GEM Parenting: Parents building strong Children and Families

Happy Mother’s Day

As I gathered these up for you to read,
I have to confess I laughed out loud myself,
had tears in my eyes,
and was very humbled.

I thought about my mother.
I thought about my grandmothers.
I thought about the mothers I know and love.
I thought about you.
And I thought about myself.

I was humbled you see
because of all the words and thoughts
that others have attributed to my daily living-
to the thing I do no matter what else.

I will hold off going to the bathroom
if my child needs me more.
I can never think of any activity
I do without also thinking of them.

When they are with me I think of
the joy I have for being with them.

When apart-
maybe wishing they could join me,
knowing I can’t do something
because it would cause too much
distress in our daily living,

yet also know that in my heart this is my choice.

I choose more than anything to be the mother I am.
To love my children with every
ounce of my being,
to let them know it in every action I display,
in every thought I have.

My love is so deep and pure  for them.
And it started the moment they were born.
It did not need anything to make it become.

Of course I get mad at them, yell at them.
Sometimes I even wish I could spank them.

But I only get mad because I love them so.

And then there are all the times
I kiss them over and over.
I just look at them when they sleep.
I listen to their stories of their days.
I read to them
And I play with them.
Oh the list goes on forever…

Happy Mother’s Day

Be a mother with Passion, Purpose, and Integrity,
Grace
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Here’s the quotes I just love.
Add yours and your reactions as a comment.

If you bungle raising your children, I don’t think whatever else you do well matters very much. Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis

A mother is not a person to lean on, but a person to make leaning unnecessary. Dorothy Canfield Fisher

At work, you think of the children you have left at home.
At home, you think of the work you’ve left unfinished. Such a struggle is unleashed within yourself. Your heart is rent. Golda Meir

Mothers hold their children’s hands for a short while, but their hearts forever. Unknown

Men are what their mothers made them. Ralph Waldo Emerson

Most mothers are instinctive philosophers. Harriet Beecher Stowe

We never know the love of the parent until we become parents ourselves. Henry Ward Beecher

The heart of a mother is a deep abyss at the bottom of which you will always find forgiveness. Honore de Balzac, author

The mother’s heart is the child’s schoolroom. Henry Ward Beecher

Who is getting more pleasure from this rocking, the baby or me? Nancy Thayer

By and large, mothers and housewives are the only workers who do not have regular time off. They are the great vacationless class. Anne Morrow Lindbergh

Of all the rights of women, the greatest is to be a mother. Lin Yutang

Mama exhorted her children at every opportunity to ‘jump at de sun.’ We might not land on the sun, but at least we would get off the ground. Zora Neale Hurston

That best academy, a mother’s knee. James Russell Lowell

Making a decision to have a child–it’s momentous. It is to decide forever to have your heart go walking around outside your body. Elizabeth Stone

Anyone who doesn’t miss the past never had a mother. Gregory Nunn

A mother is a person who seeing there are only four pieces of pie for five people, promptly announces she never did care for pie. Tenneva Jordan

No matter how old a mother is, she watches her middle-aged children for signs of improvement. Florida Scott-Maxwell

Women do not have to sacrifice personhood if they are mothers. They do not have to sacrifice motherhood in order to be persons. Liberation was meant to expand women’s opportunities, not to limit them. The self-esteem that has been found in new pursuits can also be found in mothering. Elaine Heffner

Whatever else is unsure in this stinking dunghill of a world a mother’s love is not.
James Joyce

The moment a child is born, the mother is also born.
She never existed before. The woman existed, but the mother, never. A mother is something absolutely new. Rajneesh

The most important thing a father can do for his children is to love their mother.
Unknown

A suburban mother’s role is to deliver children obstetrically once, and by car forever after. Peter De Vries

All mothers are working mothers. Unknown

The real religion of the world comes from women much more than from men – from mothers most of all, who carry the key of our souls in their bosoms. Oliver Wendell Holmes

It kills you to see them grow up. But I guess it would kill you quicker if they didn’t. Barbara Kingsolver

