The Garden Holds Sadness and Joy

A small space can hold many feelings, intentional holiday planning, and a favorite picture book from an Indigenous author/illustrator team

How was your Thanksgiving? Those who know me might be surprised that I absolutely loved Thanksgiving this year! I am not a Thanksgiving person at all. I come by this naturally. Mine is not a Thanksgiving family. And as a lifelong vegetarian who hates football and visited the Trail of Tears museum at a young age, I do not get it. My favorite memories of Thanksgiving involve amazing Lebanese takeout at my grandparents’ house. So what was so great this year? Our family decided to lean into our take-out tradition! We went to my parents’ for vegan takeout from St. Veg and amazing chocolate pie from a local bakery. Then we toured the light display at a local park to add some festivity. Very little work. Zero stress. I promised this newsletter would not be covert homesteading content, and my Thanksgiving is the proof!

You also have pics of disembodied turkey feet in your photo library, right? Don’t worry, not a turkey murderer—just go to a lot of kids’ nature programs! Think I’ll just add a “subscribe” button here…

Thanks for reading The Family Garden! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.

During these last few days, I’ve also been trying to linger in the garden, even in the cold. For the previous weeks, I’ve been avoiding my garden and I want to reverse the habit. That’s probably not the correct thing to say in a gardening newsletter, but it’s true. I had many plans for our garden that began with “If Harris wins, we’ll…” The thing is, Harris losing means so much for the world, but immediately for our family, it means the possibility of a move.

I’m married to one of those swamp creatures the incoming administration is so eager to drain. Even if his job is safe, a big if, it probably wouldn’t be very pleasant. A new job must be found, and it doesn’t feel like location can be a deciding factor. We are hopeful that we will be able to stay here, but I’m trying not to be attached to the idea.

The garden feels like an embodiment of what will be lost, on a personal level, and in a bigger sense. Will the little creatures survive four years (or more) of drill baby drill? Will anyone protect the wild places they rely on? What will the natural world be when The Kid is grown? Does planting my little corner with care matter when the world is on fire? I don’t always have the stomach to look at what could be lost.

But, also during these weeks, The Kid turned a year older and we had a party. Kids we love ran joyously through the garden. They dug in the sandbox. They ate cookie cake. Toddlers contemplated eating our rocks. The noise and mess and life were glorious. That is as real as the sadness.

I do believe that we can mitigate some of the horror to come if we commit to planting wild spaces, shrinking our personal carbon footprints, working at the community level (and where possible, state level) for climate solutions, educating the next generation, and spreading these ideas everywhere we can. Many things that might once have taken a back burner to make room for fighting for national policy change are now fully cooking, and maybe they always should have been. I will be sharing many of my thoughts and actions in the coming months. Sharing with community keeps me accountable. But for now, my big goal is to linger in the garden as I gather some dried bits for bouquets and seeds for planting, because my little space still matters to my family and to the creature friends who visit.

Observe:

This is a great time to think about bee homes. Many of our native bees make homes in dead, hollow branches. I was reminded of the importance of dead stems when The Kid picked up a cute flyer from a local park explaining cavity-nesting bee homes. There are some great explanations of how to create homes for bees, but it all basically comes down to trimming the tops of plants, but leaving the stems in place.

In general, we need to train our eyes to stop viewing clearing out and cleaning up as positives in the garden. I admit that I find this shift difficult. I know many people quickly fall in love with messy gardens, but it has taken some adjusting for me. The big thing that has helped is actively looking at the little creatures making their homes and finding their food in the garden. I know that I will begin to see all those dead stems as joyful rather than messy if I see them as a bee village. Plus, I think The Kid will happily spend a LONG time looking for signs of bees in stems and making “better” homes for them.

Do:

If you need something cathartic to do, I recommend smashing pumpkins! We still had solid Halloween pumpkins that had served for fall display. I let The Kid drop the smaller one from our balcony onto the rocks below, and then take the other two into the yard to smash with rocks and sticks. This is all kids ever really want to do, I think! I can’t overstate how joyous they are when you give them permission to smash things in the yard.

Now we’re leaving the pumpkins to decompose on the garden soil and word has spread in squirrel-land. We have a bold little visitors who will sneak seeds while we are only feet away. Sorry this picture is grainy. It’s from our security camera that really functions as a wildlife camera. Sometimes the squirrel is brave and enters the yard while we’re there and then feasts a few feet away on the fence.

