The Mother’s Day Card My Mother Saved
I made this Mother’s Day card for my mother when I was in the first grade. I remember these school projects, when we would create something for our parents to bring home on the major holidays. With folded paper, simple decorations and our own handwriting, we did our best to make something special.
The cover is decorated with green crayon flourishes, small pink dots and a sticker depicting the Sacred Heart of Jesus. The pages were fastened together with staples, creating a small handmade booklet. These details preserve the materials and methods we used for classroom projects at that time.
Inside I wrote:
“Dear Mother,
Happy Mother day
I Love you. I am good in school.
You are pretty Mother.
I know you love me and I love you.
Love,
Nancy”
I do not remember making this card or giving it to my mother. What I know is that she saved it. Through all the years and everything else that passed through our family’s life, this small first-grade creation remained among the things she considered worth keeping.
Today, I can see my early handwriting and read the words exactly as I wrote them. The card preserves a moment from my childhood that I might otherwise have forgotten. It also reminds me of a familiar school tradition and the handmade gifts that children proudly carried home to their parents.
What began as a first-grade Mother’s Day project became part of the record my mother left behind. I wrote the message, but she preserved it, allowing my childhood words to find their way back to me all these years later.
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