My Mother is Beautiful!
I know I am very blessed and not everyone has a good mother. Some have had either a grandmother or someone else who stood in for their biological mother and impacted their lives. I am truly grateful because my mother, who is currently almost 95 years old, is a wonderful, beautiful mother!
Believe me when I say my mother isn’t perfect. I remember many evenings when she would get upset about something and throw things in the kitchen sink. I remember how she would complain when we left our coat out or something else lying around that should have been put away. I remember how she would get down and not want to cook or participate in what was going on or would go to her room to be alone. But somehow the good overwhelmingly outweighs the bad.
I am the youngest of three. My sister is nine years older and my brother is seven years older. The gap wasn’t intentional and when I asked about the difference in ages my mother referred to me as an “unexpected blessing” instead of “a mistake!” Although my parents didn’t expect nor plan on another child, I was welcomed and loved. I never felt unwanted. Even when having a younger child made things more difficult, my mother always made me feel loved. When my siblings married and moved out within a year of each other, I was still living with my parents and my mom often said how happy she was about having me at home still. Mom is beautiful in how she accepts what she is given.
My mom is beautiful even though her “resting face” is rather stern-looking. Many of my friends were afraid of my mom until they got to know her because of that look. But if you could get past that “face”, she was very compassionate and caring. She often would bake in the afternoon while I was at school or work so I had a treat when we got home. She attended every event, whether it was sports, choir, plays, or recitals, in which any of us kids and sometimes our friends were involved. This continued well into adulthood and then transferred on to the grandkids and all their activities. She has a beautiful face and an even more beautiful heart.
Mom was an adequate cook but not superb. Even though it might be pasta, hot dogs, pot roast, or tuna sandwiches, we never went hungry even when she was stretching the budget to make meals. There were many nights that there was an extra person at our table, a coworker of my dad or a friend to one of us kids, and they were always welcomed and received a meal without any complaint by Mom. There were nights that I saw her nibbling through a meal to make sure everyone else had enough. Mom has a generous soul.
Although Mom wasn’t perfect I learned so much from her. I know I am loved by how she talks to me, encourages me, cared for me, and sometimes gave up her own desires to do for me. She didn’t necessarily treat each of us kids the same but that was because we are all different! I learned to be frugal, stretch a budget and show others they are welcome in our home regardless of how much I have to give. I learned how to do for myself because she gave me responsibilities and held me accountable for those responsibilities but not so many responsibilities that I felt overwhelmed. She taught me to be independent by removing childhood restrictions so gradually as I grew up that I didn’t even realize that was what she was doing! She taught me to sew, create, cook, and clean, to give generously, and show compassion whenever I can with whatever I have. She gave to friends and church when our family really didn’t have “extra” to give but she found a way to do without when someone else needed it more. She would sew or mend for others when they needed something and usually did it without pay. Through all these things, I saw how Mom is beautiful through the use of her time and talents.
Mom is also our family’s prayer warrior. All three of her kids, their spouses, her grandchildren, and now her great-grandchildren know that they are being lifted up before the Almighty God every day because of her. She taught us who God is, how to rely on Him and to serve Him. She taught us to put God first, how to spend time with Him, and to listen for Him. She taught us to look for God working in our lives every single day and to acknowledge the “God Moments” when we see them. Mom is beautiful in her love for God.
Mom also taught me how to love and respect my husband and how to put him just behind God. Living this out wasn’t always easy for her when my dad was bowling in the fall and winter and playing softball in the summer in several different leagues which kept him out several evenings a week leaving her behind with the kids and other household work. But although she was sometimes lonely, she would never complain to Dad or tell him he shouldn’t do it. I think it was her way of loving him and putting him first. Mom is beautiful in the way she loved her spouse.
I have been taught so much through her example. Even now, at almost 95 years of age, even though her mind isn’t as sharp as it used to be (she can’t remember what she ate at her last meal) and her body is starting to fail, she is still teaching by example. She lives with my sister and helps get meals on the table and when the great-grandkids come to visit, she’ll read with them and love on them just like she did her own kids. Mom is beautiful in her relationship with her family.
My mom is beautiful inside and out and I want to be just like her!