SEASONS - MOTHER'S DAY 2016

(Writting and photography by Sheila Gail Landgraf)

There is nothing more exciting or rewarding than being a mother, except maybe being a grandmother.  That is my latest and greatest blessing!   A Mother's Day present coming my way in October will be the gift of yet a third grandchild!  I could not be more excited or grateful to God.   The thought of how wonderful the grandmother experience has been so far consumes my soul!  I love being a grandmother, and I’ve loved being a mother.  

My four children did not come to me naturally, I married their Dad when they were very young and they were raised in my home for most of their lives.  They still saw and loved their birth-mother on a regular basis, and I never discouraged them from loving her.  These special children that God gave me so unexpectedly have enough love in their hearts for both of us.  I know that is very rare these days, but I can only explain it by saying it is yet another miracle that God has worked out in my life.  I have learned over and over again how God takes hard circumstances and turns them into blessings.  

 In God's Kingdom no one is "less" and everyone is "more."  There is always enough love to go around, because God IS love.  With Him in our midst, there is nothing that we cannot work through, and most of the time when we do our blessings are even greater and more appreciated.  This is my family, and I wouldn't change or rearrange anything.

I am finally in that place of realizing that my kids are grown and raised and living well rounded God-centered lives.  Nothing could make me happier!  There is nothing more comforting than knowing that peaceful feeling of “mission accomplished.”   There is great peace in realizing that you have raised up children who have become productive, life-giving adults who are responsible and loving and kind and who are now out there every day making a difference in the world, each one contributing in their own special way.

These are my thoughts as we near Mother’s Day this year.  God keeps pointing out to me that all the years of struggle and hard work of raising four beautiful children is beginning to bear fruit.  It is very eye-opening, after watching struggle after struggle as they grew wings and began to leave the nest.  On Mother’s Day I will get all kinds of gifts and tokens of thanks for this, but the greatest gift of all is just knowing that they are living their lives out, each of them in such a beautiful, unique and individual way.  I have never felt more blessed or honored.  It has been my privilege to participate in changing the world through watching them grow and for this I am forever thankful.

Now that they are grown I cherish so many things that have happened along the way,  Since it is Mother’s Day and the whole world is pondering the things of motherhood in general, I bring out my treasured memories and lay them at the feet of Jesus and whisper “Thank You.” 

Thank you for the one who has worked very hard to overcome addictions, who is working on becoming more responsible late in life.  Thank you that he finally gets it!  He has not lost his heart or his sense of humor along the way in spite of  having to recover from some huge mistakes.  He has learned some things the hard way, but he has learned.   Thank you that he has been a fighter in hard circumstances, and thank you that he has developed an uncanny ability for loving the unlovable, the poor, the downcast, the ones that no one else will love.  Thank you that he sees through the superficial and gets to the real part of people, who they are and what they are all about and appreciates them for what God made them to be.  Thank you for his gift to encourage and inspire people.  I am constantly surprised and amazed at this. Thank you that he sees the good in everyone and is finally beginning to find his own joy in the midst of it.  Thank you for helping him to be brave enough to face his problems seek the proper help to work through them.    

Thank you for the one who has worked so hard to develop a career where she helps others to overcome their handicaps.  Thank you for the joy she finds in working with children as well as adults who are struggling every day.  Thank you for the way that she loves life and squeezes every ounce of happiness out of it every day.  Thank you that she has been patient and willing to wait for the things that she knows are right and just for her.  Her choice in a husband has been exceptional, and the way she loves his seven year old son melts my heart.  The new baby on the way in October will only make that joy overflow more!  She is an awesome mother and a loving wife.  

Thank you God, for that smile that is always there, never letting the little things drag her down, only moving forward in love, even if it is only an inch at a time.  How wonderful to see her surrounded by loving and caring friends for a life time.  Is this the same teary eyed little girl that looked up at me and said “I’ll never make any new friends?”  How funny to think that she ever thought such a thing; just look at her now!  How sweet to see her finding the love she has waited for many years to find.  How perfectly open to God she has been in letting Him form her patterns for life.  Sometimes it takes my breath away when I look at all of it coming together for her.

