A Shout Out For Mom’s from NanaHood!

Today is the day we draw for a winner of Mozart for a Mother’s Soul. If you haven’t left a comment, do so for a chance to win. I will post the winners name tomorrow.

Thanks to all who sent their mom’s Mother’s Day wishes! Hope each and every one of the moms in the NanaHood Neighborhood have a great day!  Teresa

Shout outs….

“Mother’s Day is EXTRA-special for Ma & me – ‘cause I was born on Mother’s Day!  She and her faithful service dog Ka-Cee just relocated from FL to KY, to a home right next door.  Though she is legally blind, she paints every day, is a concert pianist, a gospel singer, and an all around mega-inspirational mom.”

Stormi, Communication Director for Center for Courageous Kids (NanaHood’s Charity of Choice).

From Cecilee to her mom Dana – She’s my alarm clock, personal fashion adviser, cook, adviser, doctor, teacher, sometimes my maid…shes my mom and i love her! Happy Mothers Day Momma!

This was taken in Dec. 2009 at a Christmas dinner.  My favorite memory is of her always cooking wonderful food for our family.  I loved the roast and banana squash dinners on a winter’s day after school. And her cinnamon rolls!
Happy Mother’s Day!–Becky

To Johana from Kelly Jo-

My kids have the best Nana in the world!!! And I have a wonderful caring Mother as well!!

This one is from my Aunt Mary Alice, who is a fine Christian lady, wonderful mom to her three sons, and doting grandmother to her grandchildren! Happy Mother’s Day Aunt Mary Alice! Love you!

Mary Alice says—Pictures of my mother and me together are many years old, as she lost her life at a young 51.  One of the new “wonder drugs” given for her bronchitis destroyed her bone marrow and she died of Aplastic Anemia.  But she crammed a whole lot of living into those years!   She was a wonderful mother to her children, John, Roberta, Mary Alice, and Martha Kate.  She got to see three of us married, and John and Shirley and Roberta and Johnny each had daughters under 2 years of age.  Leroy and I had married in November before she died in July, and Kate was only 12, so the other 8 grandchildren were only dreams in her visions of life for us.

This picture was one Sunday afternoon in 1951 in our front yard.  No doubt, she had gotten up that morning, milked cows, cooked breakfast, made sure everyone was spick and span for Sunday School, and served a BIG Sunday dinner, with modest help in the kitchen from her three daughters.  We always did the “3 T’s”….set the Table, fix the Tomatoes, ice and pour the Tea….but at least, we did help with the cleanup.  And in a very real sense, that snapshot of her day encompasses much of the person she was;  she was energetic, ever-watchful over her family, and generous to a fault.  Her meals were planned to include everybodys’ favorite dishes, and her cooking was perfect!  I can see her in our old house, with only a wood cooking stove, as she put a dozen egg whites into a meat platter and stood with the dish in her left arm, beating the fluff into them with a whisk!! to make angel food cake!!  And she cooked that sucker in that oven—how on earth did she control the temperature??—and it would be perfect every time!  And a bonus; she would put the yolks of the eggs in the half-shell on the top of the stove, in the indentation in the covers meant for the ”lifter’, where they cooked a crusty doneness as a special treat for us!

So many things I could say about her, but foremost was the fact that she was a Christian.  She and Daddy agreed early in their relationship that that would be the basis for their family and never lost sight of their goal.  I cannot remember a Sunday, ever, that every member of the family didn’t go to church, unless severe illness or weather intervened, and daily Bible readings were a time just before bedtime when all of us gathered and listened to her ‘read a chapter’… Both of them did without so much in terms of material luxuries in order that when we graduated from high school, we would be able to attend a Christian school, which for all four of us, was (then) David Lipscomb College in Nashville (now Lipscomb University)–because they felt that the required Bible classes would be good for us, but more importantly, we would find good mates who shared our beliefs.  That little ploy worked for Roberta and Kate, but John and I found ours ‘in the neighborhood’ !

Mother had the most beautiful blue eyes and the softest hands and kindest smile…and she was so very talented!!  She majored in music at Belmont College in Nashville (then Ward-Belmont) and taught piano, but the glory of her music was that she could ‘play by ear’, and make that keyboard sing!  She also had a beautiful voice and shared it with us and in the congregational singing at church.  She was a patient, faithful wife, and a wise, guiding presence for her children.  She could be very stern if we were far ‘off base’ (I can remember dancing around to avoid her  keen little peach-tree switchs more than once!), but she always had time and attention for our needs…and if any of us were threatened in any way, she was fierce in our defense.

A life well-lived is something everyone aspires to, but I believe that Martha Hill Bell truly demonstrated how that should happen.  I was so blessed to have her as my example, although I will never reach the heights that she did–but I’m still trying!

From Jessica to Sandy-  I would love to wish my Mom, Sandy Curry, (the most unselfish, caring and giving person- I know) a very Happy Mother’s Day!!! Today, always and forever- I love you, Momma!