A last visit with my mom

My mom came to visit last week one more time before we move. It was a wonderful time spent together. She drove up on Thursday night (and of course got lost, again! Ha ha!) and stayed till Monday afternoon. Her trip had no grand DC highlights but rather was filled with wonderful everyday ordinariness.

Gosh we love the Mimi around here.

We filled her time here with a trip to the pool. We hit up the bowling alley where me and my mom got a very respectable five gutter balls in a row. We do not have good bowling genes.

 

 Isaak creamed us all, of course.

-We had dinner at Moe's one last time,


-there we many late night sewing projects,

(With my mom's awesome help I made a Syd a pair of shorts, Marvi a skirt and my mom made her a matching top, I made each girl a pair of pj bottoms and they both got a cape for their favorite doll. Go me. :~) )

-we walked on the Potomac collecting snail shells and dipping our feet in the water,

-We baked a totally ridiculous cake which turned out way ugly, but an ugly cake is still a yummy cake. So it sure didn't stop us from eating it!

-my mom introduced us to frappes.

-We made the yummiest grilled veggie subs and she took the girls to watch Isaak graduate from his training while the "Africa" movers were here on Friday.

I don't have pics of the graduation but I do have pics of a before and after pic of the boxes! This room is finally empty, hooray!

-She cheered Sydaleigh and Marvelly on in their attempts to stand on their heads and taught them some Tae Kwan Do moves.
 
(at 32 years old my mom started taking Tae Kwan Do lessons and after many many years eventually worked her way up to become a second degree black belt. My mom is hard core. Not only can she can break through a stack of wood boards with her fist, but she is proof that it's never too late to learn something new.)

She helped diffuse arguments. We went for our traditional walks together with the girls and just me and my mom where one evening we saw a double rainbow; it was magical. A thunderstorm happily graced her visit for a shirt time and we walked to the shoppette and looked for movies. We had long talks about everything from vaccines to politics to Downton Abby to the legal way to transport alcohol.

I love these kinds of trips. The kinds where we are simply busy spending time together doing regular things. I love taking walks with my mom. I love sitting on the couch eating strawberry Twizzlers and watching the Olympics with her.

As she was leaving on Monday afternoon the girls ran on the side walk chasing her car as she drove away. It is their very special way of showing love right now, running feverishly after the car waving their little hands in the air and screaming "goodbye!".

After we couldn't see her car anymore we came in the house and I got the girls set up in the living room for a bit, and I gave myself permission to cry. I haven't been able to cry much lately. Sounds weird, but crying can be so healing and needed, and well, I just haven't had the time to do that. I kept thinking how nice it would be if my mom could come to Africa with us...the idea of her being with me and just her presence is such a calming force in my life. Whenever I know that she is going to be close soon, I breathe deep peaceful sighs of happiness. And as I stood in the kitchen crying thinking about these things...I thought too...I hope that is how I am with my girls. That my presence is calming for them. That me being close fills them with security and peace just like my mom does for me.

It was a great trip. Love my mom. I am going to miss this silly lady overseas. But, God willing she will be able to join us at some point while we are out there.