“Short-lived but dramatic, hibiscus flowers symbolize youth, beauty, success, glory, and femininity. Pollinators also love this tropical flower… they’re especially attractive to butterflies and hummingbirds.”
The Help
My mom got me started on this fun and thoughtful family tradition. If you’ve ever seen the movie The Help, you may already know where I’m headed here. There’s a fairly shocking scene in the movie where one of the main housewives suffers a miscarriage in the bathroom of her home. Her caring black maid ends up witnessing this tragic mess and calmly tends to her, helping her back into bed and ultimately convincing her to confide in her husband the loss.
Next is a scene which shows the housewife out in her garden planting a small rose bush. The view pans out and we see there are MANY rose bushes planted throughout the yard – each one symbolic of a precious little life lost too early. I don’t know for sure if my mom stole this idea from the film, but my mind always goes back to the housewife’s “mourning” garden…
My story isn’t going to be quite as sad, though, so stick around if you’re looking for a more intentional way to plant!
“Baby J”
Paul and I were married on January 30th, 2019. Why choose a date in January in the heart of the bleak Midwest Winter? I WOULD LOVE to tell you! January 30th is the date my grandparents walked up to their small-town Justice of the Peace and were legally joined in marriage. They began their life together in Bloomfield, IA … stuck it out through countless moves, job changes, and raised two kiddos who gave them five grandchildren before their journey together was cut short on February 7, 2017. My grandma Linda was quite literally a “firecracker”. Always one to make you feel welcome and heard. She left all of us pretty unexpectedly … and my grandpa Jack finally joined his bride in Heaven this past November.
We took our honeymoon that following summer and roadtriped to the gorgeous Bitteroot Valley area of Montana. The cabin we booked was quaint and cozy but still had every amenity we were used to at home. I still daydream about this trip: cows right outside our front door, a warm bubbly hot tub just off the front porch, and views for miles of God’s beautiful country.
A few days after settling back into life at home, I took one of those cheap pregnancy tests (the strips from Amazon) and found out I was pregnant. I was SO happy 🙂 I started thinking about all the new family traditions we’d start and what color of eyes the baby could have. Three weeks later, my body went through a spontaneous miscarriage and all those thoughts about what could be faded away as Paul and I dealt with the loss. This was tough. No one talks about miscarriage and all I could think about was “Why did I lose my baby? Maybe I wasn’t called to be a mama like I always had dreamed of becoming.”
Do you remember, like, five million years ago when I mentioned the rose-planting scene from The Help?? It’s coming full circle here.
My mom reached out one day and asked if I wanted to pick out a flower to plant at the house in memory of the baby that would never be in my arms. This day was also kinda tough. I found a new hybrid purple-colored hibiscus plant and my mom helped me get it in the ground that day.
So since then, it’s just been something we do. My mom took me to get a Hibiscus for Mac and again recently for baby Cambrie. Mac had fun looking at all the different flowers and I felt really good about the “Ballet Slipper” variety we found for Cam. Can’t wait for them all to bloom together this year!
I got a children’s steppingstone kit on sale from Wal-Mart this week. I think we’ll personalize those and place them by each flower to serve as nice little “markers”. <3
