THREE GENERATIONS OF MOMS

The white-haired lady on the left is my Nana. Her name was Clara and she lived to be 102. I miss her gentle answers to life's problems. "You just come," she said when I needed a place to stay just before I got married. 

I remember her hands always being busy, either peeling an apple for me or cutting pot pie dough into squares, hanging wash or holding her Bible. She had a kind heart that gave without thinking how it might affect her. Her faith led her to help first and worry about the details later. 

I'd like to think that I learned about kindness from my Nana. I have a low tolerance for unkind people and I'll be the first to defend someone who's being bullied. But I try to remember the old saying, "hurting people hurt people."

The dark-haired woman beside my Nana is my mom. Her name is Charlotte. That looks like a knitting needle in her hand. She can create just about anything. Decorated cakes, dresses for us, dolls, quilts, jewelry, curtains, upholstered furniture...the list is ongoing. She's still creating. When I visit her I always ask to see her latest creation. 

She turned an old piano into a table. I'm amazed by her creativity. My daughter has that same creative spark. It must have skipped a generation. I can draw, paint and write, but that's about it. I tried to learn knitting, cake decorating and jazzing up old furniture. No success stories to share.

The girl next to my mom is me. I think I'm eating a cookie. I still find cookies comforting. My Nana had a cookie jar that I often had my hands in. I grew up to be a mom of two children- a son and a daughter. 

I made a lot of mistakes as a mother, but when I look at my children and their personalities, I realize that I must have done something right. We are hard on ourselves as women. We do a lot of comparing, and we don't see our own good qualities. Most women are far more amazing than they give themselves credit for.

The other girl to the right of the photo is my sister, Dee. My brother, Eric is in the middle. Dee is a talented artist. She has an artist's soul. She feels things deeply and is easily moved. She has one daughter, who inherited her mom's artistic talent.

These are the amazing moms in my family, and it is okay to call yourself AMAZING if you're a mom. Carrying life, giving birth, and raising a child are difficult tasks. No female accomplishment is more impressive to me. Our bodies can grow babies and our hearts teach them to be good people. What contribution is a bigger world changer?

Happy Mother's Day.