If All the Moms….. (and a giveaway)

Nineteen years ago, I had high hopes that I’d be a mom by Mother’s Day.

The year before, my heart was heavy on Mother’s Day as Todd and I had lost our first child when I was just entering my second trimester.

Then our second child was due on April 30th that next year and was I ever excited! I hoped I could bring my new bundle of baby joy to church on Mother’s Day and sport myself a pastel corsage like all of the other ‘real’ mothers.

However, that special Sunday came on May 12th.

It came.

And it went.

Still no baby.

While our first child had come too soon to live on earth (and we’ll have to wait until heaven to meet him or her) this baby decided that even though everyone told us she’d be here in late April—the doctors, the charts, the ultra-sound, my own little “count back three months and add one week” way of figuring out when the baby would come–she decided to take her sweet time.

She arrived May 14th!! Two weeks late!!!

And this will be my first Mother’s Day without her. :-(

In honor of Mother’s Day, I thought I’d reprint here an essay that baby-turned-little-girl-turned-almost-19-year-old-woman wrote when she was seven for our local paper. The subject was : Why I Love My Mom. Out of over 300 entries, hers was chosen as the grand prize winner. As a result, she and I won all kinds of mother and daughter items from local businesses including my first (and only) manicure and pedicure. It was such fun!

Here is her winning essay and a pic of her today.

Why I Love My Mom

If all the moms were lined up in a row from here to the town of Westphalia and they all had on pretty party dresses with their hair in a bun and tap shoes on and my mom had on old sweats with baby burp-up on it……I’d still pick her.

My mom is a fun mom. She lets me bake cookies with her. She makes me chickin and dumplin’s. She lets me play with her lipstick and real scissors and craft stuff. She reads to me every night and teaches me about Jesus.

And even though she gets very sick when she is pregnant she still gave me two baby brothers to play with.

That’s why I love my mom.

Mackenzie, age 7

Okay, now…..why do you love your mom?

One winner will be chosen to receive a personalized copy of my book Homespun Memories for the Heart: More Than 200 Ideas to Make Unforgettable Moments It provides simple, doable ideas for celebrating with the children in your life be they your kids, grand-kids, nieces and nephews or school children. It covers holidays, holy days, and even daily days, like the first day of school, when they lose their first tooth of get their driver’s license. There are also many party ideas for showers, birthdays, reunions and retirement. It is chock full of recipes, gift ideas and even re-producable invitations and such. You can check it out here.