Read:

I’m putting a lot of my book energy into planning and ordering for holiday presents and holiday planning. I’ll share more of that in a follow-up post. However, I checked out The Rhythm of Family, Discovering a Sense of Wonder Through the Seasons by Amanda Blake Soule. It’s over a decade old now, but it holds up in the way that writing about seasonality and simple living does. If you followed her blog, you’ll know that her voice is soothing and her descriptions are lovely. I appreciate that the crafts and activities are substantial projects that you can sink your teeth into.

We also enjoyed Biindigen! Amik Says Welcome. It’s a beautiful picture book about my favorite animal, the beaver! The author and illustrator bring an Indigenous perspective to the language and art. They do a beautiful job showing an interconnected natural world. But, it’s also fun—not at all heavy in its message. I’m loving the array of joyful Indigenous books that have been published in the last few years, and hope we see so many more. We loved Biindigen so much that I think it’s going on the “buy” list.

Sometimes I like to take pics of books in realistic places instead of staged beautiful places, so here you go!

Contemplate:

I think now is the perfect time to start considering our intentions for this holiday season. Last year was a breaking point for me with regard to Christmas. I found myself crying in my office on Christmas Eve because it all felt overwhelming and, worse, devoid of meaning. I felt like I was following a script for creating a holiday that was largely invented by TV and corporations to sell a bunch of stuff. The day itself was fun, but didn’t feel worth the pain. I’m sure there is a better way.

This year, I have even less of a stomach for it, and I think many others are feeling the same way. I’ve seen discussions about no-buy Christmas, more spiritual Christmas (from people who aren’t fundamentalists), and simpler Christmas. I’ve also noticed a trend toward researching older traditions and reviving them. I’m all for all of these choices! I imagine there are some similar feelings for holidays from other faiths, but I’m woefully ignorant of them. I would love to hear how families of other faiths and cultures are rethinking and reshaping holidays to make them more meaningful and less harmful.

More than just thinking about how to do Christmas, I’m wondering how much weight I want to give Christmas in our family. I have realized that I simply don’t want to celebrate a holiday without it involving community or spiritual connections. We will need to do some level of Christmas celebration, because it matters to The Kid and my parents, but I don’t know if I plan to make Christmas magic this year. I’m spending a few quiet evening deciding if I want to make Christmas something that fits our family, or if I want to move some of our celebration to the solstice.

Regardless of what path you choose, if you don’t already have a way of celebrating that works for you, consider this a friendly reminder from an expert procrastinator that now is a great time to think about what you want. It is very difficult (speaking 100% from experience) to create a plan for a more meaningful and intentional holiday at the last minute. The last minute is when you (by you, I mean me) run to Target and fall prey to the junk they are selling.

Some questions I’m asking myself:

1. Can a holiday be meaningful to me when I don’t believe in the religious story behind it? Are the traditions enough?

2. Does a very liberally interpreted version of Christianity hold any appeal to me? Is it something I want to pass along to my child as part of our heritage?

3. Could we find enough meaning in celebrating the solstice? Would it feel lonely because it is out of sync with our culture?

4. Regardless of what we choose to celebrate, how can we better incorporate community? How can we lighten our impact on the planet? How can we connect with something deeper?

5. Maybe most importantly, how can the holiday be restful and fun for everyone, not a burden that leaves one person in a puddle of tears (cough, cough) while fun for everyone else?

In case someone needs a little silly, here’s Cabbage feeling crabby about a crab on her head. It’s not always easy for elderly cat who loves a small human!

Spending Election Day in the Garden

How are you spending your day?

It’s election day, did you notice? When I planned this newsletter, I first wrote “leaves” for the topic for today. I don’t think that cuts it, though. I know I can’t focus on leaves today. Or at least, not just on leaves. 

I’ve been pondering shame and guilt a lot. Two of my relationships have been strained this election season not by being on different sides, but by shame over not doing “enough.” As a recovering martyr-type and a person with invisible disabilities, I’m fairly immune to this type of shaming. However, my ability to comfortably set boundaries around my capacity to give is a hard-won skill, so here are a few thoughts in case they help.

Thanks for reading The Family Garden! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.

