My Mom

My Mom was the fourth child of her mother and the first child of her father.  My Meme’s first husband had died.  My mother was the first of six more. We don’t have many pictures of the family growing up, but I found some school pictures. 
My Mom at 12:
   My Mom spoke French until she entered kindergarten.  Then my Pepe declared that only English would be spoken in the house.  Which is a shame, as we lost the language.  My grandparents were descended from immigrants of the Quebec region of Canada.  I have traced that ancestry back to the 1700’s.
My Mom met my father in high school.  He was the bad boy from New York City.  My Mom became pregnant during her senior year. Her senior photo:

My parents married and my dad went off to fight in Vietnam.  My brother was born while he was gone.  Here we are in happier times:
I have a couple of pictures of me in that dress.  One is my favorite.  Here is another favorite of my Mom and I:
Look how young she was!  I think I was about 2 in that picture.
My Mom and my dad tried marriage for ten years and then they divorced.  They have remained friends.  They said, “Just because the marriage did not work out, there was no reason to ruin the friendship.”
My mom met a wonderful man, who became my stepfather:
This is at my wedding.  They were married for 18 years until he passed away on June 6, 1996.
He brought with him 3 daughters.  Here is a picture with his two oldest, their spouses and children at the time, there was one more addition.  My younger sister lives in Maine and has two girls.  We don’t see them often.

My Mom loves all of her grandchildren.
 
My Mom moved to Florida and was married on a beach in Tampa.
Luckily I was able to attend all of her weddings!  I was in her belly for the first, and in person for the other two!
I was able to bring my niece and nephew down to visit a couple of years ago.  We had a great time!

Happy Mother’s Day to all the mothers out there and especially to my Mom…Love you!