In Celebration of What Would Have Been My Mother’s 100th Birthday, Here are Some of the Most Valuable Lessons She Taught Me – Plus a Free Gift I Know You’re Going to Love!
My mother, Dorothy Manin, passed away in 2010 and today marks what would have been her 100th birthday.
In honor of this very special day, I’d love to share some of the significant lessons she taught me both as a young girl and as an adult.
When Dorothy was barely four years old, her sister was 18 months old and she had a brand new baby brother, her mother died.
Dorothy’s father, my grandfather, was heartbroken. He moved to Portland, Oregon where his mother, my great grandmother Mary, could help him raise the children.
Financially, times were very, very tough in those days. Yet in their home, there was always an abundance of love.
My mother was taught that there was no “right” or “wrong” way
Although Dorothy and her grandmother loved each other, as time went on, they found they had some different opinions.
When Dorothy was a young adult, her grandmother said to her,
“Look Dorothy, as long as you’re in my house, we’re going to do things my way. When I come to your house, we’ll do things your way, because there’s really no right way or wrong way. There’s just your way and my way.”
Years later, when Dorothy was married with a home of her own, her grandmother came to live with her for a number of years until she passed away. She would continue to say,
“There’s no right way or wrong way. There’s your way and my way, and now it’s time for us to do it your way.”
My mother then taught me this philosophy. When I was growing up in her house, she would say,
“This is your room. You get to do it your way in your room. In the rest of the house, it’s my way.”
My mother passed on to me a practice that she fondly called “putting a zip in your day”
Dorothy was a child of the Great Depression. Her family didn’t have much money. She and my dad both struggled with money. They had tremendous amounts of love, but in their early marriage, my dad was in World War II. Then he went back to the Korean conflict.
She raised two little girls, worked and ran a household on her own during those years. But no matter what the conditions were, there was no reason we couldn’t have fun and put a zip in every day. To choose happiness.
To Dorothy, it was a matter of attitude, not money.
Whether it meant eating a PB&J sandwich on fancy china, drinking orange juice out of a crystal goblet or driving a different route home, putting a zip in the day meant doing something a little out of the ordinary to shake up your normal routine.
Dorothy Manin knew how to lovingly parent her adult children
It’s one skill set to parent a younger child who lives in your home and to be responsible for their safety, their choices, where they go to school and so on.
But when your child becomes an adult, it’s another skill set to still be able to exert your influence in a way that contributes to a healthy, happy relationship.
One of her philosophies about parenting adult children was that you never give advice unless you’re asked, or you ask permission first.
I remember a time my mother came over to my house. At the time, I was a young mom with two little boys. My eldest son hit his little brother and I said to him, “bad boy!” Out of the corner of my eye, I saw my mom give a little jolt.
She then said to me,
“I won’t give you any advice if you don’t want it, but I have a thought about that. Could I say something?”
I said,
“Okay. What do you want to say?”
She said,
“I don’t believe there are bad children, only that children sometimes do bad things. I know that kids really respond to what we tell them they are, so maybe it would be better to say, ‘That wasn’t a good thing,’ or, ‘That was a bad thing, but you are a good boy, and I know you can do better than that.'”
Her advice that day completely changed the way I parented my children. But more than that, the way she gave the advice changed my life.
She asked permission to give that kind of advice and she didn’t ask that question only once.
For the rest of her life, my mother parented me in this way.
This form of parenting has completely influenced the way I parent my adult children. I make sure I don’t give advice unless I’m asked, and if I want to say something, I ask permission.
I’m also not attached to them taking my advice, either. Sometimes they will take my advice, but sometimes they won’t.
When Dorothy’s husband, my father, passed away when my mother was 84, she went through a very dark and difficult time
For six months, she was depressed and we were all concerned about her. We took her places and tried to do things that would help fill her time.
Finally, one day, six or eight months after my dad had died, she called me.