God could not be everywhere and therefore he made mothers. Jewish proverb

I remember my mother’s prayers and they have always followed me. They have clung to me all my life. Abraham Lincoln

Being a full-time mother is one of the highest salaried jobs… since the payment is pure love. Mildred B. Vermont

Nobody knows of the work it makes
To keep the home together.
Nobody knows of the steps it takes,
Nobody knows-but Mother. Unknown

Mother – that was the bank where we deposited all our hurts and worries. T. DeWitt Talmage

There is only one pretty child in the world, and every mother has it. Chinese Proverb

When you are a mother, you are never really alone in your thoughts. A mother always has to think twice, once for herself and once for her child. Sophia Loren

No gift to your mother can ever equal her gift to you – life. Unknown

An ounce of mother is worth a ton of priest. Spanish Proverb

Insanity is hereditary; you get it from your children. Sam Levenson

Setting a good example for your children takes all the fun out of middle age.
William Feather

And remember that behind every successful woman……is a basket of dirty laundry. Unknown

Hundreds of dewdrops to greet the dawn,
Hundreds of bees in the purple clover,
Hundreds of butterflies on the lawn,
But only one mother the wide world over.
~George Cooper

The sweetest sounds to mortals given
Are heard in Mother, Home, and Heaven.
~William Goldsmith Brown

It would seem that something which means poverty, disorder and violence every single day should be avoided entirely, but the desire to beget children is a natural urge.  ~Phyllis Diller

Mother love is the fuel that enables a normal human being to do the impossible.  ~Marion C. Garretty, quoted in A Little Spoonful of Chicken Soup for the Mother’s Soul

A man’s work is from sun to sun, but a mother’s work is never done.  ~Author Unknown

A man loves his sweetheart the most, his wife the best, but his mother the longest.  ~Irish Proverb

Biology is the least of what makes someone a mother.  ~Oprah Winfrey

You don’t really understand human nature unless you know why a child on a merry-go-round will wave at his parents every time around – and why his parents will always wave back.  ~William D. Tammeus

Now that… my kids are grown, I understand how much work and love it takes to raise and to keep a family together.  The example of your strength, devotion, and patience is now rippling through the generations.  Thank you!  ~Forest Houtenschil

My mom is a neverending song in my heart of comfort, happiness, and being.  I may sometimes forget the words but I always remember the tune.  ~Graycie Harmon

Before I got married I had six theories about bringing up children; now I have six children, and no theories.  ~John Wilmot

Who fed me from her gentle breast
And hushed me in her arms to rest,
And on my cheek sweet kisses prest?
My Mother.
~Anne Taylor

Children are a great comfort in your old age – and they help you reach it faster, too.  ~Lionel Kauffman

Sing out loud in the car even, or especially, if it embarrasses your children.  ~Marilyn Penland

Each day of our lives we make deposits in the memory banks of our children.  ~Charles R. Swindoll, The Strong Family

Now the thing about having a baby – and I can’t be the first person to have noticed this – is that thereafter you have it.  ~Jean Kerr

Mother is the name for God in the lips and hearts of little children.  ~William Makepeace Thackeray

The one thing children wear out faster than shoes is parents.  ~John J. Plomp

Your responsibility as a parent is not as great as you might imagine.  You need not supply the world with the next conqueror of disease or major motion-picture star.  If your child simply grows up to be someone who does not use the word “collectible” as a noun, you can consider yourself an unqualified success.  ~Fran Lebowitz, “Parental Guidance,” Social Studies, 1981

This heart, my own dear mother, bends,
With love’s true instinct, back to thee!
~Thomas Moore

Oh, the comfort, the inexpressible comfort of feeling safe with a person, having neither to weigh thoughts nor measure words, but pouring them all out, just as they are, chaff and grain together, certain that a faithful hand will take and sift them, keep what is worth keeping, and with a breath of kindness blow the rest away.  ~Dinah Craik

Where we love is home – home that our feet may leave, but not our hearts.  ~Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.