
For all of my 56 years, Mother's Day has been a big deal. For some of those years, I was the center of attention, because I was the firstborn, the first grandchild, the first niece,
and later because I was a mom.
But mostly Mother's Day was about my Moms, my Grandmothers and Mothers-in-law (yes, two moms and married more than once).
Mom loved flowers. Fresh cut was more her thing. She didn't have great luck growing them, but had a great appreciation for the beauty, color, fragrance and what they symbolized. She had favorites: lilacs, lily of the valley, roses. We visited a memorial garden near her home many times. It sat on several acres and took hours to wander through. Always a great day together...
Karen is my extra mom. Married to my dad for more than 35 years now. She loves nature: the undisturbed wildflowers in an open prairie, the discreet blooms along a wooded trail. And, while it's NOT a flower, I know without a doubt when to start hunting for morel mushrooms, because it has been a long time tradition for Karen to spend Mother's Day gathering mushrooms on her family's farm land.
Grandma Inez had a beautiful backyard garden flanked by lilacs: white, lavender and dark purple. And, I still have a hoya plant started from a cutting from hers. It was always there, in their house, from my earliest memories. If I assume she had been growing that hoya for some years before I was born, the plant I have is easily more than 60 years old. That amazes me...
Grandma Anne didn't have flower gardens or indoor plants that I remember. But she always smelled like a flower. She was a strikingly beautiful, well dressed woman. She was also a talented baker, and I especially remember the rosettes she made at Christmas time that were covered with powdered sugar. Like edible flowers...
Esther, my first in-law, had outrageous flower gardens that attracted all species of birds, butterflies, bees, dragonflies... Her love for gardening rubbed off on me. I was so shy back then, filled with so many questions that I was afraid to ask. But I watched and learned...
And Kathleen, my last in-law, was like a master gardener. She grew beautiful outdoor gardens, exotic indoor plants, orchids, and african violets. We were always sharing cuttings and surprising each other with new plants. The last summer at their cabin, she and I traveled into town to buy annuals for her garden. She scooted around with her walker at the greenhouse to pick out each plant. Back at the cabin, I pulled up a lawn chair for her to sit while I planted her garden exactly the way she wanted it. She talked about that garden often at the nursing home where she landed a few weeks later after breaking her hip. Before we sold the family cabin, I moved many of her perennials to my garden.
So, while running errands on Saturday, I decided to pick up African Violets for Mother's Day - for me, and to honor the memory of all my Moms, most who are no longer here.
Happy Mother's Day
May your day be filled with all your best mom memories...