Although my mother knew about my work helping people turn their dreams into results, she’d never taken my courses or studied any of the concepts I taught.
She said,
“Well, I guess if God’s still breathing me, then there’s something I should do with my life. Let me try that dream-building thing you do.”
I said,
“Okay. When do you want to start?”
She answered with,
“Well, what can we do now?”
So I asked her if there was anything that she’d ever thought about doing that she hadn’t done or any interests she hadn’t explored. We were looking for an opening to new life.
During that conversation, she mentioned something I never knew. She’d been interested in china painting for years but had never tried it. She decided that she wasn’t sure she was going to take a china painting class, but she would at least look into them.
Over time, Dorothy not only took classes, she dreamed of creating gifts that she would give all of her children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren. She dreamed that maybe even one of her pieces would be in a gallery in the northwestern United States.
Over time, she became so good that not only did she leave us all legacy gifts of her china painting, but some of her work was featured in four different galleries in the northwest.
My mother was inspired to leave a legacy
As Dorothy approached her 90th birthday, she started thinking about what else she could do. She was a well-known china painter by that point. She had made beautiful gifts, but she wanted to do something that left a legacy.
Because she had been a woman who had gone through two wars, and her husband had passed, her dream was to create a nonprofit that offered micro loans to the spouses of service people who had been killed or injured in either the Iraq or the Afghan war.
And so that’s what she did! She started this nonprofit that went on to help many, many people in the Pacific Northwest. Dorothy never let age be a deterrent.
One of the ways she funded this nonprofit was by creating her legacy piece – a book called 90 Ways to Put a Zip in Your Day.
A couple of years after my mom died, I was speaking in Seattle, and I had just finished my lecture. People began to line up to talk to me, including an elderly couple.
They thanked me for the talk, and then they said,
“We have your mother to thank for our new dining room table.”
I was a bit confused and told them my mother had died a couple of years before.
They told me they were talking about her book, 90 Ways to Put a Zip in Your Day.
The elderly woman said that my mom had tried every one of the 90 ways she listed to put a zip in her day and they had all worked for her, so the couple had decided to try each of the ways themselves.
When I asked how this was related to getting a new dining room table, she said that one of the ways listed was to have sex on the dining room table!
Perhaps your mother taught you a valuable skill, or maybe she even taught you how not to be, helping shape the wonderful person you are today
Dorothy Manin left many, many legacy gifts for me. I’m grateful that those gifts are continuing to grow and expand in my life because of the way she influenced me.
No matter how you feel about your relationship with your mother, join me for a moment, right now, in sending a big wave of gratitude out into the Universe for the woman who gave you birth.
This human being gave you the opportunity to live this beautiful life.
Even if your relationship isn’t what you’d love for it to be, you can still be grateful for the lessons this person may have taught you.
Would you like to discover more ways to put a ZIP in your day?
Here’s my FREE gift to you!
In honor of my mother’s 100th birthday, I’d love to give you a free digital copy of her wonderful book, 90 Ways To Put a Zip In Your Day.
The special book is very dear to my heart and something that my mom created a few years before she passed.
Apply even a few of the principles in the book to your life, and they will absolutely help you shake up your normal everyday routine and add a little more fun and spontaneity to your life!
Click here for your free copy of 90 Ways To Put a Zip In Your Day >>
Thank you for this wonderful, loving tribute to your mother and for reminding me of all the ways my mother made life pretty incredible for us. My mother was born Aug 16, 2013 and would have been 105 this year. Maybe sharing the same month is part of what made them so much alike from what you’ve shared. Thank you for bringing back such precious memories for me, Mary. That’s one of the wonderful qualities you share and being with you at LMI events is truly a blessing. Smiles, sunshine and blessings!
I ѕeе something trulyy special in this wеbsite.
Thank you so much Mary for sharing the beauty of yourself and Dorothy. You are both very special ladies. Bless you x
Very inspiring and a great lesson to learn. She certainly is a great spirt and a teacher to all of us. We need many teachers like her.
