Spring seemed to start early. This year they had barely had winter, it had only been a little cold with sometimes very light frosts at night. Margreet thought that she hadn't even taken her scarf and beanie out of the closet. And now it was mid-March, and flowers were already blooming which, according to her memory, usually only appeared in April.

Huib had been working a lot in the barn the past few weeks. The closet for Gloria had become beautiful. He had mounted a clothes rail on one side and finished it at the end with a knob in the shape of a bird with wings out and the head up. Every time Margreet looked at it, she felt the freedom of a bird flying so wonderfully through the air. The few dresses she had brought from the thrift store she had hung on the clothes rail on hangers that Huib had also made himself, in the evening at the dining table. He had used a small hanger from the thrift store for the model and size. Margreet had helped him sand them smooth, so that no dress could snag on them.

In the closet, she had stored the stacks of bedding. In the open compartments of the dresser, the bottom shelf held some small towels, washcloths, bibs. A box with safety pins she had put in a drawer for safety reasons

Huib and Margreet had briefly wondered whether they wanted to use paper or cotton diapers. They had decided to start with cotton and then see if they liked it.

Now there were two big piles of cotton diapers and a stack of plastic diaper panties in the dresser. Annerieke had shown her how to fold the diapers and taught her on a teddy bear how to pin the diaper on. They had had so much fun with it, that Margreet had decided, that the teddy bear should keep the diaper on for now.

.

While Huib was working in his shed on the decorative planks that would form the fence for the veranda of the guest house, Margreet was relaxing with the tapestry for Lisa and Sjaak. For herself she had named it 'Fire in Music'.

She saw it all before her, like a campfire. At the bottom of the tapestry a pile of wood. The fire would climb up and cover the whole tapestry and all kinds of musical notes would dance in it, scattered all over the cloth, but most in the lower part, as if they were splashing in all directions from there. She enjoyed the picture she had envisioned.

Margreet was grateful for the collection of rags of fabric and knitting yarn at the thrift store. To her, it was a Valhalla of possibilities. She had no problem taking fabrics that she liked, but of which she still had no idea what she might use them for in the future. Intuitively she knew which ones she would need one day.

For the wood, she already had brown and black fabric in the house. For the fire, she had found all kinds of shades of yellow and red, and for that distinct shade of gray-blue you see in flames at the bottom, she had discovered a piece of organza. She would use that to make musical notes. By now she felt expert at mixing yellow and red, using patches and threads of roughly equal or contrasting colors. Red patches with threads of different shades of yellow. And also the other way around, yellow patches with red threads. She worked mainly with small patches, or sometimes with small on slightly larger patches so that despite the fact that she worked almost exclusively with red and yellow shades, she could still create many color nuances.

She looked up when she saw a movement at the front window. It was Lisa standing there waving two arms exuberantly. Margreet burst out laughing and beckoned her to come in. She was curious how her reaction to the tapestry would be. A moment later, Lisa stood beside her, wide-eyed and open-mouthed, looking at the beginnings of her work.

"Is this going to be our tapestry?"

Margreet nodded, "Do you like it, these colors?"

"Oh yes, absolutely! I'm just wondering how you're going to proceed. Will the whole tapestry be one big fire?"

"Yes, all fire, but with a surprise in it. I'm going to work musical notes through it with this gray-blue organza. Musical notes that rise up in the flames. I named the tapestry ‘Fire in Music’. But of course you can always give it another name."

She looked up at her friend, who meant so much to her, and saw that tears were rolling down her cheeks. Margreet put her hand on Lisa's arm, "What's happening, Lisa?"

"It's so cool! So incredibly cool! I think it was on the first day that I went to live with Sjaak that he saw that there was fire in me, and he felt that it wanted to break out. When I play the violin or cello, and especially when Sjaak plays along, I experience that fire coming out. I am so glad Margreet, that you got this idea, to make the tapestry like this!"

