Sunflowers

(Dedicated to the sunny sunflower in our office)

Inspiration for planting can come from the unlikeliest place. My workplace! Of all places

An energised bunny with the most vibrant soul joined our section at work. She loves the colour yellow and equally loved sunflowers. She was the energy, love and support I needed but did not know I wanted. I don’t know why, but it just made me want to replicate that energy in my garden. My safe place My happy place. With my SonShine

 This is not first-time sunflowers grew at my house. The first time, my son and I had wanted to feed all the birds. So, we bought bird seeds and sunflower seeds and threw them in our garden.  Where we had randomly threw sunflower seeds for the birds, the most beautiful sunflowers grew.

This time around a planned attempt, my son and I planted seeds in all parts of the garden and in different pots. I love these moments with my son as we both have a passion for gardening, and the teasing and laughing that comes with it.  So, we toiled together in the garden, planted our seeds and watched them slowly grow.

We of course also had our garden enemies, the snail, who decided to eat every single young shoot that came out of the soil from our most fertile part of the garden. But this mom-and-son duo was off to our local supermarket to buy ammunition (snail bait) to protect the rest of our seedlings. So, with that annoyance out of the way our sunflower plants grew. We waited patiently! Nope, not too patiently, it took forever.

Soon the buds appeared. Much excitement. Taking no chances, as we saw not so friendly insects on it, we went back to the store for some organic pesticide. With a second apocalypse out of the way we watched our sunflowers bloom.

And with that came bees. There is something beautiful watching bees on your flowers. While some people do not like cutting their flowers from the garden. we do, as it gives people joy when you give them flowers. So, I took some to the office, gave my colleagues, arranged them in a beautiful vase on my desk. It was such a joy that my son and I could grow these majestic flowers. He cut a bunch and gave them to his grandmother. She of course loved them so much.

Now the sunflowers in the garden are serving as food for birds. It is beautiful watching all variety of birds coming into our garden thoroughly enjoying the sunflower seeds. So, from a simple inspiration coming from one energized sunny soul, we were able to spread so much joy to so many people including ourselves. Not forgetting the birds and the bees. Sorry snails and slugs; you had to go

Lessons Learnt: You might be an inspiration to the world without you even knowing it. Some things have got to go for the greater good (Sorry again snails and slugs). Even if it just one thing that you have in common with your teenage son, it is better than nothing. Every special moment counts. You need to create the right environment to thrive.