Happy Mother’s Day, Mom!

All I am, or can be, I owe to my angel mother.
Abraham Lincoln

Lincoln’s mother may well have been an angel. For me, personally, an angelic mother sounds awfully boring. My own mother is — forgive me, Mom! — far from angelic. However, the main point of Lincoln’s sentiment holds true for me as well. All I am, all I can be is from my mom.

My mother is an amazing person. She doesn’t know that about herself but when I look back on what she has done, what she has accomplished, what she continues to do and be, I am truly dazzled by her. She has overcome some pretty profound hardships with grace and growth. She raised my sister and me to be strong, opinionated, prickly women with huge capacities for love. She taught me how to be a mother — and a damned good one, if I do say so myself.

I don’t always show it the way I should (see above comment about prickly) and I don’t always honor her the way I should but I do feel it. I love you, Mom! See you next weekend!

A new published author in the family

Our county office of education puts on a Student Author Book Fair each year.  They do it at our local shopping mall.  Schools have a table set up and display the books written by their students each year.  Mrs Jackson, Gage’s teacher does it every year.  Ruthie was a published author in 2nd grade as well because she had Mrs Jackson, too.  Now Gage joins those ranks.

(I would like to point out that I still beat them — I was published first in first grade!)

Mrs. Jackson does an amazing job with her kids.  They write the stories, illustrate them, and then bind them into books.  Most of it is done in class.  Each family helps their child make a book cover.  I made both kids’ book covers the same way — well, I guided.  The kids did most of the work.

The culminating event was having the kids read their books to the assembled masses at the book fair.  In the picture above, Gage is reading it to me and a 4th grade teacher at our school, Ms. Cress.  I believe Ms. Cress had just made a funny observation about his book.

When the kids read their books, they get to sit in the Author’s Chair and are interviewed with a microphone and then they read their book.  It is a fantastic event and the children really grow as people with rich possibilities because of it.  I’m so proud of my two published author’s.

I know my own experience with having a poem chosen to be a part of a published book of poems and essays for my school district when I was in first grade is the reason I have always known I was a writer.  I had actual proof — my name in a book.  Isn’t it amazing how we can open children up to life by giving them experiences like this when they are so young?