If you vote, that is enough. If you gave what you had the capacity to give, that is wonderful. If Trump wins, you are not responsible for that outcome--people who voted for Trump are. If Harris wins, your vote entitles you to celebrate. No one needs to do a certain amount of work to deserve compassion when they feel sorrow or fear. No one needs to earn their happiness. 

This is a newsletter about how our little gardens can help save the world, but I want to be very clear that none of us individually shoulders the weight of saving the world, and no one is failing when they don’t have the capacity to give. 

If you are worried that you will wake up tomorrow and wish you had done more, please let that worry go. You deserve to feel what you feel about the election without shame. You deserve to rest and make space to enjoy your life. You deserve to sit in the garden without guilt. 

OK, so now that I’ve shared those thoughts, what exactly will I be doing with myself today? How do I plan to make space for feeling and rest? How do I plan to entertain an energetic five-year-old while I just want to obsessively check my phone or stare blankly at the wall?

Observe:

Observe anything outside! Really, anything to focus your attention on the natural world around us instead of the election. Personally, I recommend squirrels. Kids and adults will happily watch squirrels, so no one will yell that they are bored. And the thing is, the squirrels do not care one little bit about our election. They have acorns to bury! They have dogs to yell at! They will lure a kid close and then twitch their tales just out of reach! Remembering all the creatures unconcerned with our human nonsense is the most grounding thing in the world to me.

You can also watch this ladybug emerge into the world! The Kid found the pupa on a leaf at our farmers’ market. Our park, which houses the market, tends to be well-trampled and overly manicured, so we brought the leaf home. We set it on the counter (our home is…wild? I think that’s a kind word for it) while we started making some muffins. I assumed we had time before anything happened.

Nope! I looked over and that guy was wiggling! The Kid and I frantically called my husband to join and we all ran to the backyard. There, we watched the amazing process of a ladybug emerging. If you aren’t familiar with the lifecycle of ladybugs, check it out here. 

It looks white when it comes out because it takes them a few days to gain their color and spots. We gave the little one a cozy home under our blackberry bush. 

Here are a couple other visitors to our yard the last two weeks:

Read:

We have a cozy reading chair in our living room. If I know we will be home for long stretches of the following day, I like to set out a few books in the chair. The Kid is not at all required to read these, and he is more than welcome to pick other books, but I find that the invitation is often helpful. We usually choose to read at least one of the books. Last night, I put out The Mysteries of the Universe (DK), Bear and Bird The Stars and Other Stories by Jarvis, and The End Is Just the Beginning by Mike Bender. 

We are currently studying space and the formation of Earth in our homeschool, which is part of the spacey theme. However, I have also found studying the history of the universe to be an incredible counterweight to the election. I really can’t recommend Bear and Bird books enough. They are the sweetest, gentlest tales. We checked it out from the library and The Kid immediately told me I needed to buy it--big recommendation from my little guy.

I am reading Pema Chodron’s Welcoming the Unwelcome. I know this isn’t a groundbreaking recommendation, but it is the right one for the moment. I have read it before and I picked up a copy from the library a few weeks ago. I’ve been bringing it to breakfast each morning to read a little and then reading bits during the day when I can. 

Do: 

I can understand going into the woods or to the beach--somewhere dramatic and beautiful today. I think I am too anxious for these options, though. I want to be close to home and to see family and friends today. Today will be a day for the garden and the neighborhood park and maybe meeting up with friends if their voting plans allow. 

I was about to share a big project today, but then a friend texted about how hard it was to wrangle the kids and make it to vote. If you haven’t voted yet, this probably isn’t the day for projects! Also, if you are actively volunteering or working today, today might be a survival day. I don’t want the project my family is doing to induce any guilt (see opening paragraphs!). Just getting through the day is a wonderful achievement! 

Instead, I will suggest that today would be an amazing day for a walk through your neighborhood or a visit to your yard or park to look for how the bugs and animals are preparing for winter. Like the above ladybug, this can be a good time to find bugs squeezing in a big metamorphosis. You might see those squirrels burying their acorns. Rustle through the fallen leaves (if you live in a place with fallen leaves) and gently see who is in there. 

