Wheat Bread 
by Connor, Age 10

There is nothing I love more than coming home from school, walking up the end of the driveway, smelling Mom’s homemade bread, and then eating five slices of it!

- from Seeing the Everyday Issue No. 6

The fourth day of Mother’s Day Week features thoughts from Sarah Ngo. Reading about her experiences at home reveals the influence of a mother who teaches her children through daily and seemingly simple work. We see fruits of a mother’s efforts in Sarah’s reflections about her own hopes and attempts to emulate her mother. We again share our sincere appreciation to women in their selfless and ever-important work of motherhood. Perhaps we may all reflect on a mother’s instrumental role in our own development and share with her our gratitude.

Fundamental in our Work – Others
by John Alldredge

Many people have influenced me in countless ways throughout the years, but my mother has left me with some of the strongest impressions. Through these experiences I have learned about life, relationships, and our family baking tradition. 

When I was a boy it seemed that the scent of Mom’s fresh bread was always in our home. It really is tough to top the warmth and smell of fresh, hand-crafted bread, made right before your eyes. I started thinking at an early age how the smell of bread was a mark that love was in the air. That feeling pointed to her purpose: to nurture our growing minds and bodies. I know it also had a lot to do with the sense of fulfillment she carried as she talked about the bread process, and how she critiqued a warm slice of bread. She would give the credit to others, saying, “It is the wheat that makes the bread,” or “My brother’s farm has some of the best wheat I have ever seen.” 

Truly, the love of baking was a generational thing that began with my grandmother Della Jackson Johnson and caught fire with each succeeding generation, and I am no exception. Our family didn’t invent fresh bread, but there is something special about how it is made and who we are making it for—each other. 

I started memorizing my first recipes around age five and was baking my own batches of bread by age 12. My mother developed what she called “summer requirements.” From the earliest summers I can remember we would sit down with her and fill out a goal sheet. Several of the goals centered around learning how to make the highest quality bread. She would talk about the ingredients and show me how to measure them, mix them, and let the dough rise, which she emphasized as the most important step. Then it came to forming the loaf. It always seemed like hers came out perfectly, but for me that was not the case. 

The bread making process was indicative of how she handled a lot of things in her life at the time. She passed on to my siblings and me her fundamental lessons of living and working. Looking back on it I recognize her tremendous patience and persistence in teaching me. She discussed that it takes time to figure out how to make bread well, all the while pointing to comparisons of life. 

Mom would often make batches of bread purely to give away to those she loved. My siblings and I would help her and Dad deliver the bread, and watching the reactions of the recipients never got old. Mom often mentioned how much satisfaction she had in giving what she thought was straight from her heart and passing that spirit of giving to us. In many ways I miss those days of seeing Mom’s eyes light up as she would take the moment to notice that her little chicks were catching on, learning the art of working hard and giving just for the sake of giving.

As I think about the torch I now carry as a third generation baker, I can’t help but think of all the prior family contributors—especially my mother. I am inspired by their love for bread and, more importantly, their love for the recipients of such fine work. 

Babies Don’t Keep
by Liz Mackay

It was a typical Monday morning with children to awaken and help prepare for the day, lunches to pack, laundry to oversee, vacuuming to start. As I moved forward to accomplish these needed tasks, my two youngest children kept coming up and petitioning me to play a game with them, or to build a fort with them, or to go outside and play.

My response was the same for the first several requests, “Honey, I am busy at the moment. When I am done with this work, I will come and play.”

It was then that the last two lines of the poem Song for a Fifth Child came into my head:

So quiet down, cobwebs. Dust go to sleep.
I’m rocking my baby and babies don’t keep.

I never knew the whole poem as a child. My mother always would say the last two lines whenever there was a baby that needed to be rocked. However, it wasn’t just when a baby needed to be rocked, it was when one of us needed to be snuggled or hugged or kissed better or listened to as our whole world was crashing down around us.

I know that the problems we had as children weren’t life threatening, but my mother always made sure that we knew whatever was so important to us was just as important to her.

When I got to be an older child, I asked her why. Her reply was simple, “‘So quiet down cobwebs, Dust go to sleep. I’m rocking my baby, and babies don’t keep.’ You children grow up so fast, and I know there will be a time when you won’t want to tell me everything—that I may not be your first confidante—so I cherish this time that you have as a child and don’t want to miss it. Everything else can wait; it’s not as important as you.”

