Why the Blooming Hydrangea?

Naming a blog can be a tricky thing. My blog Love From My Kitchen started out as a place to post my recipes for friends and family. After I discovered how much I loved blogging, I realized I could blog about more than just recipes, so I did. Then I started to feel like Love From My Kitchen just wasn’t working for me anymore, like I was trying to run a race with a pair of skinny jeans on and maybe some cute boots with heels too. You can do it but maybe it’s not the best outfit for running in. After a while it might get uncomfortable, restrictive and just not what you need to accomplish your goal!
So after driving them crazy racking the brains of friends and my husband for several days, I finally came up with the name, The Blooming Hydrangea.
When I finally decided that was the name and I went to purchase the domain name, hubby pointed out while I was typing in the new blog name that Ange,my own name was in the word hydrangea. That’s when I knew without a doubt that this was the name for my blog! It was a great confirmation for me because I was still so unsure about the name, I hate things that can’t be changed easily.   That is what also made picking out a design for my blog tricky!

I decided on the word Blooming for part of my blog name because I love the thought of blooming, being at your best, just all out there for the world to see you.
Blooming is an adjective and the root word Bloom is a verb, it means we are doing something, I love action!  Here is the definition of bloom from the :
Thriving in health, beauty, and vigor, vigour; indicating the freshness and beauties of youth or health.
Doesn’t that sound wonderful?  To be thriving in health, beauty and vigor?  I want that!  I want to be healthy for my family, on the inside and the outside.  By beautiful I mean I don’t want to be a supermodel on the runways of Paris but I want to be a supermodel on the runway of my home for my children.  (I’m sure my husband wouldn’t complain if I was a supermodel for him on a runway either if you know what I mean! wink, wink.)    I want to have vigor throughout all my seasons of life, no matter where I am or what’s going on. I want to bloom with love, life, joy and hope! How do we do that?
Well when thinking about flowers I chose the hydrangea for the name because I love that you can change the color of the flower petals by subtracting or adding things to their soil. It reminds me of our hearts, we can change our hearts by adding or subtracting to our own soil. We choose what to put into our soil, what to take out of our soil, how we are nourishing our hearts, with things that last and will sustain or with junk and things that will rust out and die. We need to take care of our soil and add the best fertilizer if we want to bloom with love, life, joy and hope!  For me, that fertilizer is God.
I  have a special little clump of dried hydrangeas that I keep because it reminds me that God loves me and cares about  me.  One cold night in January hubby and I went to Wallyworld for a date, hot I know. We decided to look in the magazine section just because we could and I immediately found a Country Living Magazine to drool on browse through. On one of the pages was a beautiful arrangement of blooming hydrangeas in a bowl. I told my hubs how much I love hydrangeas, they are my favorite flower and I wish I had some right now but it’s snowing out and it’s January.   Later that night when we arrived home, there on the front step was a clump of dried hydrangeas, just sitting there.   I knew it was a gift from God!  He was saying to me, “Here my daughter, I can’t give you blooming hydrangeas in January when snow is everywhere but I can give you a little dried bunch just to let you know that I care about you and love you.”  So I hope that while you are here, you will know that God loves you too, even if it’s not in the form of dried hydrangeas on your front step in January.  I hope you will find at The Blooming Hydrangea something that will inspire you to Bloom, a place where life and love create something beautiful, you!