I love you Mom!

My mom has breast cancer, again.  She is a strong woman, the strongest woman I know.  She has beaten cancer once, and is back fighting again. She is holding her own in this fight, through prayer and sheer will she is still feeling very healthy and I am so thankful.  I am not the medical expert of the family, but from what I know, since the cancer has come back, there is no way to fully cure it this time.  She has had many good scans in a row now, another one just the other day, showing no growth.

Recently a friend of mine gave me this picture of my mother, it is probably 20-25 years old.  I really like this one because I feel like it is a picture of her in her element.  She loves to be outside, especially at the beach.  She is relaxed and contemplative.  It was probably a week of camping at the beach, so she was probably quite busy that day wrangling kids, feeding them, watching them, and here she is at the end of the day, probably just finished giving some pushes on the swings, getting ready to watch the sun set.  Now that I am a mom, I can more fully appreciate what the end of that day might have felt like

  She is still the same now, so full of energy and life.  Much of the time I forget she is sick, I am not sure if it is that I am in denial because I don't want her to be sick, or if it is because she seems so healthy that it is easy to forget.  I found out that I was pregnant with Henry shortly after mom found out about her cancer returning.  One of the first things she said after I told her I was pregnant was that she was worried she wouldn't get to know him.  I am so happy that she has met all of my children and that they get to spend time with her every week, I really hope that they always remember her and how much fun she is and how much they love her.

 

  I am so thankful to my parents for giving us such a wonderful example of a loving marriage.  We would always groan when they would kiss in front of us, especially every time we get onto an elevator, I am not sure what started that tradition, but it never fails, as soon as those doors shut, they are going to smooch.  I am grateful that I have always felt secure in their love for me and for each other.

 Mom is spontaneous.  She has an idea and runs with it.  She never needs much notice, and is always up for anything.

 This is another one of my parents in their element.  I think that they were meant to be grandparents.  They seem to have loads of patience and love for these children. 

 One thing you may not have known about mom is she is a little bit naughty.  She has her own sense of what is right and as long as it fits into her "it's not going to hurt anybody" code, she goes right ahead.  Giving pop and coffee to grandkids falls into this category.  She loves to spoil the kids with candy, juice boxes, chocolate milk, and fruit snacks.  I remember her breaking into the Habitat house in their backyard when it was under construction to see what they would be able to see of her house through their windows.  She also broke into a cabin in the woods once when it was raining to stay dry.  I am pretty sure she and dad played cards with another couple in there while they waited out the storm.  I also am quite sure that at least one grandchild has had a driving lesson on her lap.

 

 She has always had a servant heart, I am glad that I could see all the times she baked goodies for people and brought meals and just spent time with people who needed it.  I watched her serving as an elder in her church and being a caring nurse.

 My mom is superwoman.  She manages to fit so many things into her day.  She is always cleaning, baking, cooking, working, shopping, and doing whatever needs to be done.  She cares for those around her and it shows.  She has been an outstanding role model for me to follow as I have become a mother myself.

In my memory we went to the beach a ton every summer.  Mom would never get her hair wet because she did not want to ruin her ‘do, but she made up for not going under with us in the water by digging the best holes.  She would dig holes big enough for multiple kids to be buried.  She made sand castles with us and taught us how to make drippy doos.  She or dad would throw us into the deep water while we screamed with delight.  She always made sure we had at least SPF 4 or 8 sunblock on.

 Growing up our house always smelled like food – good food.  Mom is a great cook and baker.  She always makes too much food and all of it is always delicious.  I am glad to have inherited these tendencies, even with my limited palate. 

 

Mom’s code also includes a bit of good enough – if you are going to be swimming in a pool, sunscreen on faces is good enough :)

 

 Our family is a card playing family.  We were taught young and it has always been something we did when we get together.  The running joke is that mom can’t play an entire hand of cards without doing a load of laundry or something else that totally disrupts the game.  We played many hands of rummy during the week at the cottage, but since there was no washing machine, she did pretty well!

 We thought it was so cool that mom would drive crazy on our street.  She would swerve between lanes back and forth the whole last block (probably going 15 mph, but it was still cool). 

 I love it when someone plays with my hair.  I must have gotten this from her doing it when I was growing up, but she just twists it into a ponytail, then lets it go, runs her fingers through it this way and that and I feel so relaxed I could fall asleep.

 If mom has a big breakfast, she won’t eat again until supper.  I must have gotten dad’s stomach or something, because I never have skipped a meal because I wasn’t hungry.  Mom eats applesauce with everything.  If I invite her to dinner she invariably offers to bring applesauce, probably because she wants to make sure she can have it with dinner.  She makes her own applesauce, freezing a bunch every year.  She mixes in about equal parts applesauce and sugar to make sure it is sweet enough :)  She also over sweetens mashed strawberries and sliced peaches so that they all taste good enough to be desserts.  I have a hard time toning down my own since that is what I grew up on.

 Mom loves to scare the pants off of people.  Growing up, you never knew if mom would be hiding behind a door or around a corner, ready to pounce and make a loud noise that would surprise you.

  Mom, I love you so much and am so grateful for your example and who you are.  

Thank you.  

I love you.