Just in from the Great Lakes

Posted June 12th, 2009 by Jen in family life
7 Comments »

I so wish I could sit down and write all the wonderful details of my trip to Port Huron, Michigan, but I have too many pressing duties at the moment. But, so I don’t forget, I’m making myself a short list of a few of the highlights.

1. Continental Airlines still serves meals.
2. I saw my great-great grandpa’s wood carvings of all the presidents (through Hoover) and they belong in a museum.
3. The St. Clair River is still brilliant blue.
4. I collected seashells and rocks along Lake Huron.
6. I remembered why I love the Great Lakes–just a feeling I get at the shore.
5. Six of us cousins stayed up talking ’til 3 a.m. one night. Who knew they were all terrified of my mom’s painting of a ragdoll, so much so that one cousin once slept in the bathtub at Grandma’s to avoid walking back up the stairs and passing the horrid thing.
7. Listening to my cousins speak at my Aunt Beth’s memorial was incredible.
8. My cousin Amy playing the bagpipes at the memorial was a tender moment.
9. My Uncle Marshall’s ham radio–an 83 year old trying to call Australia, but unable to remember how to make the connection; it was a mixture of hilarity and sadness.
10. Meeting the captain/builder of the Earth Voyager, the fastest sailboat on the Great Lakes, was a spontaneous moment. He’s getting the rig ready for the Port Huron to Mackinaw Island sailboat race.
11. I felt instantly at home when I was driving down I-94 out of Detroit and saw the giant tire.
12. I slept in a room full of ten thousand books–all murder mysteries. How I slept so soundly is the mystery. My Aunt Pat is a collector. She wants to add another room on their house just for her books.
13. Lunch at the River Crab in St. Clair was a treat, eating Atlantic Salmon while watching the freighters and sailboats pass by our window.
14. I wished a hundred times that my kids were with me so they could have met all their cousins.

That’s all I have time for–blessings on your weekend!

Tags: family, Lake Huron, Michigan, Port Huron, sailboats

When Your 6-year-old Makes You Cry

Posted April 17th, 2008 by Jen in family life, parenting
17 Comments »

She tried to hide the card under my pillow last night, but Dad shooed her off to bed, not knowing her mission. This morning she was grumpy-sad because her big brother had taken the card from its safe-keeping under her own pillow and placed it in what he thought was a safer location. But all she knew was that it was gone.

What the child went through to get a special card for her mom. She bought it with her own money, all the money she had, having no occasion but love, taking great pains to make it a surprise, and made me cry.

I mostly cried because the card read, in pretty Hallmark lettering, “You’re Never Too Busy to Be a Wonderful Mom.” And even more precious was her own lettering inside, “Best Mom.” But I am too busy. I get short-tempered and forget to speak gently. I don’t deserve such a showering of affection. I was tenderly aware that I cannot take advantage of a child’s unconditional love for a parent. Yes, she would love me, and does love me, despite my many failings.

There is such hope in the knowledge that love covers a multitude of sins, and my little girl so encouraged me to live up to her childlike love, and to possess that kind of love myself. I am the luckiest mom around to have a 6-year-old make me cry.

Tags: children's card, family, hallmark card, love, mothering, parenting