By Chase age 13 Spring brings, along with many other things, the time to prune everything. My favorite plants to prune are the grapes. A few days ago, Mom and I pruned all of them together. We cut off most of the newer growth and any vines that aren't growing the direction we want them to. Sometimes it feels like you are cutting off the whole plant! Some of the vines are so long and tangled that we have to cut them into three or four sections just to get them away from the fence and other vine. The vines might be really long, others might be tiny. Some were even 16 feet! As we were pruning, Mom and I thought of an analogy with the grapes. As you prune a plant, it seems like you are hurting it. We have to cut off so much, sometimes it even looks like we have killed it. This is kind of like our lives. We are tested, hurt, and sometimes it feels like we are going to die. But in the process, all of the excess stuff of our lives and