The Kid likes to bring his bug journal and draw pictures of the special bugs he finds. Today would be a beautiful day to let each kid grab a notebook and pencil (or staple together some pages if you don’t have any notebooks) and begin recording. These dramatic seasonal change moments are often the best time to start a nature or garden journal for kids and adults. I challenge your family to keep going through winter. I believe nature journaling through fall and winter is a powerful way to change our relationships with the seasons, the cold, and dare I say it, life and death.

If you have already voted, today might be a good day for a big project. We’re going to be making seed paper today with wildflower seeds from our yard. Next week, I’ll share pictures and a full how-to. I’ll probably pop it up on IG today or tomorrow, too. But, if you want to fill your day today, the basics are to find a bunch of scrap paper. This could be a mix of newsprint and colorful paper. Use all those edges your kid left after cutting a tiny shape from the middle of the page that you have been saving but don’t know how to use. Smush them up really well with water. Mix with native plant seeds and then smash the whole mess into a screen or mesh colander. Allow them to dry, and viola, plantable paper! 

Contemplate:

Today I am contemplating the bigness of the universe and the expanse of time to remember how small we are. I will make space to gaze at the moon tonight, even if it means putting my phone on silent. Did you know that the moon was made in a collision of Earth with another small planet? Part of that planet remained on Earth and part became the moon. I find this connection beautiful and reassuring. 

I am also noticing the little things. I have already stood barefoot in my garden and touched the plants. Feeling the ground beneath my feet never fails to calm my nerves. But, I’m not actually trying for calmness. I no longer fight with my anxiety. I’m looking for places that can hold my anxiety with me. The garden can definitely hold some shaky nerves.

The last few elections, I chose to go to bed instead of anxiously watching the results roll in. I don’t know if I’ll be able to make that decision this year. My nerves might not allow it. But if I do stay up, I will be taking lots of time with my phone parked a safe distance away to watch silly TV, eat snacks, light a candle, pet my sweet old lady cat (who will be delighted that I am awake), gaze at the moon, and be thankful for my life just as it is.

Crunch Time!

Acorns, Spooky Trees, and Halloween

When we go for walks in our neighborhood, our steps are now decidedly crunchy. I love the feel of leaves and acorns crunching underfoot! I have less love for the child-curated collections of leaves and acorns disintegrating in all of my pockets and bags, but such is the price paid for many a wonderful nature walk.

It’s also that time of year when animals are madly gathering food for winter and parents of little kids are madly crafting Halloween costumes! Ours is finished, which does not make me the overachiever it might sound like. The Kid just happens to have a birthday not too far from Halloween, so I have learned the hard way to prep early or I will be seeing too many witching hours! 

Thanks for reading The Family Garden! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.

Our garden is still more green than brown, but the brown is gaining ground. As I discussed last week, I have learned to embrace death in the garden. The messy jumble of dead plants will remain to make cozy winter homes for bees, caterpillars, lightning bug babies, chipmunks, skinks, and whoever else wants to overwinter with us. Here’s the offering this week!

Observe:

These two weeks have brought some Lepidoptera fun to the garden. We have been visited by a few of these beautiful painted ladies. 

Although we have been moving our garden to more native plants when planting, I tend to let any flowers from previous years that pop up on their own do their thing. Less work is always my garden mantra! The painted ladies seem to love the dahlias.

The Kid found this little guy in, of all places, his sandbox. 

Granted, he told me that the plants by his sandbox (mostly self-seeded borage) are HIS and no one else is allowed to cut them without permission, so his sandbox is greener than planned. We’re pretty sure this is a wooly bear, although it’s so young that it was harder to be certain than expected. We brought the caterpillar in for a ten-minute house visit because the mosquitos in the yard were horrible. 

During the visit, the caterpillar perfectly demonstrated the caterpillar poop-flinging that I had recently read about in Wildscape by Nancy Lawson (see below for more info). Did you know that caterpillars often throw their poop to keep predators from locating them by scent? The poop flinging we witnessed was less extreme than some of Lawson’s descriptions, but enough to be a little startling. You didn’t know this would be a newsletter about throwing poop, did you?

We also met this Oak Dagger Moth (we think) caterpillar at the park. If you do meet this one, it’s a look-only caterpillar since it can cause skin irritation. We moved this one (using a leaf) from the strange place it had ended up in a pavilion to an area with food.

