By Staff
Michelle Blaylock, Mom's Corner
Do you realize Mother's Day is a week from Sunday? Ready for a history lesson?
Well, although the United States Mother's Day isn't really connected to the European holiday honoring mothers, the earliest Mother's Day was in ancient Greece.
They had celebrations in spring to honor Rhea, the mother of the Gods.
In the 1600's, England celebrated "Mothering Sunday" on the fourth Sunday of Lent. During this time period there were many, many servants who lived away from home and did not see their families very often.
So on "Mothering Sunday" they were given the day off to visit their mothers. They even had a "mothering cake" to make the day more festive.
In the United States, Julia Ward Howe (by the way, she wrote the "Battle Hymn of the Republic") first suggested Mother's Day as a day to celebrate peace.
She did hold meetings in Boston, Mass. but the idea never really caught on.
After her death, her daughter, Ana Jarvis, took up the fight to make a national holiday to honor mothers.
In 1907, she convinced her mother's church to have a day to honor Howe on the anniversary of her death.
With the help of supporters, by 1911 Mother's Day was celebrated in most every state and in 1914 President Woodrow Wilson made the second Sunday in May the official date for Mother's Day. I found it interesting that most countries celebrate Mother's Day but not necessarily on the same day we do.
For example, most of South America and Europe celebrate at some time in May.
However, Norway celebrates Mother's Day as the second Sunday in February and Russia celebrates it Nov. 28.
OK, so much for the history lesson. On to our celebration of Mother's Day.
My hubby and kids always ask me what I want for "Mommies" Day as they call it.
Although I really appreciate the flowers, candy, clothes, and jewelry, I really like it when they do something for me.
I'd love being able to sleep a little later on a Saturday morning, or have an uninterrupted bubble bath.
I also wouldn't complain about not having to cook or do dishes occasionally either!
I also love to get things with my kids' handprints. It's fun to compare them from year to year.
One year for Mother's Day, I took T-shirts and, using fabric paint, wrote Grandma's Angels on them.
I had the kids stick their hands in the fabric paint and put them on the shirts. I wrote each child's name and age under their hand prints. Their grandmothers loved them!
There are many other ideas for crafts for Mother's Day. The web site www.orenoque.com/mothers-day-crafts/ has some terrific ideas.
A few of my favorites are the hand print apron (cover a plain apron with children's handprints), the gumdrop flower garden (see directions at end of article), and the photo house card (make a house shaped card, cut out the windows and attach photos behind windows).
Another internet site that has great ideas is www.kidsturncentral.com/holidays/mothers/momday.htm .
It has some printable coupons for things such as one bedroom cleaning, one day of being an angel (no fighting with siblings), one night of babysitting, one day of free dishwashing, etc.
These can be put into a cute book and given to a mom.
It also has ideas for children who have been adopted and want to remember their birth mother, who are in foster care or have a stepmother.
Mother's Day is also a terrific time to remember other special women in your life or the life of your child, such as aunts, a special teacher, a close family friend, etc.
I want to leave you with this thought by Lin Yutang, "Of all the rights of women, the greatest is to be a Mother."
Gumdrop Flower Garden
You will need: a pound cake, chocolate icing, lady fingers, toothpicks, coconut dyed green
Directions: Cover the pound cake with chocolate icing, cut lady fingers to look like picket fence posts and place them around the cake to resemble a fence.
Next roll the gumdrops out thin and cut them into tulip shapes, use the green gumdrops for leaves.
Stick the toothpicks into the flowers and leaves then arrange them on the pound cake like a flower garden.
Finally, sprinkle the green coconut around the flowers for grass. Eat and enjoy.
This would be a great activity for spending time with your kids. (Make sure you have some extra gumdrops for sneaking.)
Have an idea, comment or question? Send it to: Mom's Corner; P.O. Box 1496; Hartselle, AL 35640 or e-mail: moms-corner@juno.com