My husband built me a new desk as one of the final projects in our house renovation. It sits right in front of a window overlooking one of the original apple trees on our forty year old property. Two weeks ago the tree started to bloom. It is a stunning thing - it looks gorgeous yes, but more than that it is the smell - delicate and sweet. When you stand under it you can feel the way the whole tree is absolutely alive with hundreds of bees buzzing among the blossoms.

This picture isn't from this year. I kept meaning to get a shot but didn't get my camera out in time. A rain storm we really needed washed them away before I anticipated in the midst of an overfilled week. This picture isn't from last year either because last year I was depressed and reeling from death. It's a quick one I snapped on my phone from the year before and all three of my kiddos are there, enjoying the gift of the blooms and the rain showers, tinier than it seems they ever were.

Two years can go by just like that. I've been told and I've seen it myself, the truth that days (especially if they are dark) can drag on and on and on. Yet somehow I was just rocking my last baby under the stars and now she is about to be five.

I haven't written much here the past year but it feels like it is time again. Time to bring some presence back to this place where I like to reflect about love and life and God and belovedness.

One way I'm going to ease myself in without feeling a need to be too serious or too wordy is a summer series. I'm calling it 'Summer is for...' Just a photo or two with a few words. A chance to capture a few moments of gratitude and a few memories for the future hopefully once a week or so because summer is for savouring.

Summer is for biking in the middle of the day under gorgeous skies just because it is fun and we have nothing else to do.

Summer is for reading bedtime stories in the gazebo while the sun goes down.

Summer is for little girls with pink toenails.

Summer is for new life.

(If you blog or instagram I'd love to see what you are using your summer for too.)

It turned out to be a hard week to write about hope. This week my little view of the world seemed to have more than it's share of loss, mourning, injustice, hardship, sadness, sickness. When I think about what I hope for it's this: wholeness for people and planet. Kingdom come. I think this is why Barbara Kingsolver says the most you can do with your life when you have figured out what you hope for is to live inside that hope. 'Not admire it from a distance but live right in it, under it's roof.'

How many of us have the gumption, the strength in spirit really to do that - to say 'I hope for goodness, wholeness, light and well being and most of all I hope for love' and stay there living with it in a week like this one. In a world like this one.

When I was depressed I couldn't. The mind lies to you and says there is no hope, there is only more drudgery. There is only more getting through, there is only more of this. There might only be more darkness.

I'm still learning this the thirties are more than tired - they can be a breeding ground for mental illness.

I'll end with this: I believe in Jesus but sometimes I feel like I can't see. So I look for the light he brings instead. I see it in money raised for a new widow. I see it in people speaking up and demonstrating about oppression. I see it in meals cooked and kids looked after and 'how are you doing' texts sent with some chocolate on the side. I see it in fair trade Christmas gifts and spending time with family who are hard to love and cups of tea shared with friends. I see it in parents who work hard at jobs they wish they didn't have to go to. I see it in diapers changed and toddlers consoled and books read. I see it in prayers prayed and love sent. I see it when I look in your eyes.