Thank you for the one who is always positive, never negative, always bringing grace and love into every little moment and creating magic with her charm and genuine beauty.  She has that uncanny gift of making magic out of nothing at all!  She comes bearing simple little gifts that delight the soul and make you smile on a rainy day.  Her smile can stop the world!  She is so eclectic, off-the-wall creative and a genuinely true artist of life.  She is such a giving loving aunt to her sister's children.   She thinks of all the little things that make life special.  She knows just when to come and go in order to lift your spirits and make you laugh.  She never forgets her promises.  I have watched her struggle, make mistakes, recover with grace, face hard situations and come out rejoicing! The smile and the love never leave her face and she has always kept her genuine heart of concern for others.  I doubt she has ever made an enemy in her life.   She is always looking outward instead of inward and she shines with genuine beauty.  She has wisely followed her heart and is very busy pursuing her dreams.  I am thankful to be in her life and to see the effect she has on everyone around her every day. 

I am thankful for the sweet and beautiful level-headed one.  What would I do without her constant inspiration?  If you could get inside that level head you would be amazed at how creative her thoughts are.  The first one to make me such a proud grandmother and the one who brings so much peace and calm and beauty into every life she touches.  I am amazed at her ability to make good choices in tough life situations.  I am pleased at the way she honors her husband and keeps her household.  She has an uncanny way of making plans and seeing them through.  I am amazed at how she works a hard demanding job and still puts her family first.    Her zest for music and travel are contagious, and her sense of balance is a true blessing.  She can draw and paint like Rembrandt, maybe even better.  Her natural beauty is amazing. She lights up every room she enters.  She brings the beauty and grace of life into every situation she encounters.  She has a quirky sense of humor that sneaks up on you when you least expect it.  She is blessed with the finest husband in the land, and she loves him with her whole heart.  What an awesome mother she is to my beautiful granddaughter! 

With all of these special personalities in these gift-from-God adult children, plus two awesome son-in-laws and two and one-half amazing grandchildren, there is never a dull moment in this family.  Every day in my life is Mother’s Day .  I have a bucket full of the memories and we are making new ones every day.  I will always cherish the memories of them growing up in our home and I look forward to making a million more both in our home and in their homes.

 They have all grown up so smart, beautiful and successful; each in their own way, I still cherish all of these blessings that come with invisible price tags, these blessings that can’t be measured in monetary value, and now I am rejoicing with the opportunity to do all the fun parts over with my grand children.

Mother’s Day has never felt more fulfilling or refreshing.  

At this point I have realized it was nothing I did at all to have these wonderful people in my family, but simply God weaving his wonder across our lives and putting all the pieces of the puzzle together at just the right moments.  For this I am eternally grateful.

No need for gifts kids - just keep being the lovable people you are!

SEASONS - THOUGHTS ABOUT MOTHER'S DAY

When you are a step-mother, Mother’s Day can seem bitter-sweet.  How do I know?  I married a man who had four kids, all less than 10 years old.  The first few months we were married, they were living with their birth-mother and visiting with us every other weekend.  I enjoyed those special weekends immensely!   I kind of felt like I had the best of both worlds, I could have fun with them, and I could send them home and have alone time with my husband.  My plans are often changed by God's plans.  About six months into our marriage, their birth-mother ran into some huge personal problems and a judge reversed the custody of the children.  All four of them came to live with us overnight.   So, I know from experience.  

That was part of my own personal journey through life, which I will explain more about later, but there are so many varried reasons for this day being a bitter-sweet experience for many women, depending on the hand of cards that living life has dealt them.  Some women have wanted children a long time and have been unable to conceive or adopt.  Some have lost their children, either to death, divorce, addictions, disease, bad choices, and some have lived to regret abortions that they didn’t contemplate enough, making this day a pain they can't even speak about or share with others.  Some women raised their children not realizing what a treasure and a gift they were; they simply didn’t have time for them; and time ran out before they woke up and changed.  Every woman has their own personal story.  Fortunately, mine had a happy ending. 

