When my youngest daughter was pregnant with her first baby, she began a blog titled “Countdown to Motherhood.” Each week she had a different mother from her circle of women write an article about their experience with mothering. I was one of the mom’s in that circle.
Today I’m sharing what I wrote on that long-ago Mother’s Day. (Link for the original article HERE)
Why Mothering Can Feel So Hard
I never thought much about being a mother. I mean you grew up, got married and had kids. Everyone did it; everyone that I knew anyway, and they didn’t seem to make a big deal about it. But it is a BIG deal. I had so much to learn about being a mother.
• It doesn’t come naturally to everyone.
• It isn’t always a piece of cake.
• Sometimes it’s overwhelming.
• You often don’t know what to do next.
• If you just keep at it, it will be the very best thing you ever do!!
• I would do it over again even though there were some very hard times.
At almost seventy I look back with fondness on those earlier days. I look at pictures of my sweet children and realize that I didn’t understand how wonderful they were. It’s so easy to get caught up in the work of mothering that you forget to pay attention to the joys of being a mother.
A Few Things That I Would Want to Understand If I Had It To Do Over
• Realize that the time will come when you will miss hearing your child say “mom.” It can be wearing now but you will miss it!
• Cherish every wet, sticky, sloppy kiss because no matter how many you get, they will never be enough! You will want more of them long after your child is grown.
• A clean house is not more important than a sweet relationship with your child. Messy bedrooms eventually disappear and so does the child – into adulthood – and then all you have left is a clean room and hopefully a child who wants to come home to visit.
• Conversations with a child are amazing if you take the time to listen. I know that right now you just want to hear quiet, but the day will come when you will miss that childish prattle.
• A child’s laughter and joy are contagious. Catch it because it renews your own energy and relieves stress.
• Being the caretaker of another person’s learning and personal growth is an amazing stewardship and is worth all the time and effort it takes to do it with kindness and gentleness.
Now that I’m a grandmother, I understand these things better. Moving at a slower and gentler pace is what grandparents do and so we see a bit more clearly and we enjoy a bit more deeply.
Any mother who is clear on the importance of being a mother and is willing to make it her number one priority for a short while can understand these things long before she is a grandmother.
Child-rearing lasts only a short time so, despite the challenges, weariness and redundant work, embrace every Mother’s Day while your kids are in your home. Once they leave it will never be the same!
What if you went Screen-Free, as a family, for a WHOLE MONTH!! Do you think you could do it? Would your family go nuts? Would everyone crack up? Would the fighting increase? Yikes!! A whole month!!
We all have traditions. Our family had many traditions. Some were built around holidays or special family days. Many were built around spiritual and religious beliefs.
her she said that she was having tons of visits and treats but that her family could use some nurturing. Hence one apple pie.
Saturday morning our church planned a Christmas breakfast. That’s right, breakfast. I would have opted to take a breakfast casserole, but my husband has a family tradition of Green Chili Pancakes and it’s so unique that he really wanted to share 
it. The problem is, he doesn’t know how to make it, I do. His grannie taught me. : ) So I needed to make 50 pancakes and then a huge pot of the green chili sauce. It was too much to do Saturday morning, so it had to be done on Friday. This is very delicious by the way. 
Long story. And I also realized that I needed a formatted document to include with a special framed family genealogy chart we are sending to our children. We are direct descendants of William Brewster of the Mayflower and I wanted to help each family understand who he was, what his family was like, and why they came to America.
It’s Saturday morning now. The church breakfast is done. The chili pancakes were a success. Everyone loved the pies which have been eaten and I am heading off to do the tent kit and get the rest of the stuff wrapped and shipped. My house is a disaster and the kitchen cabinets can’t even be seen. I haven’t vacuumed, dusted, or cleaned anything. Laundry is piling up but I did get one load in before the breakfast. Another big woohoo!
In two months I will be sixty-nine years old and my husband will be seventy. I contemplate that and I am amazed and astonished. It makes me smile with pure joy. Can you even imagine such a thing; to live this long! What an amazing thing to accomplish!
Each item we own requires some of our energy. The more belongings we have, the more emotional energy, as well as physical energy, is needed to maintain it. I want you to visualize something.
Fall is in the air- I love it! Although it still seems a bit like summer here in the west where I live, I know fall is just around the corner. There’s a slight chill to the air and the suns rays seem a bit thinner. The flowers are brilliant and blooming like mad in the final days of warm weather.
to be closed up for winter with too many obligations, too much stuff, too few hours for home and family or feelings that burden my days and nights. Winter is for rest and I want to be free to rest.
When I was a girl I lived in a series of small towns. Just before the start of the new school year, there was a holiday called Labor Day. I had no idea what it was about but I knew it meant school was starting.
description of each book