Margreet heaved a sigh of relief and smiled at her, "And you make me happy with that again!"

She stood up to hug Lisa. In the embrace, Lisa began to talk about something else, "I came to tell you something, Margreet, a piece of news. Sjaak already knows, but no one else does yet. In the beginning of our relationship Sjaak and I made love once. It was so special, so loving the way he treated me. I didn't know that, it was so different from what I was used to... well, you know. But the second time I blocked, and it went on for a few weeks. Until some weeks ago, then it worked out well again, and I started enjoying it more and more, too. And this morning..." Lisa let go of Margreet and put her hand on her belly and looked at her radiantly.

"Do you think you're pregnant?" asked Margreet with bated breath.

"Yes, I don't think so, I'm pretty sure. I feel fine, nothing wrong, but I knew this morning when I woke up. I just knew it, with a startling certainty. I immediately told Sjaak, whereupon he told me that he knew the date on which it was conceived, exactly one week ago. He had felt it then, as if an explosion took place when we both came. I had never heard anything like it, and I told him so. He laughed so much! He said it was also completely new to him, he also thought it sounded unbelievable. Precisely because he didn't know this feeling either, he hadn't told me, but had put it in his mobile. He waited until I would know that I was pregnant, and only let me read his message in his mobile this morning. An explosion, fire, music, your tapestry. It all comes together and it totally belongs to us, to Sjaak and me!"

Lisa knew very well how Margreet had experienced the first months of her pregnancy. Margreet had told her everything, about the images, the impressions they had received about their little daughter, about their certainty that they could continue to live without a midwife and that they did not have to arrange for a maternity nurse. She had also told of her trains of thought of doubt and temptation. But Lisa wanted to hear it all again. So Margreet made the two of them a glass of star mix tea and they sat down on the couch together.

Lisa fired questions at Margreet, to which Margreet told everything again. She was enjoying it, she was so happy for Lisa and Sjaak. The moment Margreet told her that she had seen that their daughter would become a painter, Lisa suddenly interrupted her: "Our son is going to do something in construction, drawing nice big buildings, really special, not just a block of concrete."

She slapped her hand in front of her mouth: "A beautiful gallery for Huib, for you, for your daughter, for Elly, for music from Sjaak and me, for other artists. It's going to be a paradise of creativity, Margreet, it's going to be so special, nowhere in the world is there anything so beautiful. And our son is going to draw it, build it, or have it built. I think he's going to have it built, he's more the creative mind behind it. He'll probably need Simon and his pals a lot in the future!"

Lisa was shaking all over her body, crying and beaming at the same time, and she kept repeating, "It's so beautiful, he sees it all in front of him and just draws it! So beautiful, so incredibly beautiful!"

Margreet felt the depth of this sudden impression Lisa had received.

"Everything is coming together, Lisa. Sjaak and you, your music, and all those others around you with so much creativity. It grows, it blossoms, it stirs the fire for our children. Wow, I'm not used to this from myself either, that I get such words all of a sudden. It feels like we are reinforcing each other, is that possible, do you think?"

"It certainly can, after all, we experienced that during that trial." Lisa recalled: "Marieke knew she had to be there as reinforcement for Johan. And Alexander thought a lot about us and thus strengthened Ellen. Do you remember that we talked about that?"

Margreet nodded, "Yes, now that you mention it! And so that apparently works not only between soulmates, but also within our group, because we now strengthen each other as well. You have seen the beginning of the tapestry, ask me to tell you again about how I experienced the past few months and you suddenly get such strong impressions, and a little later I did too! You really saw it all before you didn't you, that gallery of your little son?"

"Yes, and so bright! I saw the building grow, rapidly, with lots of glass, and your work appeared in it, not as separate departments, not a tapestry department and a wood department, but all mixed together, and that too was empowering. The people I saw walking between them looked their eyes out, became visibly happy and enthusiastic."

Silently the young women sat together, processing the impressions that had come to the surface....

To chapter 233. Rosalie

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