I know it is past Mother’s Day but getting a baby gift done took a little longer than I hoped. Our own family Mother’s Day has been rechristened the “Festival of Meat” by the friend of one of our son’s. He was astonished by the menu of the traditional breakfast that is made and served to me, and now Laura– who is doing much more active “mothering”.
In honor of the best cook in our family, the kids’ grandma Hazel we always start off with something she did to make her family feel special—the ring of perfect strawberries around a mold of powdered sugar on a paper doily. For the first time this year Katie (6) and Jack (9) did the mold and so the 
tradition continues.
We then move on to scrambled eggs and now comes the meat selection that generated the name—we have sausages, Canadian Bacon, corned beef hash and a lot of heartburn. Funny thing about tradition—any suggestion of dropping anything is met with looks of “what are YOU thinking?” Actually it was heart warming to see Jack and Katie wanting to do what they have seen done every Mother’s Day since they can remember and be given the job of making the powdered sugar molds and to see the “big” kids doing the cooking and clean up.
That’s our family tradition but we have been watching and waiting anxiously for the start of a new mothering story. One of Laura’s friends (who she met in Junior High at a Leadership camp) is now physician. Dr. D. is a person who has the most peaceful countenance and her work as an Emergency Room doctor is a perfect fit for her personality. She is unbelievably smart too so I know that anyone with an emergency had great care. She has just finished a stint at a big city New Jersey emergency room but has come home to Wisconsin to be close to her family and wait for the birth of her babies. Yes, babies.
She is jumping into the world of motherhood with twin girls! They arrived healthy and beautiful the day after Mother’s Day to great fanfare and joyful feelings from her family and extended family (which we consider ourselves). I wanted to do something a little different for each of them and also, of course, wanted washability. I can’t believe someone would knit something that needs to be dry cleaned for a baby! So for this year no Festival of Meat for Dr. D. and the girls just a big “Welcome to the World”.