True freedom is to respond in a different extraordinary way to the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune.
Your Mother was truly a wonderful person.
Thank you for sharing the wonderful story of your dear mother and for the beautiful book! Such an inspiration!
This is such a wonderful tribute to your mom I’m sure that she’s proud of you.
I love the story about asking if she could give advice. Such a brilliant way to coach a new parent.
what a generous gift and how excited I am to read it! when you have shared about your mother at DBLives she sounds a lot like my mother. I think she is an amazing model for starting something new, no matter what one’s age. I would like to have a sense for more fun in my life and I have learned so much from her through you. thank you for sharing you mother with us and I am grateful for this opportunity to get to know her better through her own words. 🙂
You are truly an inspiration to others. Your smile and thoughtful words reflect your Mother and how much she means to you comes out in everything you do. May God bless you and you have a long life as your Mother did.
Thank you for your generosity in sharing your mom’s wisdom. Can not wait to read her book. Am so excited you have given this book as a bonus gift. I remember so well how you shared about your mom’s life at the Dream Builder Live conferences and how she came to believe in her dream of possibility no matter her age. So much gratitude for your trainings, classes. Have loved every minute of your teachings!!
Dear Mary, this is a beautiful tribute to your mother. You’re fortunate to have a wise and loving mother. I love her attitude towards life and admire her legacy. Reading about her desire to create a legacy almost made me cry. I don’t know what this means to me, but I came to your recent Dream Builder event in DC because I have aspiration to create a non-profit similar to your mother’s foundation and to fund it with a book that is yet to be written. Was it a coincidence? I didn’t have chance to connect with you at the event. I have the feeling we’ll meet again soon. Thank you for sharing your memories and for the gift from your mother. In gratitude. Blessings. 🙂
Well thank you bro much Mary for sharing your mother with us and giving us a present. I live it and I love your stories. How grateful you all must have been to have such a wonderful lady in your life. I can see you are following in your mother’s foot steps to be the most wonderful person to your family and leave your own legacy. I love u have a wonderful day.?
Dear Mary thank you again for the generous gifts you leave us in some form or fashion. I had a tragic relationship with my mother who is gone 2 years now in that there was no love respect or understanding of me and as daughters do, I did everything I could to not be like her and as daughters do, I ended up in some ways very much like her. I do realize the gifts that came from the Harsh Times and I am grateful for who I am.
Thank you so much for all the gifts you are sharing here. The wise words about not volunteering advice to adult children unless you ask permission is a lesson for me. I have shared on facebook, its a gift that should be shared as wide as possible.
Hi Mary
I loved this blog about your mother. My mother just transitioned out of the physical on July 12th at the age of 96 1/2. We will be celebrating her life on Saturday August 18th. So I, along with my siblings, are opening up many memories we haven’t dusted off for a long time. For the remembrance flyer, my sister wanted to add Mom’s china painting as one of the things included.
So your mother’s china painting and being in the northwest struck I strong chord. My mother started china painting when she lived in Merlin, OR after she retired from Children’s Hospital in Seattle at age 63. She belonged to the china painters association and took many classes. We have some of the pieces she painted as gifts. She won some ribbons for some of the pieces she painted. She became good friends with the local china painters in the Grants Pass area.
Mom moved to McMinnville, OR after the end of a long term relationship that had begun before she retired to move to Merlin with him. She continued to do her china painting, but at a slower pace than when there was the network of china painters that became her friends. She took classes from several teachers, but there was one that was more like a mentor and a friend. If Mom struggled with a technique, she was the one Mom would call to help her figure it out. I can’t help but wonder if our mothers might have known each other through china painting and if your mother might have been one of her teachers.
This was at any rate a timely piece to read. Mom didn’t do any china painting the past few years, but her kiln and some china blanks are still in the storage shed by her mobile home tthat she had moved up from McMinnville to Chehalis and again to Fife in WA.
