Mom's Bayou Visit

Living far away from family is without a doubt the hardest part of living this Coast Guard life.  It comes with the package though.  Most of the time we just deal with it and look forward to those occasional visits from our loved ones.  For Christmas this year, we got to host my Mom.

Anyone that knows this sweet, little lady expects some sort of story to go along with any of her meanderings.  She sometimes gets lost, always has.  This trip she had her bearings and made it to Louis Armstrong International Airport mere minutes after a celebrity sighting!  We were excited to get our arms around her to say the least.

She planned all along to make cookies for us upon her arrival.  We had a lovely bucket of baked treats from my mother-in-law, but the cookie monsters quickly dug into those.  Good traditions don't get skipped.  She set to work making one of my favorite treats, the peanut butter blossom.  Unfortunately, we use natural peanut butter and low fat butter, which threw off her game tremendously.

Her second venture into cookie land left us with a bowl full of elastic dough that would not come close to making it through the cookie press.  The third attempt was another fail, though they tasted like a recipe for homemade pancakes we all enjoy.  Poor Mom tried so hard and we let her down with our mediocre ingredients.  I fully expect a package in the mail with the real thing any day because she refuses to give up.

We got to take her to dinner.  She hiked with me in the bayou and got to see her first ever wild gator.  There were several long talks about religious views, all amiable by the way.  My mother is sweetness and we enjoyed her immensely.

A real treat for me was giving her the gift that we had been working on for over a month.  It was entitled "365 Reasons You're Loved."  I contacted our family and had them send me memories and sweet things to say to this sweet lady.  Several of them made me cry knowing the positive impact their words would have on her.  Written on little rainbow colored strips of paper, we happily packed them all into a mason jar and tied it with a pretty bow.  She gets to enjoy this gift all year round!

We made one for my mother-in-law too.  These were the greatest gifts we've given and well worth the effort.  I truly hope that they are enjoyed as much as they were when they were being created.  We may not be there daily to give them the love we have for them and that's where this gift comes in.  There are 365 pieces of love.

We're settling in to 2015 and already missing our loved ones on a daily basis.  There are plans in the works for more visits, which gives us happy occasions on the horizon.  Until then Skype and FaceTime are the greatest inventions of all time!