To the bestest mommy ever!

This is a special blog post dedicated to an essential person in my life: my mother. Yes, I know that yesterday was Mother's Day so I'm technically a day late, but better late than never, right?

My mother has been my inspiration throughout my life. She has taught me by example the way I need to live my life and has showed me what it means to be compassionate, loving and service-oriented. She is constantly giving of herself, sometimes to the point that she has nothing left to give and yet she still presses on. She always puts her children, her husband and God first in her life. I can't tell you the number of times I stumbled across her while she was on her knees in earnest prayer during my growing up years. I knew she was truly communing with God, and her faith sustained me until I developed a strong faith and testimony of my own. I've also felt her prayers and been protected many times as I've grown up and moved out on my own.

Most of the time I don't think my mom even has a minute to herself during any given day, but she finds some way to manage. I've talked until I'm blue in the face trying to teach her about "me" time, but the idea seems foreign to her. Perhaps someday when I'm a mother myself trying to balance the demands of family life, running a household and working full time I will understand why that is. Until then, I'll keep trying to teach my mom that it's okay sometimes to do something for yourself. :)

My mother is always, always serving other people. She is a caretaker to the very core. She is also nurturing and loving, traits she has also taught me to have, although I still have a lot to learn about both. Here are a few photos to document all the wonderful things about my mom.

This is the two of us a few years ago after we both got fabulous hairstyles. Yes, you should be able to tell from the color of my hair that this is an old picture, and by old, I mean about three years old, but it's a great one so I used it anyway. :)

I wouldn't dare write a blog post about either of my parents without mentioning square dancing. It's the one thing they do for themselves that has nothing to do with their children (trust me with my parents that's a healthy and encourageable thing!), and I'm so glad they have it. The lovely lady standing just to the left of my mother is her dear sister who shares this hobby with my parents. She has been an honorary mother for much of my life too, so of course I need to mention her.

Here is my wonderful mother with three of her daughters, one of her adopted daughters and a beautiful granddaughter. She is very involved in her children's lives and will do anything she can to help. In fact, it's terrible for her when she can't do anything to help.

Did I mention she's also a wonderful grandmother whom the grand kids cherish?

Sometimes I get to do cool things like travel with my mom. Here the two of us are in Brazil a couple of years ago when we went to pick up my brother from his mission. It was one of the experiences of a lifetime for my parents, who haven't had much opportunity to travel, and I was so grateful to be a part of it. Because I can't get the spacing to work right on my blog, I'll also tell about the other picture. It's my mom and me in our family's special place, Yellowstone National Park. She and my dad introduced us to the park many moons ago when we were pretty young, and it's become dear to all of us.

Finally, my parents have set a wonderful example to me of what a happily married couple can look like. They preside over our family in love and righteousness, and I'm so grateful for both of them. Love you, Mom and Dad! Happy Mother's Day! How appropriate that this picture should've been taken in Yellowstone too. :)