So grateful to have read this blog today. Thanks for writing it.
Barbara
The simplicity of your mother’s observations and words make them profound. I’m over 45 year brain injury survivor and I recognize wisdom when I see it. Thank-you for sharing.
Wow! Thank you, Mary! Thank you for all the information you put out there for us to take sips of and grow. Thank you for sharing your mother’s wisdom. And happy name’s day! the 15th of August is Saint Mary’s day in the orthodox and Catholic churches. May you be happy and blessed! 🙂
Thanks to you and your mom for reminding me that age is no limit to achieving anything. Inspiring and thought provoking . God bless you. God bless her soul.
Thank you Mary!
I love the advice, which I try always to live by, to attach ‘bad’ only to the action, never to the child.
Thank you Mary and your ma for the gifts of timeless (and ageless) wisdom and joy!
Simply awesome!
Great inspiration and a blessing. Story inspires a reconnection to our mothers.
Well done. Stay Blessed.
Thank you for celebrating your Mom’s being and the gift of her life. Hearing you and reading the book really lifted my spirit with delight. I’d love to have a hard copy to pick up – love hard copy books! Happy to join in celebrating the gift of your Mom.
Barbara Fry
Beautiful book that you can pick up when you have a few minutes to read, and put down again until next time. Easy reading and powerful words to inspire your day.
Thank you for this gift!
She was great and brave lady,she left one fantastic story for us liked a good lesson.i should try to face the challenges.
What a beautiful tribute to your Mom, Mary. You are a beautiful person too. She shines through you. Much Love!
Thank you, Mary! I always love to hear about your very special mother. You speak of her so lovingly in your courses that I feel I have known her personally. I’d like to mention a tribute to her beautiful hand-painted china also – as she developed that wonderful creativity later in life. Sometimes those handmade beautiful pieces from loved ones take on a splendor of their own because they contain the whole spirit of love. Drink deeply from that teacup – “as if the axis of the universe turned on it” as you taught us from Monk Tich Nat Hahn. Your beauty is her real legacy to thousands of us!! Love, Joan
Thank you for sharing this. You mother certainly influenced and inspired many people. I am inspired just watching your youtube. I can’t wait to get the book. I am going to try to wake up every morning and put a zip in my day. I am a hospice nurse and I have my patience tell me something good about each and every day when they wake up and I make them each a journal to leave for their love ones. I will share this book with each future and my current patient. Thank you for being such a blessing. Love and Light your way
Oh, Mary–Took me so long to get in line, I feel certain that no one will read this far–but maybe you will. So very thoughtful of you to share this, and the art work was also superb! Thank you so much–I didn’t have this close a relationship with my mom but an incredible thing happened and Greg Braden said it should be put in Reader’s Digest, but I don’t have verification–my son, while returning from a trade show he and his wife stopped at a huge Antique Shop.While she was browsing, he noticed a huge table with a sea of shoe boxes–and on one, he saw ‘prison and jail’–his curiosity got the best of him, so he reached in, picked out a card–and saw they were humorous post cards. He chuckled and went to put it back–until he noticed the writer of the card put the short message on the front. As he glanced at it, he felt his legs go weak–because that card was written by my mother when she was 14! In 1907! And with that card in my hands, I ‘got’ my mother’s message. she wanted me to know that written things last way beyond the grave, and that she played the role she was given–that I had the perfect set of parents that would cause me to search out for the Perfect Parent (God) and that the many books I had written would still be circulating after I am gone! We made our peace over that card–and I forgave her….
Happy Birthday Dorothy Manin!
Thank You For This Beautiful Gift Marry Manin Morrissey!❤️
It’s obvious you had to get it from somewhere and now we know…. it all started with Dorothy. What a special lady! Now you have taken it even further and have improved the lives of SO many people. You have much to be proud of ….thanks!
