I have so many good memories of you, Mom.  Normal  mom- memories, of you cooking in the kitchen, making granola and pancakes and lasagna and sometimes the dreaded liver and onions.  Of you making beds and painting walls and rearranging furniture, and watering your coleus and African violets on the shelf in front of our big picture window, and driving our big blue van to the grocery store.

I remember singing together in the quiet evening time on the living room floor, all dressed in our PJ’s.  We’d sing Jesus Loves Me and I am Jesus’ Little Lamb and Under His Wings and I’m But a Stranger Here and I don’t think we ever felt more like a family than then.

I remember daddy coming up behind you while you were cooking in the kitchen just to wrap his arms around you and kiss you on the neck and remind us all that you were at the center of his little world.  How you didn’t miss a beat in the cooking but your mouth curved in a smile all the same, and sometimes you’d reach back to kiss him while we all giggled.

I remember you looking lovely and stylish on Sunday mornings, walking us 8 kids all clean and slick-headed next door to the little church , where you settled us down in the back row, right in front of your organ.  Daddy in the front of church preaching and you, Mom, in the back, playing away on that lovely organ, feet and hands flying through every hymn.  You and Daddy were the bookends of my every church experience growing up.  It isn’t the least bit surprising I grew up knowing Jesus every remembered minute of my life.  And there isn’t a better gift than that.

I remember you nurturing the little ones, napping with them in the afternoons with a cloth diaper tucked into the bedroom door just so, to keep the latch quiet when one of us older kids would peek in the room with a question.  Other times of the day I’d find you in your rocking chair nursing the latest baby and reading Emily Loring books from the library propped just so in the drawer of a little table next to your chair for hands-free reading.   Thanks to La Leche League, none of us thought a thing you nursing those younger babies til the ripe old age of 3 — yes, even the big strong son who joined the military before he became a whiz at Microsoft, and the daughter who is now a missionary-nurse in Ethiopia working every day to save the lives of other mommas and babies.  I’m sure it was partly because of you that it felt natural to nurse my toddlers, including our precious girly who didn’t come into my arms til nearly two.

You gave me another gift too, though, Mom.  One I got seeing you living your own life, and working it out so that it twined in snug with ours, while still allowing you to be distinctly your own person.  You were at home almost all the time and yet you found time for interests that sustained you. You taught childbirth classes and assisted at home births and did breastfeeding counseling for woman after woman after woman, all while keeping space for us.  We never doubted that we were at the core of your heart.  But we had the privilege of seeing you as a vibrant and valuable and an interesting person apart from us.  It was a huge gift to give your six daughters, especially in this world that sometimes values at-home motherhood too little.  Life is as interesting as you make it, wherever you happen to spend your days.

When I tell you how sweet my memories are of you, you laugh and tell me I’m forgetting things, that there were some things you didn’t do right and that the picture was not as rosy as I remember.  But grace and time have left me remembering nothing but good.  I remember how you made me feel: strong and smart and capable and very well loved.  If I can do half of what you did for my own children, I will be thankful.  You have blessed me indeed.

Proverbs 31: 29-30– “Many daughters have done nobly, but you excel them all.  Charm is deceitful and beauty is vain,  But a woman who fears the Lord, she shall be praised.”

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Click on the link to read about my friend Ann Voscamp’s Mother’s Day Project.

It’s not too late for you to thank your own mother, and bless a needy family in Haiti in the process.

The book winners are #29 Amanda and #33 Missy Rose
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May is shaping up to be something special. Three of our kids are being confirmed. We have a son graduating from high school and a daughter graduating from college. Then there’s the main event, the birth of our second grandbaby, probably sometime near the end of this month. Could there be any more excitement?

This weekend I had the fun of taking some pre-baby pictures of our Amanda and her Ben. Amanda has been feeling good, painting furniture and filling her freezer and working in her garden, and we are all getting eager to see their little guy’s face.

A Facebook friend asked me this question the other day: “Just looking for a bit of advice. Do you have a book you can recommend or a blog post about balancing getting involved with causes and balancing family?”

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Great question, eh? I think that especially when parenting little ones, it’s important to be sure not to over-commit. Parenting is our main ’cause’, after all, and I think we really have to be wary of things that deprive our kids of our attention and energy. Ann Voscamp wrote a great post along those lines here.

I occasionally feel a pang of guilt that I do almost nothing volunteer-ish at our church, with the exception of supervising church camp cooking every June. Granted, that is a HUGE undertaking.  But it only takes a couple weeks a year, and I didn’t begin it til my kids were past the toddler stage. I may have time to fill other positions at church later in life, but for now I’m at my limit in that department.

Other families have had good luck doing volunteer projects with their kids, especially once they’ve reached elementary age. A few years ago my oldest daughters and I and some friends sewed dresses to bring to kids in the orphanage where our younger daughters lived.  It was a really fun project that let us get together with friends for a couple hours a week for a couple of months.

I’ve heard of families who arrange to sing and visit at nursing home a time or two a month.  Some work together with their kids in soup kitchens or community gardens.  Others fill boxes for Operation Christmas Child.  There are many ways to help in the world.  I think the answer for each family is unique, and needs to be evaluated often and prayerfully.

What about you?  Is there a particular activity that has worked well for your family?  Something that didn’t work?  How did you balance volunteerism and your family’s needs? Please chime in and share your wisdom, friends.

For Easter we visited with John’s family for the noon meal and then gathered with my side of the family for awhile in the evening. What a blessing to live near so much family! By evening I guess I was worn out on picture-taking — I have exactly zero evidence of the second gathering — but here are some pictures of the fun that happened earlier in the day. Click on pictures to enlarge.