Things My Mother Left Me

For this week’s special Mother’s Day Blog Blast, Parent Bloggers Network is asking us what our Mothers handed down to us.  I was adopted when I was 16 months old,  so I might not have resembled my Mother physically, but she definitely passed some traits down to me.  She passed away in 1997, a month before Ryan’s first birthday, and Chris and I both wish she was still here to see how the interests she passed down to me have passed onto our kids.

My Mother taught elementary school, mostly second and third grades. And she LOVED books. She would go to teaching conferences and come home with canvas tote bags stuffed full of the latest Newberry and Caldecott Award winners.  When she passed away, my Dad had me go through the books and choose ones I wanted to keep before donating the rest to a special collection created in her honor at the public library.  I definitely think that I inherited my love of a cute  canvas tote from my Mother

I lived with my parents for a while after I graduated from college, and after my Mom retired in 1991, I helped her catalog her books. As we went through them, she would hand me certain ones and say “just look at these illustrations”. She had an eye for books with the most amazing illustrations, and she taught her second graders as much about the artists as she did about the authors and their stories. To this day when I browse the childrens books at Barnes & Noble, I look for ones with unique  illustrations as much as a good story line.

My Mom loved Beatrix Potter’s Peter Rabbit. I have a tea set in my china cabinet, with tiny plates and cups and a teapot, with the most beautiful Peter Rabbit illustrations on them.  I find myself drawn to Peter Rabbit stuffed toys and board books, to baby blankets and onesies, to Christmas ornaments and china figures.  I’m saving the tea set and the little  The World of Peter Rabbit books in the presentation box, and I would be thrilled if one day, one of my kids said “hey Mom, can I have that?”

So. Those are the things my Mother left me, the things she passed down.  The Parent Bloggers Network Mother’s Day Blog Blast is sponsored by JOHNSON’S® Brand,  Their second annual Celebrity Hand Me Down charity auction runs from 7 pm PT on Thursday May 7 through 7 pm PT on Thursday May 14, featuring items donated by celebrity moms Gwyneth Paltrow and Jessica Alba.  All proceeds will benefit the new global JOHNSON’S® NO MORE TEARS® Clean Water initiative via their well-known charitable giving site, Baby Cause.

So tell me in a comment- what did your Mother pass down to you??