You mentioned this at Dream Builders Live in DC. So happy to have this digital copy! An inspiration! Thank you! Love and admiration, In Christ,
Dear Mary,
What a beautiful tribute to your mother! Thank you for this lovely gift, too! (Her china paintings are gorgeous as well.)
I can relate, too, my parents (both passed now) were born in 1917 and 1919, and my dad died in 2010 at the age of 92. He was a lot like your mother in asking permission and the way he offered advice, usually saying, ‘If it were me……” Gotta love ’em! <3
Dear Mary,
Your classes have changed my life and given me vision and hope. Thank you for being a universal spiritual seeker and making these spiritual truths available to all who wish to dedicate themselves to living a life they’d love.
How wonderful that you are honoring your truly remarkable Mother. I do something special every year for my Mother too.
I’m coming to the end of my Brave Thinking Master’s
Class. This August I willl complete it. I am thinking about my next step. I could spend a whole year re-studying what I’ve already learned! I amso happy and grateful you’re in my life and that I’ve learned so much! I’m proud that I’ve kept up with the lessons and have installed new
ways of thinking in my life. With deepest Gratitude and love,
Jacquie Faber
This has moved me to tears of absolute joy and laughter!! Thank you so much and I wish Dorothy was still here as I’m sure we would have had some serious laughter today. god bless her and may she continue the joy and laughter in heaven.
Mary, What a great and lovely way to respect and remember your mom. My mom instilled a lot of things into my life that I find I use all the time. She started a 501C3 and I have been toying with the idea of starting the ministry (again) in her honor.8-8-14. I just hit the 4 year mark of saying goodbye to an awesome mom and role model!
Thank you for sharing your dear Mother with us all. I enjoyed reading your post and book. What great advice and some of her zips are things I have been doing for years. I look forward to trying some of her suggestions for my coming year. What a perfect way to honor her life and mark 100 years since her spirit touched this earth and she continues to live and touch people. Happy 100th Dorothy! I’m sure she’s still putting a zip I her days.
She has put into words how I try to live my 62 year old life!
Thank You!
Thank you Mary for sharing this wonnderful lessons by your Mom. I was tempted to read it because my mother has taught me wonderful lessons in life I owe gratitude to my Mom. Thanks againI want to say so much in honour of Mothers who leave the gift of strength to their children. Thanks
Love love love this book! I need to get permission to purchase or copy for my group of great women who will be as inspired as I am from these great words of wisdom!
Please let me know how!
Fondly
Sharon D
GFWC Ohio Warren Junior Women’s League
Hi Sharon,
Feel free to do as you please with the digital copy and I will post an update regarding hard copies in the future 🙂
Thank you so much Mary for sharing this wonderful part of your life. What a special lady she must have been. It is no wonder you have those special qualities as well. Thank you for blessing all of our lives with your talents and programs.
Hi,Mrs.Mary thank you for the gift.. This is a great story about your mother and grandmother. It was very inspirational. I admire you’re relationship with you and your mother. I wish I had,a better relationship with my mama. I love her, but she don’t won’t to get along with me. I’m always trying to make up to her and,apoloize. This time I’m not. For things I didnt do!! It hurts alot! I learned alot today to help me, with my children and my adult children.. U are a blessing!
I can’t wait to read this book! I know that it will be full of helpful,positive & loving wisdom. Thank you for sharing,Dorothy Manin & Mary Morrissey! God bless you all!
Thank you its a lovely story and teaches a lot
Dear Mary,
This is an inspiration.There’s no doubt your mother must have inspired many,and yet many more to be inspired by her China paintings ,wonderful book & the nonprofit project
May her soul continue to rest in peace.
Thank you very much and God bless.
Thank you so much for this delightful
and inspiring book. I admire her attitude in life one of my favorites is taking a different route to or from work. Luv it!
