A tribute to my favorite Moms

I have several moms in my life that I would like to honor w/ this post. The first being my own wonderful mother. One of my favorite childhood memories of Mom is about a doll & the love of a mother. As a girl, I had a Baby Alive & I was crazy about that doll. It ate, cried, & kicked (if I remember correctly) & acted just like a real baby. Anyway, my little sister broke her head off & I was soo upset. My dear mother took me/her to a doll hospital & we left her w/ them to "heal" but because of the mechanisms in her neck, that allowed her to move, they were unable to repair her. Mother, being cunning & resourceful, shopped & bought me an identical doll, dropped it off at the "hospital" w/out my knowledge & then took me w/ her to pick her up...making a huge production of it. I was amazed that my dollie's hair, which was ratted & falling out when I left her, was now shiny & beautifully coiffed! But Mother just explained that they had sent her to a beauty parlor before releasing her & I fell for it! I didn't learn of her deception until I had had children of my own. LOL Mom still goes the extra mile to make her kids, grandkids & great-grandkids happy....we should appreciate her more. ;o)

This picture of Mom was taken in the late 50's (the baby in the background is my big brother) . She bore a striking resemblance to JackieO, don't you think?

Still absolutely beautiful @ 70! I love you Mom!

The next mother I would like to honor is one that has brought much, much happiness to my life...my daughter, Shilah. She has given me the top four grandkids in the world. (according to their slightly prejudiced grandmother!) Shilah was always a very maternal little girl ... I knew she would grow up to be a great mother & she has. I always used to tell people that I learned a lot about being a grown-up from my little girl...now I can say the same thing about being a mother. This is a pic of her at about age 5, playing dress-up.

Here she is, last year on Mother's Day. She's still the most beautiful girl I've ever seen! I love you Shi!

This is my Aunt Beryl, my father's sister. She was/is a wonderful, supportive aunt who is really more of a mentor than an aunt. I spent a lot of time w/ her as a girl. We had special "girl's lunches" ...either @ tea parlors or her home & she taught me to appreciate the finer side of dining. She used to take me on walks & then question me about what I saw when we got home, to teach me to be more observant of the life around me. She was creating art & cards from the computer as far back as the 80s...long before the internet & Etsy & all the resources & inspiration we have available today. I love you Aunt Beryl!

Now I'd like to honor the "soon-to-be" mother is who is going to be the mother of my next grandchild. She's an intelligent, loving, witty, gorgeous woman (she always says we have a lot in common! LOL) & we are very lucky to have her in our family. I love you, Stacie & I just know that you are going to be a fabulous Mom!

Last but not least...I'd like to honor the woman I am named after ...my paternal grandmother, Camille. MamMaw is no longer alive but she continues to have a profound influence on my life. She accomplished more in her life than anyone I have ever known. Course it didn't hurt that she lived to be 101! She was such a role model that she was named Texas Mother of the Year in 1975 (she was very proud of that title & I'm sure would like it mentioned here on my blog. ;o) )...she was also the vice-president of the DAR. This a photo from 1963, taken by the famous photographer Richard Avedon & published in Vogue magazine. MamMaw is second from the left, w/ just her profile showing.

But she wasn't some hoity-toity socialite. They lived on a farm (I always thought of it as a ranch because they raised horses & cows & chickens, not crops but MamMaw always corrected me, saying, "This is Texas...it's not a ranch unless it's 2000 acres." ) until shortly before my grandfather died, MamMaw worked a kitchen garden until she was in her 90's & she loved spending time w/ her grandchildren & then later, her great-grandchildren. I was a very rebellious teen (enough said!) & was sent to live w/ her @ age 16. She was nearly 80 at the time but she instinctively knew how to handle teen-agers....or maybe it wasn't instinct but experience, she had 6 children of her own! She had a huge, circular driveway & my friends & I made the center, party central. When too many of us gathered, MamMaw would come down & put us all to work in the garden. She was soo sweet about it (& fed them all so well!) that they kept gathering anyway. I'll never forget how shocked I was when she could always out-work me. I was in the prime of my youth, she was 80 & yet, that old woman could saw limbs off trees, long after I tired.

This pic is small but it's a treasured photo of her & my daughter, Shilah. I love you, MamMaw!

Happy Mother's Day to all you Moms....it's a wonderful job, ain't it?