Happy Memorial Day, mamas!
A lot of us have kids who got out of school recently for the much-anticipated summer vacation. Woo-hoooo! Although it can be challenging to find ways to keep everybody entertained and out of trouble during the summer, it’s fun to have some extra time to hang out together. We hope you’ll enjoy the long break with your kids, just as we plan to do with ours.
Because so many moms have trips and vacations planned over the summer, we’re going to do a “Summer Remix” here on nwaMotherlode, where we re-post some of our readers’ favorite posts that have published previously. We update the homepage every day, so we often hear from moms who missed the chance to read the “front-page” stories before they got replaced with newer articles. Now you’ll have another chance to see the posts readers enjoyed the most.
This Summer Remix post is one you’re going to love because you guys wrote it! We smiled and laughed when we read the comments posted on our “Listen To Your Mother Giveaway” post in April. We thought the comments deserved a big encore performance at the top of the homepage so everyone could enjoy them. Here they are:
From Kathleen: One thing that I will always love about my mother is here willingness to travel. Her excitement about hitting the road or jumping on plane was contagious! We camped a lot growing up- two kids, two dogs and a VW Vanagon. Probably one of my most memorable “wake ups” was having her sitting on my bed asking, “Do you want to go to Ireland?” I was 14 and two weeks later I was there!
If only I had the patience and will to be the mother I was before I had children. 
From Shannon: It’s really hard for me to pick just one….I think my favorite would be how my mom was always able to find her sense of humor and make me laugh even in the most “unfunniest” of times….I was accident prone and also had several surgeries….her humor was needed so many times 
From Sarah: My kid does not sleep well; never has. I have a friend with a 6 month old who just pulled 13 hours — Anna is more likely to do 5 or 6 at a stretch. Saturday morning she woke me up at 4 saying she was hungry! But I know all those moments by her bedside are precious and fleeting (even though the past 2.5 years seem like forever!) and I’ll get some nice karmic payback if she ever has kids who don’t sleep
From Amanda: True story and will have you laughing until you cry. My son was about five, his coat had been dirty so I threw it in the wash the night before. As usual we were rushing around. That evening when I returned home from work, my husband pulled my black velvet thong from his pocket and said look at what your son took to school. Yes apparently by the magic of static cling my underwear was plastered to the back of my son’t coat for all the world to see. Sidenote, the song black velvet has been my ringtone ever since.
From Rosemary: My daughter loves for me to tell her the story about the time we were at the mall and she was squirming so bad while I was changing her diaper. There wasn’t anything I could do to keep her on the bench! Poop fell on the floor and I wanted to cry. People were walking by!! I was so upset and laughing at the same time that I just let her run around with no diaper on. Finally, I was able to calm her down long enough for me to put a new diaper on her! I know someone must have seen the whole episode and must still be laughing or mortified!!
I also love to watch my mom with my children…..I watch her laugh and time stands still. There is such joy in her eyes. That will always stay with me.
From Heidi: My motherhood journey just restarted from the beginning, so now I am enjoying a teen, a tween, and a baby! Learning to love every stage!
From Sarah: My youngest, a 5 year old asked me if I was going to ever have another baby (my body yelling, HECK NO) and I say to him, “I don’t think so, babe”. He answers to me, “but, can’t we just get one at the hospital?”.
From Marian: This is gross I know, but my daughter loves to hear the story of how she spread poop out of her diaper on the wall and my son loves to hear how he would pee all over the wall. They just love potty humor.
From Amanda: I love to tell the story of my little guy Harvie breaking not one, but BOTH his wrists. We lived out in the country and he had just learned how to climb trees. He played with the three little girls up the road a lot. Well one day he was outside playing with the girls. I heard this awful cry coming up the front steps. In stepped Harvie, 7 with big ole crocodile tears streaming down his face saying his arms hurt. I checked him out, nothing seemed to be wrong. We cleaned him up and he didn’t want to go back outside. It was getting close to bedtime anyway, so I gave him a snack, some tylenol and sent him to bed. He woke up the next morning with 2 very swollen wrists, so off to the ER we went. The ER nurse asked him what he did to which he replied “I was swinging like a monkey and Emma (his, as he put it, girlfriend) distracted me. I fell from the tree.” The nurse, while doing his x-rays, then asked him if he was trying to impress the little girl. Harvie replied “yes, she’s my girlfriend!” The joys of being a mom!
From Carey: I have 4 year old twins and it amazes me to hear them use words that I think they don’t understand. However, they use them correctly. This past weekend the girls were playing with something and one of them was not getting her way. Instead of getting upset (we were in the truck) She said “Frustraation”. My husband was driving and we cracked up laughing. She is such a mess. Cracks me up and totally makes the 2am yelling for mommy worth it”
From Lindsay: A not-so-proud Mommy moment…when I locked myself out of the house with my toddler son inside. I never wished so hard that he knew how to open doors than at that moment. And it was raining. And he found the scissors. You can’t make this stuff up, nor would I want to! I’d LOVE to hear the other Mama’s stories!
From Carrie: With three kids, it’s really hard to pick a favorite mommy moment. I wish time would slow down a little. My kids are growing up too fast! I hope I’m helping make some great moments for them to remember.
From Cedar: I have a 6 year old and a 2 year old, very rarely do they get along but when they do it is music to my ears. Most nights if there is time before dinner is ready they run around the house as superheros. They put there arms out and make a swooshing sound to look like they are flying. Man those times a wonderful and so fun to watch.
From Robin: You know how little toddlers will find a string or something and bring it to you…like a prize? When my son was 2 he came to me, fist closed, to give me a prize…of course I opened my hand to accept…and it was a LIVE SPIDER!
From Ambre: During dinner at the camp ground, Addyson started screaming that there was a black bean in her nose… I blew her off… How could there be, right?? Wrong, after several minutes of her crying and not being able to talk her out of it, I flipped her over and saw the black bean in her nose! Then I said, “We DON’T put black beans in our nose!!” #thingsonlyamothersays
From Kari: Love hearing kid’s big words! One favorite in our household was ‘excamator’ (excavator)! One day we were driving down the road and my son, probably 3.5 at the time said, “Mommy, stop antagonizing me!” Guess I told him to stop antagonizing his brother more than I thought!
From Jenny: My daughter loves to hear the story of the day we let our families know that baby would make 3. It was a crazy day with lots of confusion that led to half the family thinking my oldest sister, whose husband has been fixed, and the other half thinking my second older sister who had just recently divorced were the pregnant ones. Only my sis-in-law figured it out. It’s a pretty funny story but too hard to explain in writing and the translation would be totally lost!
From Beda: I locked my daughter in the Mini Van after I put her in the car seat….I then remembered she is double Jointed and was teaching her how she can get out of it! She did do it, but then she took advantage of it and before we would get to our street she would get out….Thank God she stopped doing that!