Read:

Acorn Was a Little Wild by Jen Arena is a book about acorns that will definitely get some giggles. If you are a parent who might once have been a teensy bit wilder than you are in this season, you will also enjoy this one. 

On the adult front, I have absolutely loved Wildscape. It offers such a beautiful lens for viewing our local wild spaces. I learned an amazing amount of information, but I was also impressed with the way it altered my viewing habits in my garden. Lawson looks at her yard with the observation skills of a scientist. I find myself looking at my own yard more closely. It would be an appropriate and doable read for any older kids and teens who are interested in nature, and I’ve read a few passages aloud to The Kid (the poop-flinging one to be exact--what kindergartner doesn’t want to know about caterpillar poop throwing?).

Do:

Go on an acorn scavenger hunt! Gather some nibbled acorns and guess who has been munching. Find a place with at least one oak tree and hunt for signs of the animals eating. You can learn about how different animals in your area eat and store acorns, or just make some fun guesses. We like to look for acorns with little holes and acorns that have been smashed in half or have gnawing marks. Some of the squirrels seem to bury acorns in the playground mulch, which The Kid finds funny. If you’re lucky enough to have different types of oak trees near you, you might begin to notice which animals prefer which types of acorns. Bonus points for the best impression of an animal eating an acorn! 

In the garden, I’m about to divide some of my perennials. I like keeping a rhythm to the garden through repeated groupings of plants. As we move to natives, I’m planning to spread our bee balm, cone flowers and tall phlox at regular intervals. I also want to fill in some back spaces in the garden with goldenrod, which I’m hoping to source from our patch. Here’s a pic of the flowers at their height this summer:

I’m also extremely proud of how this wild strawberry has spread as ground cover. I know wild strawberry is one of those plants many people are used to fighting, but it is such a valuable part of the ecosystem. I also think it’s beautiful! I’m going to try to plant some of the runners in other corners of the yard. 

Once all the moving around of plants is finished, I’ll decide what we’re adding. Stay tuned for a raised monarch garden and a few other fun additions!

Contemplate:

In the park near our home, there are big, stately oak trees. They have provided shelter and food for far longer than our home has been here or than I have been alive. We made friends with one tree in particular, which The Kid named The Acorn Tree. It earned this name not because it produces acorns, although it does, but because a portion of the tree died long ago and made an interesting little nook in which animals often leave acorns. Sometimes dinosaurs visit the tree with us.

The Acorn Tree is often our destination on walks and I find myself contemplating the beautiful old tree. What has she seen? Did she see Civil War troupes ride through? Does she miss the trees that once stood here? Can a tree miss things? What did it look like in that spot when she sprouted from a tiny acorn? Was she buried by a squirrel? How was she damaged? Sometimes, while The Kid drops toys and acorns into the nook on her trunk, I turn this into something close to a prayer or a meditation. Touching a tree that old is powerful. I encourage you to find an elder tree near you and see if you, too, can be friends.

A Final Note This Week—VOTE time!

I voted! It was super easy! I highly recommend early voting—no line, everyone was cheery, so simple! None of our joy of nature exists in a vacuum. I voted early in the big election we’re all thinking about. But, I also voted in our HOA election, because our HOAs matter so much if we are going to change the way we treat our natural world.

Notes from an Autumn Garden

Death, Dragonflies, and Dinosaurs (dinosaur toys, that is!)

Hello from the fall garden! We’re coming off of many days of rain, about which I will not complain a bit given the devastation not too far south from here. In our tiny patch, the plants loved the drizzly days. Our pumpkin plant, unbeknownst to us, made a dash through the fence and into our neighbor’s yard. It did bring to mind a cartoon monster plant. As I write, the reemerged sun is giving the orange leaf-tips of our maple a gentle glow. The wings for The Kid’s Halloween costume arrived yesterday, so there is a five-year-old-sized dragonfly hunting in our home. Fall is really, truly here!

Observe:

Our garden has that scraggly October vibe. Some plants are overgrown. Some plants are dried out. Some are beautifully in bloom. The whole thing is buzzing with life. Hungry wasps, bees and butterflies have found our patch of goldenrod. Birds and chipmunks are sneaking the seeds and berries. Little skinks pop out to say hi, risking the fast hands of The Kid who desperately wants to hold one.

