Starting this blog, called to mind several pieces about mothering I had written and published in the past. With my children grown now, its always heartwarming for me to take a look back and remember just how much they inspired me during their growing up years.

Mothering ... I Wouldn't Have It Any Other Way

When I was young, I had no great desire to get married or have children - it somehow didn't fit into the equation of my life ... an yet, here I sit, married nearly 18 years with two kids and wouldn't have it any other way.

For someone that showed very few maternal instincts as a youth, I did an "about face" when my children actually came along; I suddenly believed in natural childbirth, breast-feeding, stay-at-home-mothering, and homeschooling - all of which I did with a passion (and I'm still homeschooling my youngest today). Its interesting how those little faces can miraculously transform our original conception of the world ... and our place in it.

Somewhere we make that jump - that transition - from being children ourselves to raising children of our own. And on that sometimes, wonderful, sometimes bumpy journey, we grow up and grow into a way of life that brings out the best in us.

Mothering these last 16 years, I have given more than I have taken, been awake a whole lot more than I have been asleep, and have been blessed more than I could have imagined. Its a strange mixture of love, hope, frustration and fun ... and, no, I wouldn't have it any other way!

Reprinted from The Senior Review copyright © 1997 Jan J. Stover

A Mother's Work of Art

If I were but an artist
Who could make a paint brush dance
By placing brush to canvas
In a rare but timely dance

I'd paint the splendor of the moment
Capturing in time
The gentle transition
Of a babe no longer mine

To a little boy discovering
Venturing out into to world
Standing still and at the same time
Into the future he seems hurled

If I were but an artist
Who could make a paint brush soar
I would paint this little being
As I've ne'er seen him before

Capturing on canvas
His clumsiness and grace
The frustration and accomplishment
Both seen upon his face

The child within the babe awakening to life
The babe within the child reckoning with strife

And if I were but an artist
Who could make a paint brush sing
I would paint with brilliant colors
The gladness this child brings

His temper and his tenderness
Would blend a brighter hue
Than any paint could on a pallet
Ever hope to do

And with each stroke would be revealed
The beginnings of a man
Arms outstretched to a world unknown
In hopes to understand.

Reprinted from The Senior Review copyright © 1997 Jan J. Stover