While the field only tells a partial story – as do the cards and their creators – the banner, below, has a lot of history for us.

It’s adorned many homes we’ve lived in, since the late 1990s, whenever birthdays happen. It’s nearly thirty years old and has seen many moments of laughter and quite a few tears too. We never pretend to be happy on birthdays – we either are or we aren’t. In our home – and in our family – we always allow people to be who they are and we never put on a front. That’s just too tiring.

And this banner, battered, creased and looking a little sorry for itself, still comes out 5 times each year and watches over our celebrations.

A gift I am most excited to receive

This is a plastic bottle. That’s not all that exciting! Only this particular one can be frozen (it’s wrapped, inside, by a cool pack to keep the contents cooler for much longer). It doesn’t leak and you can dish wash it. Honestly, what’s not to like?!?

My last bottle (this is my third) finally died after many years of use on walks up mountains and accompanied me on many cycles. The one before that was stolen! They really are rather good and people who’ve seen us with them often ask where they can get them,

Why am I talking about a bottle that holds water? Well, as much as the features are pretty cool – and they really are – this one matters because, as a family, you’re not likely to see us without a bottle each, like the one above.

Yes, we have the same type of bottle, although, no, they don’t match!

They are special to us, however, because the investment is worth it. They last ages and the after sales support is out of this world.

The investment in the large farmer’s field is worth it – if you’ve seen farmers working virtually around the clock, you’ll understand how they don’t like wasting their time. So you can accept that their efforts are worthwhile. It is worth their time!

The investment in the birthday banner might be easier to measure, as it has looked over many, many birthdays. The few £££ we spent buying, many years ago, has been very worthwhile as far any expenditure can be.

The investment in the cards above are worthwhile too – they tend to get saved so we can look at them again when we want to. That reminds us how very loved we each are. Their original purpose gets revisited each time we look at them again.

And God took time to invest in you and me, because He knows we’re worth investing in too. He hand made you. When you consider how He spoke the world into being, but makes each one of us by hand, it reminds us just how very precious each and every one of us is – made on purpose and with purpose.

Right, I’m off for a birthday dinner and then, God willing, some more birthday cake 😁

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