Again as I listened to my child petition me for my attention, I thought about my mother and the words she would sing. I turned to my children to see what I could help them with; everything else can wait.

So quiet down, cobwebs. Dust go to sleep.
I’m rocking my baby and babies don’t keep.

This morning marks the first day of our week-long Mother’s Day celebration. We, with you, recognize that mothers are worthy of our daily thanks for their selfless and enduring efforts–we let Mother’s Day be a special time to reflect and honor those great women in our lives. In the first day of this celebration week, we give you a story from Norene Bean. She shares how simple and consistent time with her Mother provided Norene a foundation of security and safety, helping her to know that in a large family and in this big world, she mattered. Here are her words:

Growing up, I always knew Mom was there. As I came home after school she was often sitting at the sewing machine, or folding clothes, or baking in the kitchen. If I didn’t see her in the house, I opened the back door and heard her singing as she gathered clothes off the clothesline or worked in the garden. One more place I would look to find Mom was in the family room at the mangle where she sat ironing shirts, pants, tablecloths, and Dad’s handkerchiefs. My siblings and I often laughed at the name of the machine that pressed our clothes because it also tried to “mangle” us when we got our fingers too close while trying to help feed the clothes between the hot rollers—we have the scars to prove it.

This was one of the jobs that kept Mom stationary for a while, and it required little concentration. Maybe that is why I remember talks I would have with her while handing her the clothes to iron next. Mom kept her hands busy while she talked—it was her way. Mom seemed to understand the importance of our visits. Sometimes we talked about nothing in particular; other times the topics were timely and meaningful, and I still remember the message and feelings years later. All were significant to me. I needed to know that in a large family, I mattered. With Mom at her mangle, she made time for just me.

Please feel free to share this story with someone who might benefit from reading Norene’s experience. You might also share a subscription for Mother’s Day with the women in your life and add a note about how they have influenced your life.

A few things you’ll find in issue 17:

- Editor’s letter discussing the wholeness that comes from everyday “family work.”

- Eating, Working, Playing: Personal stories of how parents’ conscious efforts to actively engage their children in everyday life created meaningful experiences and promoted physical, emotional, academic, and social development in our readers.

- Sharing: an academic article discussing the effects of everyday family work in building bonds between parents and children.

I realized something. I’ve been the mother of a daughter for just over a year, and I’ve had a lot of time to contemplate while rocking my little girl to sleep at night. It’s been one of the most angelic times of my life, as I hold this little angel with hair like blonde feathers, white porcelain skin, and the face of a baby doll. I would do anything to bless and build her in healthy ways. Every day I strive to be better because I’m the mother of Eden.

Having a daughter makes me look at the world differently. I see all the injustices thrown at women—the sexual put-downs, the expectations of body and appearance, the unrealistic ideals of what beauty is—and I pray, as a mother of a daughter, to not only protect her from these cultural woes but also rear her to rise above them.

My own mother lives down the street, and I see her almost every day. She continues to inspire me. Last week, when I wasn’t expecting her, she walked into my kitchen . . . and I realized how meaningful she and her life were to me. I looked at her as a person, not just as my mother, and I saw this strong, reliable, beautiful woman with whom I am privileged to spend so much of my life.

To think that this woman, my mother, loves me the way I love my new baby daughter made me stand a little taller. It took having a daughter to see how my own mother must see me; how she must love me like nothing else in the world.

When I’m sick or feeling down, I hear from Mom. She checks up on me. She prays for me. She knows my husband is my anchor, and still she’s always right there when I need her. And the best part is when I do the slightest thing—like make cookies for a neighbor, French braid my hair, or reach out to a family member who’s struggling—she continually praises my sincere, heartfelt efforts. Her warm and sincere words build me up and help me see the whole picture in life. The older we get, we start to realize how important relationships are and that our parents won’t be there forever.

If my mom loves me like I love Eden, why would I ever doubt myself, think I’m not good enough, or let others intimidate me? I don’t fully grasp the magnitude of it, but I’m starting to understand a mother’s love.

After getting a paper cut in his hand the other night, Sam (age 4) sat down on the stairs, heaved a big sigh, and then said, “I’ve had a hard life.”