Here are some snapshots:

Read:

If you didn’t gather from his costume choice, The Kid loves dragonflies! We are still working to bring more dragonflies to our garden. One of our goals for the next year is to add water, which might invite more dragonflies. Who doesn’t love a bug that can fly backward and is a mosquito-killing machine? 

We recently went on a dragonfly walk and the guide suggested this field guide for those of us in the Eastern US. I also ordered one for Northern Virginia to narrow it down a little for us! I love having field guides on the shelf because they are accessible for all ages. Sure, I can look things up on my phone, but my five-year-old can’t. We all enjoy flipping through the pages of a guide, though. I also encourage you to visit local nature fairs and festivals. I’ve picked up amazing hyper-local field guides at these events.

For the younger among us (or anyone who just wants a great overview) we loved Are You a Dragonfly? by Judy Allen. So fun and opens the door to pretend play!

Do:

This is a fantastic time, as a family, to think about what the animals around us are doing to prepare for winter. Bugs are particularly easy to observe and wonder about. Take a trip to a pond and watch the dragonflies zipping about. Did you know that some of them migrate south? Some overwinter as larvae in water? In most of the US and Canada, you can find a patch of goldenrod. If not, any flowers in bloom right now will do. Who is visiting? Where will those visitors spend the winter?

Where around your home will the animals and bugs spend their winter? With little kids, it can be fun to get down on the ground and look at animal level. If you have an outdoor space, how can you make it a better home for your small neighbors? You might decide to leave as many leaves and dead plants as possible. You might decide to add a pot of fall flowers to provide food and then let the dead plants overwinter as homes. Maybe you will notice little holes where animals live that you can protect from lawnmowers and trampling. I also like to let young children be creative even when it might not be exactly what an animal has in mind. If they want to build a stick home that will mostly be inhabited by imaginary bunnies, that is still a lovely connection to the natural world!

Fall is also planting season! Where I am in Virginia, it’s not quite cool enough to plant, but I’m planning. Gardens can easily become about consumption, so I try to start with a non-consumer lens. What plants can I divide? What seeds can I gather from my garden? Is there a harm-free way to gather seeds or bits of plants nearby? Do friends and neighbors have any to share and can I share any of my plants or seeds? Then, when I’ve exhausted those options, I head to my local nurseries. We are lucky to have Watermark Woods Native Plants nearby. Check for similar gems near you and look for native plant sales. Now is the time to research. Don’t forget to include the kids! Most kids love gathering and scattering seeds (just don’t plan for accuracy!). If you have space, can you give your child(ren) a spot to plan and plant?

Contemplate:

One of the great shifts in my garden has been accepting the presence of death. I think of this as a philosophical and practical exercise. Animals depend on dead and dying plants. Plants eat dead animals. We recently had a dead chipmunk in our garden. As much as I would have loved to feed him back into the cycle of life, in our tiny yard, it wasn’t possible to do safely. So I acknowledged him as God’s sweet little creature (please feel free to insert your version of secular or faith-based acknowledgment when you find dead creatures, lol) and disposed of him safely. It did open interesting conversations with The Kid, though.

Plants are another matter. I think it’s interesting that part of what makes a garden look appealing to us is a complete absence of brown or dying plant parts. Some of this could be a natural preference, but I think a lot of our preference is learned. We have been told to prefer green lawns and neat, green gardens. I think this is mostly consumerism at work, but wonder if some of this is our cultural obsession with avoiding death.

And yet, without death, new life cannot be born. We must learn to be comfortable with death if our gardens are truly to be refuges of life. Letting our flowers go to seed feeds the birds and other small creatures and grows new flowers in the spring. Allowing dead stems and leaves to stay through the winter gives homes to caterpillars, lighting bug larvae, and other small friends. When we clear away death rather than facing it, we quite literally clear away the potential for new life.

In the garden and in nature, we are able to see and touch death and to witness the rebirth that inevitably follows death. For me, I see part of that great mystery of which we are all part and it deepens my faith in that which is bigger than me. I think each person will see something different, but for all of us, there is an opportunity for profound witnessing. By touching death in our gardens, I believe we not only allow new life to thrive in our gardens, but also in our souls.

I keep my newsletters free because I want to support as many people as possible in connecting their families and homes with nature. I will occasionally offer extra resources with a paywall, but the main newsletter will remain free. I will offer some extra options that might be paywalled. Thank you and love to your family!