A lovely post, Mary. The 100th anniversary of my deceased mum’s birth was also this month. I reminded my children it was her birthday, and my sister and I toasted her memory.
Well done,
Nina
Today on my 80th year, may we all be blessed with a ZIP in our day forever!
Dear Mary, I love your story (all of the stories around your mom).
Thank you for reminding me of everything I owe my mother, and thank you for the beautiful book!
Susanne
LOVED IT! Thanks for sharing! Just in time…needed that boost about FUN FUN FUN!
Thank you very much. I used to attend your Living Enrichment Center and I have missed hearing you speak. Reading your words today fulfilled me in the way I used to feel when I heard you speak. Thank you again for the inspiration.
Very inspiring lesson Mary. I normally am prone to offering my children advise without asking .This is a great insight. Also thank you forr the free book. I am so excited to learn those 90 ways .
Thanks to your Mother for putting a smile in my day and reminding me of my Mother who now resides with the Lord. My Mom also lived through the depression and felt truly blessed for the experience. She was accomplished and touched many lives having the same attitude as your Mother. Two kindred Spirits lighting the lives of those they loved and complete strangers they met along their journey.The are loved, missed remembered and every now and again they send a Heavenly message to touch our heart and remind us they are always with us and we will meet again one day.
Thank you so much for sharing .
Your mother must have been really a very wise and gifted women. I do not have similar experience of beeing parented
so well, but can see the lessons I have learned accordingly.I look forward to read in the book and honouring your mum and learn from her!
Thank you so much. Love from Elisabeth from Austria, age 67
Thank you.
I will always remember her quotes on how to parent !
She seemed to be a very smart loving mother ….
Aww – sounds like you had an amazing Mom. Thanks so much for sharing her words and ideas with us. Fills my heart!
You can give back what you take but whot you take from your mother you never can give back. Sai Baba
Great woman. I enjoyed every bit of it. Thank you Mary for sharing.
I lost my mum 8 months ago. She had me at age 17, so we had some challenges.Just when we had become real buddies, she called one morning around 8, and had a cheerful conversation, hoping to see me later. My mother died that afternoon at 4.
We had many good times I remember and thank her for.
Her principles were:Truth,fairness and determination.
Thank God for mothers.
Amazing lady ? What an inspiration she was, she is and she will be. Thank you for sharing your love and her wisdoms xxxxx
Thank you once again Mary, we have missed you in Portland since the breakup of LEC. Bless you for continuing on your journey and reaching out to us. My dear friend Jean Gunby found you again in Scottsdale and travels to visit with me off and on in the Portland area and shares your wisdom in your adventures with me. I am recovering from stage 4 cancer and your little Snippets of Hope are of a great comfort to me. Thank you for sharing your mother’s delightful story we love you Mary! In love and light, Cheryl Douglas PS…it is Jean’s birthday today too! 8/14/1954
This book is the most Joyful book I have ever read. Kudos to your Mom for writing it. Thank you for making it available to read. I can see why you are s grateful that you had a mother like Dorothy and all that she taught you. Much LOVE to you Always, Mary. Keep up the Greatness that is within you.
Thanks for sharing your mother and her 100th birthday with me. What a blessing it was to have been able to receive such loving wisdom.
We all think we lead ordinary lives. When we gain wisdom we realize that those ordinary, little things make our lives so special. Bless you, Mary! Thank you for this beautiful book. Thank you, Dorothy Manin for inspiring happy thoughts across time and space!
Am always loving your work ma’am. And now knowing and getting some of the materials that made you, am definitely going to go through the book now and put a zip in my everyday life.
God ,Universe, put this in my emailfor a reason ….an for this I am grateful for You and your beloved mother Dorothy!! Thank you !!
God bless your mother she sounds like she was a wonderful person…I will take these helpful tips and try them in my own life…thank you Dorothy…your spirit surely lives on.
What a great read to start the day!