When four small children came to live with me in the twinkling of an eye, my whole world changed in an instant. I was forced to give up the carefree, luxurious, pampered lifestyle I previously enjoyed, and I came to the hard place of making the decision that I needed to cancel my career life for awhile. I had worked hard in my profession.  I never expected this to happen, and I wasn’t at all prepared for the sudden change; but as I look back now, over 24 years later, I can only see what a miracle from God this change became in my life. I would not trade those wonderful, magical days for anything. This unexpected burden turned into a great big huge surprise package of blessings from God. Living with what I had considered to be “less” was actually “more” because of the richness of those blessings that come with invisible price tags, those blessings that can’t be measured in monetary value.  For example; the solid gold experience of flying kites with them over our little bit of farm land, passed down from my grandfather to my parents to us.  There was something that felt solid about having another generation to pass things on to one day.  I cherished all the simple things like this, those times of laughing and jumping on new mowed hay together, and the priceless experience of making mud pies in our own driveway, or maybe the valuable memories of fishing in the little pond in our front yard, or the way I felt like a million dollars after teaching them how to ride their first bicycles on a hill near our first little rental house. We shared many pets together, and we created many adventures together.

Now that the kids are all grown, I can clearly see that my living with less made me a much better person, and it taught them more about life too. Though my own Mom and Dad were a perfect example to me; what I knew about being a part of a family from practical experience was almost zero before they came to live with us. What I learned about love through raising them was priceless.

The neighborhood where we lived became a much more creative place because by day; we ruled it! We hiked through the pastures, and waded in the creek and mud puddles that God provided especially for our entertainment. We played in the tree house and put a tire swing in the old tree by the road. There were those one million "little things" that just seemed to sneak up on you, unplanned and unexpected, which were worth more than all the jewels in any famous queen’s jewelry box.

I have fond memories of building huts and hideouts in the woods on a hill by the lake near our first rental house.  I can vividly recall sitting inside and reading all of my favorite children’s classic stories to them. I got to take them to school every day, and we often sang in the car.  I knew all the lines to all their favorite songs on the radio. We took trips to the mountains and the beach together. We went to the movies together. We went skating.  We went to the zoo.  We drove out to Sportsman’s lake a lot.  I got to participate in the excitement of the proms, the beauty pageants, the school plays, banquets and awards and graduations.  I got the calls when the teacher was concerned, and I relayed the messages to my husband in the careful ways of a mother’s heart. I got to help with the science experiments and the literature projects that we still talk about from time to time (We covered Narnia very well - four times!)  We enjoyed many exciting days at the ball park, and we spent lots of sleepless nights when they had sleepover friends, roasting some-mores and having pillow fights. I planned the “Sweet 16” surprise birthday parties with their friends.  We camped in the back yard some summers. I was the one present when they gave their hearts to God. I helped them pray their way through to the Kingdom; and I knew when their hearts had arrived safely home. I knew their favorite colors and their favorite foods, their favorite clothes, and what they liked and what they did not appreciate.  Then there were those every day, normal things of childhood that you always remember, times when they were sick and stayed home from school and we watched movies all day; and nights we skipped the schedule and ordered pizza and played games in the den, those emergencies, like when one stuck his toe under the lawnmower and I played guessing games with him while the doctor sewed it up, or when one fell off the school bus steps and was embarrassed to tell anyone else but me, or when one got car sick from riding in the back seat, or when one got in trouble for swapping classes with her twin sister. 

We shared so much.  We shared those great omelet and pancake breakfasts their Dad was famous for on sleep-in Saturday mornings.  I showed them how to pinch a lightning bug and make a ring to put on their finger, and how to put them in a jar and make a lantern. After all, I am the one who showed them how to tie a string onto a June bug's leg to watch him fly around in circles. I pointed out the tadpoles in the pond, and explained how they would turn into frogs one day.  We spent hours gazing at the stars in the night sky on our little farm. I told them how butterflies came from caterpillars in a cocoon. I could go on forever with these little/big moments and memories of childhood, that only become significant when you are looking back.

