today's treasure

It's June 1st tomorrow, and I've missed my chance to share signs of spring with my readers. As I view blogging more as an opportunity to trade comments than a diary, I like to post something that inspires people to write back. So, how about sharing some life treasures instead? Our treasure this week involved two baby mice.

My four-year-old and I discovered them in the grass near the porch, so tiny they lacked hair and open eyes. No doubt, one of our felines dispatched with their mother. My daughter carefully collected them in her octogonal box and began mothering them. She fed them for two days with an eye dropper and kept warming them in her hands. Snowflake and Geranium. Her instincts were very sweet. She drew a wardrobe of little pink dresses on paper and cut them out. She drew baby blankets decorated with little flowers and taped them to the box. At the library, she selected Margaret Wise Brown's collection of stories entitled Mouse of My Heart. I read aloud the stories she selected for the mice. Two days later, she buried them in her flower box underneath some pansies so she would know where they were. These were all her ideas, I just sat back and smiled.

I am very awed by these simple expressions of love. My way of saving this treasure is to write this vignette, keeping it in my octagonal box of memories. That and this photo of little pink paper dresses.