When you hear the word “uprooting,” what do you think of? Maybe pulling up weeds or transplanting flowers? If people are uprooted, is that a good thing or a bad thing? I guess that all depends on your perspective and your faith.

My uprooting news is that, after a lifetime of living in North Carolina, I’m moving to Northern California for my husband’s job. Yep, I’m leaving home, leaving the South, leaving sweet tea and biscuits (oh, the biscuits), leaving family, leaving friends. (I apologize to any friends who are reading this news for the first time here. I tried to reach you all in person, but I hope you’ll understand that this is a busy/hectic time right now.)

I’m filled with equal parts excitement and dread. While I’m looking forward to this new adventure, I’m not always happily or gracefully packing up a life I love here. So I’m looking for signs of hope and words of reassurance wherever I can find them.

As my husband and I work to declutter our home to get it ready to sell, we’re moving lots of little treasures out of the house. About a year ago (maybe longer given how quickly time flies), he brought home three little gifts for me: solar-powered plastic flowers that wave in the sunlight. He’s adorable that way.

I set them in a sunny window and waited for them to start waving. The blue one started. The red one started. The purple one … well, it didn’t start. Even after I set it out in direct sunlight for a bit, it still didn’t wave. I don’t know why I didn’t throw it away, but it sat next to the other two, never budging all this time.

Two weeks ago, I took all three flowers for a road trip. We’re fortunate to have a place where we can bring boxes and our treasures to wait while our house sells. I set the three flowers up in another sunny window sill and checked them the next morning. I took this video to share what I discovered:

Wow! I’m not one to overuse exclamation points as a general rule, but wow!!!

I never thought plastic solar flowers could amaze and delight me so much. You see, all that little flower needed was a road trip—a bit of shaking up and uprooting—before it could thrive. And maybe if that’s true of a little plastic flower, it can be true of me, too. I can thrive in a new place, uprooted, shaken up, in an unfamiliar sunny spot.

Those little plastic flowers are a comfort to me now in the moments I get panicky about moving away.

Back in March, I wrote a post called The big push. I know Richard Rohr didn’t write the words I quoted in there just for me, but they comfort me even more than the little plastic flowers. God is giving me a big push. I’ll be honest: some days it feels like a bully’s shove. But I have hope and reassurance that God is going with me and dreaming a California dream for me that I never imagined for myself.

A.A. Milne, creator of Winnie the Pooh, wrote, “You can’t stay in your corner of the Forest waiting for others to come to you. You have to go to them sometimes.” I’ll be leaving my little corner of the forest soon, and I’m looking forward to meeting those who needed me to come to them out in California. I’m trusting the uprooting will bring a wonderful change.

How about you? What ways has life surprised and pushed you? I’d love to hear your uprooting stories in the comments below.