and more each day.

Planting Seeds

You may have helped your papa or mama plant seeds in the garden or in the flowerbed. The warm sun and the rain make them grow rapidly.

We do not plant weed-seeds, but in some way they get into the ground, and come up along with the garden-plants. If the weeds are not cut out, they will crowd out the good plants.

AN ACT OF KINDNESS

When we do little acts of kindness, it is like planting good seed. When we are not kind, and say bad words, it is like letting the weeds crowd out the good plants.

If you are good and kind to papa and mama, brother or sister, today, you will find it easy to be kind to them tomorrow. It makes you happy to be good to those around you.

If you are cross and say bad words, you may want to say them again. You can not feel happy when you have said and done bad things.

God can help you sow good seed. He will help you to be good. He will help you to love all around you.

Flowers of Springtime

HOW pretty and sweet are the apple, peach, pear, plum, cherry, and orange blossoms! How good God was to make all these things for us to see and smell! We can enjoy the blossoms. Also, we can see the little apples or other fruit grow until they become large, juicy, ripe fruit. Then we can eat them, and oh, how good they will taste! God is very good to us.

Not a leaf nor a blade of grass could grow if God’s hand did not care for it. He causes the warm sun to shine and the gentle rains to fall so that everything can grow. Things could not grow without the warm sun and the rain.

God has caused the wild flowers to grow along the road-side and in the woods and meadows so we can enjoy them. How glad we should be that we have such a good God to worship! When we kneel to pray, we can say, “O Lord, I thank thee for all the pretty things I see each day.” The pretty things are some of the blessings that he daily gives us.

A Walk in the Woods

HAVE you ever taken a walk through the woods by the brook on a warm day? How cool and pleasant the water looked as it ran along over the rocks! Did it not make a pleasing sound?

It is delightful to go through the woods where you can see the beautiful trees. You can nearly always find some flowers growing along the edge of the brook. Besides, the little birds fly among the trees and sing so sweetly. Almost any child would enjoy a walk through the woods. But there are many children in large cities who never have the pleasure of going to the woods.

How pleasant it is to sit down in a cool, shady place, and think of the lovely things that God has given us to enjoy. As we look around us, we can see so many blessings that God has given us.

Even the little birds and flowers seem to be telling us that Jesus loves us. God has made many beautiful things for us to enjoy. It makes us happy to see the beautiful flowers, and to hear the little birds sing so sweetly.

Our Feathered Friends

WHEN all the trees and bushes and grass are green in the spring, we see the little birds and hear their sweet songs.

How happy they seem as they fly about from tree to tree, and scratch in the ground to find little seeds and insects to eat!

Sometimes we find a bird’s nest in the bushes or on the ground. God teaches the little birds how to build their nests with small sticks, leaves, and feathers.

This is the bird’s house. We sometimes see tiny eggs in the nest. The little eggs hatch, and then there are little birdies in the nest in place of the eggs. The mother bird hunts worms and bugs to feed the little ones.

Did you ever see a nest of young birds? How they open their little mouths when you come near! They think you have something for them to eat.

Once a little boy found a meadow-lark’s nest with young birds in it. As they opened their little mouths, he thought he could feed them better than the mother bird. He decided to raise them for pets, and so carried them home. He fed them bread; but as the little birds were not used to that kind of food, they did not thrive on it; and when one day the boy forgot to feed them, they died. How sad he felt! And how sad the mother bird must have felt when she could not find her babies!

God made the birds to enjoy the woods and fields. We must not destroy their nests, for that would be wrong.

The Bible says, “Behold the fowls of the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feedeth them.”