Mother’s Day was kind of strange this year.
My mom had just had a knee replacement three days before.
One of my sons and my husband had left the day before for a (possible 3 month) stint in South Carolina. Gary went for a job. Patrick went for a vacation. 🙂
Patrick knew that it would help Gary not to be so lonely if he went along with him, so that’s the main reason he went. But he doesn’t hate the swimming pool and independent lifestyle he’s enjoying right now. He always wanted to live a bachelor’s life. He’s getting his chance now.
But Mother’s Day was kind of melancholy without those two members of our family. Even though I still had 9 children here, the house seemed kind of empty.
The remaining children did their best to make it a nice day for me.
Fiona gave me a box of assorted books and cards and cd’s and a Snicker bar. She knows what I like.
The kids all pitched in and cleaned the house real well.
Kelsey picked a bouquet of wildflowers for me.
She also made chocolate chip cookies.
Anna bought petunias and planted them for me in front of the house.
Emma got me a Reese Cup as she got herself a special treat at Walmart.
Abby graced me with the privilege of buying her a candy bar during said trip to Walmart.
And my Boys…
Well, my boys made me proud.
Morgan (10) and Garrett (7) baked peanut butter cookies with a little help from their friends.
Boys in the Kitchen from Penney Douglas on Vimeo.
Shawn was listening to Sherlock Holmes on the Gutenberg Project while his little brothers baked cookies. That’s the voice you hear in the background in the above video.
Shawn sang and worshiped the Lord with me that night, choosing songs that he knew I liked, and we had a nice prayer time together.
Today, Shawn made me proud again. Here is what I found him doing.
Reading Dante while listening to Classical music from the period in which Dante lived. Can you get more cultured than that? What a great unit study!
They make me proud every day.
So do my girls.
"Oh that God would give every mother a vision of the glory and splendor of the work that is given to her when a babe is placed in her bosom to be nursed and trained! Could she have but one glimpse in to the future of that life as it reaches on into eternity; could she look into its soul to see its possibilities; could she be made to understand her own personal responsibility for the training of this child, for the development of its life, and for its destiny,--she would see that in all God's world there is no other work so noble and so worthy of her best powers, and she would commit to no other's hands the sacred and holy trust given to her." -JR Miller
Now, that is a wonderful Mother’s Day in all sorts of ways!