A Sunday Favorite on Mother's Day

To all the nurturing women out there -- young mothers, potential mothers, grandmothers, stepmothers, foster mothers, those who mother their neighbors' children or beloved nieces and nephews, their pets, their aging parents, those who extend their encompassing love and care to any who need it, those who hope for a child to mother, or long for a lost one, and to my fellow empty nest mothers. . . A Blessed and Happy Mother's Day.



I believe mothering to be a sacred trust, a partnership with God for the raising of His children here on Earth. I thank my own Mom for her example of dedicated, loving and wise motherhood; she gave me the blueprint for my own life.

I thoroughly enjoy being a Mother. The last few years have been an adjustment -- moving from the hands-on mothering of children at home, to the equally important but very different skill set needed by the "empty nest" mom.



On this Sunday, I'm joining the Sunday Favorites blogging meme, hosted by Chari at Happy to Design blog. (Click here to join or read more!) This blogging party lets us post a blog from the past; mine is my second-ever blog post, from last October. It's about my empty nest Halloween. . . .

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Originally posted on October 31, 2008
(My second-ever blogging post... no pictures! Today I added this one of my two girls on Halloween when Alida (left) was 3 and Annie was 2. My sister Peggy made those costumes; she has 4 girls and we traded back and forth a lot. Ack! There was dust on my scanner.)

It's Halloween, and it just got dark.

I have lit all the lights in the first floor rooms. The house, inside and out, looks bright and welcoming and all ready to welcome witches and goblins and Indiana Joneses for Trick or Treat.

Tally so far is ... 2: the neighbor kids from the house behind us, whose grandparents used to live in this house. No one else has ventured either up from the street in front or down from the cul-de-sac behind to beg for candy.

This makes me sad.

In our former house, in a close-built neighborhood, with quiet level streets and no moving vehicles except those of other parents, the streets were alive between 4 and 9:30 with kids. It looked like a Peanuts special when you looked out from our porch, with little costumed beggars swarming over grass and piles of crunchy leaves and the remains of spent annuals.

I loved it. I loved Halloween. I loved bringing cupcakes and juice to the school, watching the parade in the parking lot, hosting a Halloween party for my Girl Scouts.

I loved making costumes for my two daughters, usually in a mad last minute rush. I loved decorating the house with spider webs and flying bats and a scarecrow on the lawn swing, pumpkins and hay and Indian corn ... even a big goofy-looking plastic skull with giant googly eyes and a motion sensor that triggered "I SEE you" in a lugubrious tone when people approached the front door.

Now, I've got a couple of tasteful pumpkins, a few copper colored mums, and a bittersweet wreath -- pretty, but restrained. Now I have two bowls of candy -- one at each door -- and no little takers. Now I've got a great old house, perfect for Halloween parties, and my girls are elsewhere -- one of them 3000 miles away.

I miss a real Halloween! I wish someone would knock at the door, some little extortionist, threatening me with dastardly deeds if I don't pony up the Twix and the Kit-Kats.

Oh well. Howard will be home by 7:30, and I did buy two bags of his favorite candy -- 3 Musketeers Bars.

I will make him beg.

Happy Halloween!

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Thank you to all the wonderful people who expressed sympathy over our sudden loss of Connie, our elderly Cavalier spaniel. It is truly a gift to have such support. -- Cass