Hug A Sheep Day and My walk with God (true story)...

Dream asked me to remind everyone that there are only THREE MORE DAYS until the very first, annual Hug A Sheep day! 

She also says that if you can't make it to an Open House / Fiber Festival this Saturday, you are certainly welcome to Hug A  Sheep, vicariously, through one of the many sheep blogs available.  She definitely thinks that you should VOTE for which sheep you'd most love to hug on the sidebar of this blog.  Just so you know, fondling wool  yarn or wool  garments counts, as does hugging the closest thing that you may have to a sheep ~ such as a dog or cat ~ use your imagination!  Just be sure to give a moment's thought to all of the wonderful products, not to mention the joy, that our woolly friends provide for us.

Now, about my walk (and talk) with God...

Last weekend, I was in Russell, Pennsylvania, visiting my very Dear Friends, Linda and Pete Westover, of Foxglove Farm Shetlands.  On Monday, we went to a wine tasting at a wonderful vineyard in nearby New York.  After the wine tasting, Linda had planned a picnic on Barcelona Beach for the three of us.  It was delightful!  While Linda and Pete strolled the shoreline of Lake Erie, looking for Sea Glass, I decided that I wanted to hunt for something different ~ something I've been wanting to start a collection of for a long time.  I was going to hunt for heart shaped rocks. 

Aren't they cool?

I've been wanting to start a heart shaped rock collection for some time and this seemed like the perfect opportunity.

I mean, you'd think that out of the kazillions of rocks washed up along the shoreline, surely some of them  would have to be heart shaped!  Sometimes, I had to use a bit of imagination to see the heart.

Sometimes, the heart was broken.

There were a LOT of broken hearts on that beach.

As I was walking along, searching for heart-shaped rocks, I began 'talking' to God.  I often do that.  I'm not a classically religious person.  I haven't been to church in years.  But I definitely believe there is a kind and wonderful God and that for some reason, he seems to love me.

So, as I was walking and searching, I mentioned to God that hearts often symbolize love.  Like the imperfect rocks that I was finding, love was not perfect either.  Sometimes, Love is difficult to recognize...

Sometimes you really have to use your imagination to see it.

I didn't mind the imperfect rocks/imperfect love.

But my neck was getting sore and I was looking through hundreds, if not thousands, of rocks.  I asked God if maybe I could find one that really did look like a heart.

  

Not that I wasn't happy with the 'sort of' heart shaped rocks that I was finding.

  

The ones that I had to use a little imagination to really see the heart,

 

I could still see the love  heart ~ even if nobody else could.  And I was satisfied with that.

But I explained to God that I would really like to find a TRUE heart shaped rock.  I'd be happy with just one.  It didn't have to be perfect...

Just close enough to obviously be heart shaped.

One that I didn't have to use my imagination to see ...

because it was clearly, unquestionably a heart.

Guess what happened...

Not instantly.  It took a little while.  But when I saw this rock (above), I knew that God was listening.  Like he always does.  Not that I always get what I want, but at least I know that he hears me.

Something interesting happened when I was putting this post together today.  As I was going through my wonderful, heart shaped rock collection, it occurred to me that most of them look MUCH more like hearts than I thought they did at the time I found them.

I suspect there's a message there... 

DREAM says...

"You can see Mom's heart shaped rock collection (although, I can't for the LIFE of me, figure out why anyone would want to)  and ME,  if you come to our "Hug A Sheep" day, Open House and Fiber Festival.  And DON'T  FORGET  TO  VOTE  FOR  ME ~  er, of course I mean:  for the sheep you would most like to hug...  Which would of course, be ME!!!"