Do you want to know how I know? Well, I was sitting outside this afternoon, after just getting out of our pool, and watching the moorhens swimming across the water. (I'll tell you more about them at another time.) As I was swinging back and forth I felt something crawling on my leg and guess what it was. Not an ant (first and immediate guess) - it was a lady bug! I don't know what I'm doing right these days, but the lady bugs are finding me.

Of course, it is an old wives tale that lady bugs bring good luck. But I choose to believe it. So I'm sitting there watching this lady bug, and pretty soon she flies off probably because it was getting close to dinner time and she and her man had to fix vittles for the younguns. Or something like that.

I digress. The reasons I'm lucky are many. It's nice to attribute it to a lady bug landing on my leg, but that's not it. I am lucky because I have my family - my mom and dad, in their 80s, are still here. I have the love of a fantastic man, and we share our home with three incredible dogs and two not-so-incredible cats, although they would put me in my place in a second if they could read. I have two wonderful sisters with whom I have come to share a warmer, closer relationship than I ever have in all my years (and I'm not about to tell you how many that is). And I have the beauty of an incredible garden canvas just waiting to be painted with all the colors of the rainbow.

Ultimately, I know there are a lot bigger things going on in our country and the world outside of our little plot of land and I'm not forgetting that. But this afternoon, as the lady bug landed on my leg and our dogs played in the sun I knew I was lucky. Happy Gardening.