Seeds of Beauty

 Sticker on a trash can near my workplace:

HAIL MARY full of Grace
KICK  I.C.E. out of This Place

Mary stands on a snake labeled ICE--traditional iconography, based on God telling the serpent in Genesis that the seed of Eve "shall crush thy head".

This sticker reminds me, I haven't yet put up my "lets hold hands" prints. Largely because the weather has been damp,
 and they are paper.

I do continue to put up God's eyes, and they continue to be taken at a slow rate, so the fence is still ringed with these bits of brightness. And the wool yarn and natural sticks weather very well!
(I'd run low on sticks, but I found a lot when I went to the lake for the Marching Parade.)
I hung these on the fence yesterday.

These seem to be something I can do... and that I DO do. 
I enjoy making them, and it lifts my heart a wee bit to see these plucky bits of beauty out in the world. Especially now a recent wave of above-freezing weather brings slushy, dirty snow and trash. 
 I imagine, I hope, they continue to give other people a tiny lift too.

My goodness, this has been a challenging quarter-century, eh?
I wrote a long, in-depth list of events & images (hanging chads, burning towers, Skittles, sunflowers, face masks)... then decided they don't need amplifying and deleted the list.
They already take up plenty of (too much?) space in our consciousnesses.

I do feel wearied, but I'm going to head into the New Year with the intention of watering the seeds of beauty. 
I will focus on small things I can do every day, as if misting houseplants.

Making small things of yarn. 

Eating greens.
A smile at work. 
A prayer offered:

Please help me, Mary, share your grace. 
Be with me, walk with me.
Amen.