A Happy Mother's Day 2017

I got to watch and listen to these cute kids (well the oldest three) sing a couple Mother's Day songs at church on Mother's Day.  We got to church a little late and ended up sitting right up front.  I had the best view of my singing kids that I'll probably ever get!  Grant knew the words and Brett and Camille kind of smiled and looked cute.  It made my heart happy to see them up there, knowing they were proud to be up there singing for me.  How I love them!

 The kids walked home from church with Grandma Jackson and we took some Mother's Day pictures with her.  She's a great example of a loving, fun, and hardworking mom.  We're lucky to live close by and to have our kids know her and Grandpa Jackson so well as they grow up.

 Cute mother/son pic!

That night we had my parents and grandparents over for a Mother's Day dinner.  Keith helped, but to be honest I really made the dinner!  Ha!  I prepared a lot of the food the day before so our work load would be light.  Luckily Keith did the dishes.  That's huge for me!  I don't mind cooking any day if someone else does the cleaning!  For dinner we enjoyed pork enchiladas, chips and salsa, beans, watermelon, strawberry salad, and Keith picked up a couple desserts from Costco for us. 

Here's the whole bunch of us:

(Don't mind Camille.  She has a hard time ever being normal in a picture lately!)

 The three moms:

 My mom and me.  She's another great example of a fun, loving, and hardworking mom.  Keith and I really lucked out with being sent to great parents!

My parent's live close by too, and it's so fun to be able to have them in my kids life also.   

I have to get a couple of these gems in here too!  I had pulled out old pictures of my mom with her kids and took pictures of them and printed them out, put them on sticks, and stuck them in a pot of Mother's Day flowers for her.  Here are a couple of them.

Here we are (I must have been about 7) at my mom's parent's condo in Sun City West.  How I loved that place!  I have some of the best memories of that place!  Lots of memories have to do with the food, down to the dishes and the unique glasses that we all wanted to drink from (like that eagle mug my brother has on the table!).  I can't eat a grapefruit without feeling like I'm back at my grandparents home.  Anyway, here we are, the four of us kids with my cute mom.  I'm the girl in the middle at the counter.

 In this pictures, my mom is younger than I am right now, but she's at about the same point with her kids that I am, with the oldest just eight and a toddler on her lap.  This was from my brother's baptism day.  I'm the one up front in the middle with the awesome blue sock with sandals!  I had the best fashion sense back then!  Ha!

Here's our little family at Grant's baptism.  No blue socks with my sandals this time! ;)

I'm so very grateful to have great mom's in my life and to be able to be a mom myself.  It's what I always dreamed of doing when I grew up.  On those hard days when I feel overwhelmed and just want to run away for a while I remind myself that this is exactly what I hoped for and I have so much to be grateful for.  I'm so lucky to have a great husband who supports me 100% in every way.  Because of his hard work for our family I get to be exactly where I want to be every day, with these kids at home.  And Keith is glad that I'm happy to be here.  Like I mentioned above, Keith and I really were blessed with great parents.  Of course they weren't perfect, no-one is, but they gave it their all.  My mom always put her family first and I know Keith's mom did too.  They took their responsibility to their family serious and their families were blessed because of it.  I sure try my hardest and I hope my kids will feel like I did my best someday when they grow up and look back on how I mothered them.  

Here's some of my favorite things I do as a mom:

Reading chapter books to my boys at night before bed.

(We are currently reading Indian in The Cupboard and they are captivated!)

Play one on one with them when I have a chance.

(Like today when I played with Tyler in his room with a stuffed tiger and a ball.  Somehow he was thoroughly entertained!)

Prepare food for them and watch them eat it and like it.

(The liking part doesn't always happen, but we're getting there.)

Playing outside at dusk.

Watching them try new things.

Getting them to laugh or smile and watch their faces shine up at me.

I check on them every night and give them a big kiss on their forehead before I go to my own bed.

Play Pat-A-Cake with Camille.  We always give each other a big hug at the end.

Sit with my babies and a bottle before bed, just the two of us with the blinds cracked a little so I can see their sweet faces in the soft light.

Puff up my cheeks and squish them back down with my babies feet.  They laugh so hard!

Work with them.  Brett especially benefits from doing housework together.

Be silly for my kids.  Wether it's making funny faces or silly voices or doing a funny dance, they love it and I think it helps them see that I can lighten up sometimes.

When I tuck the older boys into bed I pretend to put glue on my lips and then give them a big kiss on the cheek.  Then I say, "Uh-oh, my lips are glued to your cheek and I can't get them off!"  And then I start making funny sounds like I'm going to drool on them (but I don't!) and they laugh so hard.

I'm sure I'll think of more later, but at least some are now documented here.   

And now it's time to go check on those kids and kiss their foreheads. :)