Now I am speaking of these special memories with my grandchildren, and because I was given this gift of raising these particular kids, I strongly suspect that I will also have the privilege of always sharing the gift of life with their children! 

The years have passed by like sand through an hour glass, and we have enjoyed some really sweet Mother’s Day memories together, not to mention some magical Thanksgivings and Christmases. We’ve shared some awesome springs, summers, winters and falls. My scrapbook is full of handmade cards and notes and photos of special gifts received. I’ve captured all the major milestones of their lives in photographs. going on now in 25 scrapbooks of approaching 25 years of life together and those scrapbooks and memories line my bookshelves now.  I have many gifts, memories and experiences to cherish, and for that I am so thankful!

So, taking all of the above into consideration; whatever could seem bitter sweet?  It is quite unlogical and silly actually.  In the child custody case we experienced, the birth mother always got the children on Mother’s Day.  Is that not the silliest, most selfish statement I’ve ever worried about in my life?  I know it, yet it is true.  Talk to a million step-moms and you will get this same observation.    

We would all agree that this Mother’s Day cross to bear was just the right and good thing to do.  It was the healthy thing for everyone, and we all know it was the best thing for the kids and for their birth-mother too.  Yet, somehow on that day, as the Mom who was actually living in the trenches and raising them day in and day out; I often felt sad.  I often felt completely alone, because it always seemed as if no one else was even coming close to understanding how my heart protested the irony of that day from my own broken and personal perspective. 

It was a place that a husband and a Dad could not fully understand or share with compassion.  It was something that only another woman could relate to, and most of the other women in my life were not in such a place.  I had no sympathy from anyone on this day.  My parents didn’t feel sorry for me.  My friends didn’t even think of it; much less ponder how I must have been feeling.  It was just something between me and God, like a silent prayer all day long, like a little  cross of suffering.  I knew that God understood how I felt, because it had occurred to me, after all,  that He had been in such a place many times.  His children often went other places on the days he had set aside especially for them to come and celebrate life with Him.   But, I soon discovered that I couldn’t even use this analogy for comfort, because God was truly God, and I would never be the birth-mother, the one who received the honor and glory of this day.   So, I talked to God anyway, because I knew He understood suffering and pain.  I held on to whatever little tidbits of encouragement I could find from the scriptures on this day.    

Finally, one great day, I woke up and realized how selfish and foolish I was being.  I knew God had to change my heart and help me to realize that I truly had been given the greater blessing in having the opportunity to be with them every day of their lives.  Why should I resent this one public man-made day?   I had to learn, on this day above all others, to live out the meaning of that scripture that says “in all things give thanks.”  Finding this place was like being let out of prison. In my pitiful pondering one year, God reminded me that I should take my mind off my own silly selfish problems, and try to do something positive for a change.  Maybe there were others who needed a little love on this day.  It occurred to me that maybe I needed to spend a little more time, and put a lot more emphasis on the time I had left to spend with my own mother.  I also had a wonderful mother-in-law that I could show my thanks to.  That is when my heart opened up and truly began to enjoy Mother’s Day.  I had discovered, like most of the best things in life, it isn't about me!

When the kids left the house to spend a happy weekend with their Birth-Mom, instead of dwelling on the fact that they would be having fun with her all day, and imagining that they would be honoring her publicly, going to church with her and spending the hours with her; I would concentrate on making the most special occasion that I could design to honor my Mom and my Mother-In-Law.  So I put aside the idle hours of self pity and moved forward.  They both were delighted with the new-found extra attention, and I was freed from my own traps. 

