Motherhood Matters

Motherhood has been on my mind lately. The following things have kept motherhood at the forefront of my thoughts.

Mother's Day

I love Mother's Day.  I love celebrating all mothers and thinking with gratitude how much my own mother has done for me.  Mother's Day also fills me with gratitude for the opportunity I have to be a mother.  It is one of those most precious gifts from Heavenly Father that fills my soul with emotion and gratitude whenever I think about it.  Not only do I get to be a mother, but I get to be the mother to the greatest two boys on the planet.  Only a mother can understand how much I love these precious souls!  

Without any encouragement from anyone, both boys gave me beautiful Mother's Day gifts.  Brian made a card which included the drawings below, and he showered me all day long with hugs and "Happy Mother's Day" exclamations. 

 This is a picture of "Brian and Mommy playing in the rain".

 This is "just Mommy and Brian being happy".  I LOVE how he draws me.

Timmy's gift came a few days before Mother's Day.  I was buckling him into his car seat on our way to go get Brian from school.  Out of nowhere, he got very serious and said, "Mommy? (then made sure I was listening) I just think you are a good mom."  That little thought coming from Timmy's mouth at that moment was a sweet tender mercy that I needed more than anything.  With a tear in my eye I gave him a warm hug and told him how nice it made me feel.  The experience has been on my mind since and makes me want to try even harder to be that "good mom" Timmy was talking about.

New Baby

My little sister had her first baby a few months ago.  We had the opportunity to visit them in the hospital.  When I saw and held that sweet new baby for the first time, I was overwhelmed with some very strong feelings.  The feelings were so strong it sort of shocked me at the time.  It was an assurance of God's love for all of us and an assurance that this new sweet baby was a miracle meant to be here with her loving parents.  

 This is me holding my baby sister Mandy's first baby named Eleanor.

Choosing Motherhood

Back when I was 19 years old and at BYU, I went for a semester to study Church History in Nauvoo, Illinois. I made many wonderful friends there that still influence me today.  I recently got in touch through Facebook with many old friends from Nauvoo.  One of those friends, Lia Suttner Collings, compiled/wrote a book that just came out this Spring at Deseret Book.  It is called Choosing Motherhood and it is a compilation of stories from successful women who put motherhood first in their lives.  I got the book because Lia, whom I admire and look to as an example, wrote several of the chapters.  I loved this book.  

I learned something from each chapter and each mother represented, but the chapter that has stayed with me the most is called "Teach These Souls To Fly."  In this chapter, Lia was asked by her sister the question, "why would anyone want to be a mother?"  Lia's answer came while contemplating the the painting Teach These Souls to Fly by William Blake.

Some of Lia's own words are best.

"As I watched the flight of this mother-child pair, I thought of how my sister-or any outsider-couldn't know about motherhood until she experienced it herself.  I didn't think that my sister could know that the ignorance I saw in the child's face could also be innocence.  In humility, he let his mother pull him-just as my children let me-proving him everything King Benjamin required: "submissive, meek, humble, patient, full of love, and willing to submit to all things which [his mother saw] fit to inflict upon him" (Mosiah 3:19).  In devoting my days and nights to my children-the sort of individuals the Savior had said made up the kingdom of heaven-I might teach them all that I knew, but they would teach me many, much more important lessons through their childlike nature.  We would lift each other."

"This powerful woman reminded me of Elder M. Russell Ballard's counsel; "As mothers in Israel, you are your [children's] first line of defense against the wiles of the world."  I couldn't provide my children better protection against darkness than to teach their souls to fly above it. . ."

""Teach these souls to fly" - the sacred duty entrusted to mothers, a sacred opportunity afforded to women."

""Who wouldn't want to be a mom?" I wondered. . .What other career could claim as its end product the elevation of a human soul?  Not just the enlightening of a mind or the development of a body, but the improvement of every aspect of a vibrant child of God?"