A beautiful story about an amazing woman.
You were blessed to have her as your mum Mary.
Your mother also shares the same name as my mum who passed away at 70 in 2009′.
Thank you
Thank you for sharing with us the legacy of your amazing mother!!! I’m so grateful to both of you, and to God, for shining your lights and bringing your gifts to this world! ?
This is a beautiful story about your Mom. Thank you for sharing her wisdom with us.
Dear Mary …
August 8, 2017, was the 100th anniversary of Edith Josepha (Carroll) Gresty’s birth. Like yourself, I was born between the drought, depression and WWII on a Saskatchewan, Canada prairie farm. Her husband, brother and sister ‘joined up’, Mom went out to work to support the family. When Dad came home and they had a farm of their own they were partners in the fields and pastures, home and childcare … we grew up knowing it was our interests, abilities and dreams that defined our futures, not our gender. Generation after generation carry on the Way. Thank you.
What a beautiful story of a very remarkable woman. Thank you for sharing ~ it put a Zip in my Day.
xo
Wow Mary Kay Ash would have been 100 May 13th & sounds like your mother had a lot in common with her in addition to being born & died in the same years.
Here is to inspirational women of the great depression & to the women of today that are smart enough to to take action on their lessons.
Thank you so much for the thoughts you expressed as appreciation for your mother’s life. I know that she was and remains a valuable person of history. I feel the same way about my mother and at 63 years of age, I am encouraged by your words to leave a legacy that keeps giving.
Love the vitality and enthusiasm you mom expressed on a daily basis, it seems. Lucky you to have had such a wise Mother.
Thank You Mary for sharing your Mother’s Zest
For life.
I would be delighted to have a copy of her book.
JOIE DE VIVRE
Elizabeth van Diepen
Thank your for the sound advice and lessons… I’m so challenged right now with my adult children
Good
Thank you so much, Mary!
Iloved your mother story, Peace and Light to her soul,she was a wonderful person!
Today is also my birthday 🙂
kind regards,
Isabel
Yes,lam one person who did not ask for permission when giving advice.
But l think its a best way to get trust from your children and it also that you respect their opinion
Love, Love, Love this book!!!!! Also today is my birthday August 14, 1959 just like your wonderful, beautiful Mother!!!!! God bless you and Ms. Dorothy’s spirit.
Happy Birthday, Dorothy Manin! May God bless you.
Absolutely beautiful. I miss my mom dearly. This was a joy to read. Thanks for sharing.
This was a very beautiful writing. Thanks for sending it. It reminds me to appreciate my own mother.
Wish that I had been able to meet your Mom. I will get to know her some by reading her book. Looking forward to it
My mom had polio as a small child. With help of the Shriners. She was able to walk unassisted for many years. She did not ever expect to have a child, but here I am with no siblings. This put a very unusual spin on my upbringing.
Dear Mary, that was a moving tribute to your mother. My mother devoted her time and energy taking care of her husband and her five boys. When we went on vacation, while the rest of us were having fun, mom was doing laundry, making lunch or dinner, or otherwise spending her time taking care of all of us. I loved her dearly. Unfortunately, she is now suffering from severe dementia (possibly Alzheimers). She was my biggest supporter but now she doesn’t even recognize me. It is such a cruel fate that she spent her life taking such good care of us and her present condition. Anyway, you were so fortunate to have such a wonderful mother as you had; it makes all the difference, as you well know. I downloaded “Put a Zip in Your Day” and I love it. Too bad she didn’t write more. Thank you so much for sharing your story. I’m sure many people will be reading your story and downloading the book. Thank you so much.
Your mother is a remarkable woman. Thank you so much for sharing this inspirational book with me. It was something I really needed today.
I loved your mother and miss her every day of my life.
The dining room table! I am a chef! 🙂
I miss your mom every day of my life. She influenced my life more than any person on this earth. Her book still sits on my coffee table and makes me smile.