Don’t get the wrong idea, I had always honored both of these wonderful women in the past, but I put a lot more “special” into this day after I reached this higher level of maturity.    It was a win-win situation for all of us.  I have some awesome memories of those days.  One day I took them both to a local tea-room and we enjoyed a lovely meal.  I bought them imported tea and a special cookbook from the gift shop there.  One time I took them to a spring concert in the park, where we were served a special boxed lunch with wine and cheese and were given a lovely outdoor concert. All the Moms received a rose.  Many times we had reservations for the newest upscale restaurants.  Once I took them to a restaurant that specialized in fondue meals, and they were given roses and had their photos taken.  Sometimes I made them special decorative baskets full of little books, framed family photos, candies, soaps, etc.  Sometimes I gave them flowers, sometimes I cooked them a special meal at my home.  
God arranged it that the last meal I shared with my mother-in-law was on one of these special Mother's Day outings.  She died unexpectedly a few weeks later.  I was so glad we had shared that very special day, and I will always remember her profound and sincere thank yous afterwards.  It comforts me on the days that I am missing her sweet and thoughtful presence in our lives.    My own Mom is now widowed; but thank God, she is still in good health and enjoying every day of her life.  She spent so much time being a caregiver for my Dad who suffered long with Parkinson's disease.   I realize more than ever how much it means to her to get out of the house and away for awhile to do something happy and uplifting.  I cherish all of the memories of these days gone by, and look forward to making the next memory with her in the coming days.

And you know what?  

As the kids got older and older and grew in understanding and love, they began to make my day very special too, in spite of the fact that they were always leaving and going away from home on that day.  

They often left sweet hand written cards on my pillow with words of thanks for what my presence in their lives had meant to them.  They always remembered to say “thanks for all the things you do that make our lives so much easier and so much more fun.”  Many times I would have breakfast cooked and on the table when I woke up on that morning, with special little designs in the food and fresh fruit or a vase of flowers left in an obvious place.   If they were away, the phone calls would always come.  They would often make a date to do something with “just me” on another day during the upcoming week, and we would always have a great time.  One of my fondest memories is going to a local festival with one daughter.  I also have great memories of middle of the work day lunches. 

Now that they are grown and living happy fulfilling lives of their own, I’m glad I taught them the true meaning of love and respect.  They all reflect it with their calls or visits or by giving in their own special way and saying “thanks for always being there for us.”  

I truly have come to believe that verse of scripture that people used to quote to me long ago…..”And I will restore to you the years that the locust hath eaten,” (Joel 2:25).    I think the verse is true for their Birth-Mother too, especially because I did not express my sad feelings or protest their visits with her, but just let them love her without restraint.  Now we both know the joy of their love.  You know what….there IS enough to go around, because love never runs out, it just multiplies.

   

So, I hope you enjoy a blessed Mother’s Day, whatever your situation is in life! 

Take my best advice and go for the good in this day.  Don’t let the devil make you bitter or angry with his perversions.  Don’t listen to the lies of this world.  If you are a step-mother and can’t see your children today, put some emphasis on your own celebration with YOUR birth-mother.  If you are a birth-mother, but because of divorce, or distance, or whatever reason, and you will not be able to see your children on The Day, focus on your own mother too.  If your child has gone to heaven before you, look around and see if there is someone else out there who feels lonely on this day too.   If your mother has passed away, there are lots of very sweet ladies living in this crazy world with children that aren’t paying attention to them, or children that live too far away to be with them. Go find one of these ladies and celebrate the day with them.   

I attended a funeral just the other day that put me in a waiting line next to a total stranger, a sweet, smart, beautiful woman who told me that her daughter's career had taken her many states away, and she had no other family, as she had become a widow about four years ago.  I would never have guessed her loneliness, had we not been expressing our concern for my newly widowed friend we were waiting in line to greet.   Maybe you are single, and without children, and do not have a family to celebrate with.  Quite possibly, like me before God opened my eyes wider, you are wishing this day would just go away.  I would urge you to make the effort to get out of the house and just take a trip to a local nursing home on Mother’s Day.  Go into the cafeteria and sit down with those eating lunch.  Listen carefully and see if any of the women there have memories of their children that may not be with them anymore.  They may need someone just to listen to their Mother’s Day stories.  You might just be the one that makes this day happy instead of sad for them. Take a bunch of flowers with you.  Flowers are better spent on the living.  

There is a way to let all of the innocence and the happiness behind the good original intentions of this day come shinning through.  Find it!  Remember what Joseph told his brothers during the famine in Egypt, “What you meant for harm, God turned to good.”  That is a statement worth living out.  The whole world wins.