I miss you mom and I think about you so much! 

Thank you for teaching me to love life. You enjoyed every stage, and you smiled your way through each chapter. You found joy in living.

Thank you for teaching me to love children. I cherish the children I have as I know you cherished yours. I never felt like a burden to you. You built me up and provided confidence when I didn't feel it.

Thank you for making our house a home. You put your touches everywhere and we all enjoyed being there.

Thank you for loving literature and music, BYU sports and cooking. We share many of the same hobbies.

Thank you for your firm faith. You always trusted the Lord and turned to Him with every concern, knowing He would hear your prayers and help. Your faith never wavered.

The years pass and the seasons change, and yet I still try to model my life after yours. Of course, we are different and my experiences will not always match yours, but no matter life's happenings, your character and your spirituality provide templates for me to pattern my life on. I know what you valued, and I value it too. I know the direction you were facing, and I try to face the light too. I know you were striving to be a disciple of Christ, and I am trying to be one too.

I love you mom! Thank you! I am eternally grateful for you.

These marvelous art pieces by Caitlin Connolly make me think, and I wonder what she was thinking when she drew them. I like the lines, colors, and subject matter.

Open Hands Receiving

She Wore It On Her Sleeve

Leaning On a Mother

Her Arms Grew Tired as She Held the World in Its Place

A Busy Mind

Letting Go of Some Sorrows

Lifting Up a Woman

Leaning Against Something Unknown

 I attended an art show titled "Certain Women" in Provo yesterday.  Here were a few of my favorite pieces.

"Careful Mending of the World" by Paige Anderson (two pictures above) 

"I love to think of creation, in its many forms as repeated acts of healing repair.  It is a hopeful thought that though my efforts are meager when compared to the magnitude of the suffering I see, somehow, someway, my small acts of creation, are able to reverberate outward--contributing to a greater wholeness."

 

 

"Measure of Life" by Annette Everett (above).

"The woman who stands with the veil lifted is a protector and a guide.  A guardian angel? An ancestor?"

 

 

"Be" by Morgan Casey (above).

Measure me?

My Mother Eve.

The Mother of Humanity...

Her power passed down generationally.

Divinely anointed,

Irreplaceably appointed,

I am Her posterity.

How can one attempt to measure femininity?

Life is created in my BODY.

GENERATIONS are held in my BELLY.

WORLDS of before and after, my eyes SEE.

I am the portal,

the gatekeeper,

the in between.

Can mere words be used to define all of feminine divinity?

I am

Immeasurably

Incomprehensibly

Eternally

EVERYTHING

I need 

To BE.

 

"Lift Up Your Voice and With Us Sing" by Lisa DeLong (two pictures above).

"We now are separated from our divine home, yet we intuit that there is more than the hazy shadows we see in a darkened glass. We see patterns of the heavens above echoed in the earth below. We are hungry to know, to remember more."

This vase sat on my table for Mother's Day dinner because it has special meaning to me. First of all, my mother loved fresh flowers on her dining table.  She often used a tablecloth or placemats and added a vase with fresh flowers. 

Second, there is a special story about the vase that I remember my mother telling me.

My mother loved the color purple.  She had a deep purple comforter and some purple accessories in her bedroom.  She liked all colors actually, but in her bedroom she went for a purple theme.  One day she was visiting a sister in her ward and the sister had some flowers on display in a beautiful purple vase.  My mother complimented this sister on the vase and flowers and later the sister gave the beautiful vase to my mother. My mother was embarrassed that she had commented on the vase and feared her comments seemed like a hint to the woman that she wanted the vase.  She never meant for the vase to be given to her, but this sweet sister gave it to my mom, and my mom was touched with her generosity and she cherished the vase for years.  The vase was on display in my mother's bedroom, and when we were going through my parent's home after they both passed away, I asked if I could keep the vase as a memory of my mother and the sister who generously gifted it to her.

 

Mothering is going away as an institution and as a way of life.

Various government efforts to reverse the plummeting birthrate haven’t proven effective. For instance, Taiwan spent more than $3 billion to incentivize families to have more children, including six months of paid parental leave, a cash benefit, tax breaks for parents with young children, and investment in day care centers. These kinds of incentives are important, but to really move the needle, incentives have to emerge from within, from “the reasons of the heart.”

I suppose it boils down to some sort of deeply held thing, possibly from childhood — a platinum conviction — that the capacity to conceive children, to receive them into my arms, to take them home, to dwell with them in love, to sacrifice for them as they grow, and to delight in them as the Lord delights in us, that that thing, call it motherhood, call it childbearing, that that thing is the most worthwhile thing in the world — the most perfect thing I am capable of doing (Quoting Catherine Pakuluk).

Centuries ago, children had economic value; for example, they provided help on farms. People tended to have more children for a tragic reason, too: because the rate of child mortality was so high. As the economic value of having lots of children in a household decreased, and health outcomes drastically improved, couples needed a new motivation for having lots of children.

(The mothers interviewed) described their choice to have many children as deliberate, chosen rejection of an autonomous, customized, self-regarding lifestyle in favor of a way of life intentionally limited by the demands of motherhood. To these women, children were “expressions God’s goodness and blessing” and were desirable for their own sake.

It’s about having a very important reason to do this, and the reason to do it then outweighs the costs, which are very significant.

But the challenges the women described unfolded alongside moments of great happiness and they were accompanied by the belief that their self-sacrifice would be repaid in a “divine economy of goodness and joy." In losing themselves, she said, the women found their identity.

(https://www.deseret.com/family/2024/04/23/birth-dearth-catherine-pakaluk-fertility-rate-utah/)

 

This book was worth the read for these written gems and art:

What do women hold? 

The home and the family.

And the children and the food.

The friendships.

The work.

the work of the world.

And the work of being human.

The memories.

And the troubles

and the sorrows

and the triumphs.

And the love.

Men do as well, but not quite in the same way.

Sometimes, when I am feeling

particularly happy or content,

I think I can provide sustenance

for legions of human beings.

I can hold the entire world in my arms.

Other times, I can barely cross the 

room. And I drop my arms. Frozen.

then

I am brought back to my grandmother,

my mother, my aunts,

my sister, my daughter,

my granddaughters,

my cousins,

The women who are my friends.

We have spoken to each other

for thousands of hours.

It is hard work 

to hold everything

and it never ends.

You may be exhausted from holding things

and be disheartened.  And even weep if

you are very emotional. Which would be

anyone on any day. With good reason.

But then there is the next moment

and the next day and

 

hold on.

(Maira Kalman, Women Holding Things)