a garden for cooper

shortly after we picked the location for coopers service, my precious husband began thinking about what kind of tree we could donate to the arboretum in cooper's honor. since my precious husband has his degree in horticulture from cornell, i knew it we would not be planting an ordinary tree. he spent some time thinking and researching, finally settling on an eskimo sunset sycamore maple. what we did not know, was the politics involved in tree donation, and of course we are not the typical donors. my precious husband had a very specific place in mind where he wanted coopers tree planted. his vision did not mesh well with the overall vision of the arboretum, particularly since they paid a landscape architect a great deal of money for a master plan. however, after some back and forth, we were given more than just a spot for a tree, we were given a whole burm where we could plant whatever we wanted. better yet, it is located right next to the children's playground and soon to be planted children's garden. i can not think of a better spot for cooper's garden.

so monday after work, we planted the garden. well, my precious husband planted it and my mom, mother in law and i watched from the sidelines.

we will plant bulbs in the fall, daffodils, of course. i think it is a perfect spot for us to go and feel close to cooper. i know cooper approved of his garden because there was this one bird sitting in a tree watching us the entire time, just chirping away. it was if he was saying, " thanks dad for planting a garden just for me."