As a Mother's Day gift for my mother-in-law, I took a jewelry box, with small square and rectangular compartments for rings and bracelets and slightly larger ones for necklaces, and turned it into a photo collage of my two sons. I cut out images from extra photos over the years, where part of the frame was blurry or mostly landscape or I was just too far away for a good picture. Somewhere in that 3×5 photo was the perfect smile of one of my sons or the laugh of another son or the sweet look of a child at play. My job was to capture it in this padded box, with lovely red lining.

My sons are now 13 and 16, so I had plenty of material to work from. As I reviewed my stash kept in two card files, organized year by year, a still life narrative of my kids emerged.  Stretching from newborn baby to independent teen and tween, I was given the gift of remembering.

I remembered their years as newly licensed walkers in a world of stairs and household furniture towering over them. Baby gates and vigilant parents kept them safe.

I remembered them as toddlers and pre-schoolers, riding together in makeshift kiddie trains at a local fair or playing in the backyard with the garden hose or digging in the turtle-shaped green plastic sandbox. (You know the one I'm talking about, with a lid that resembled a shell. It was a fixture in most backyards with small kids in the 90's.)

As grade-schoolers, I remembered our hikes through Colorado pine trees and occasional camping trips in more remote areas, where nature engaged them with quartz-like rocks and small beetles. 

Their first day of school photos were taken in the shadows of the aspens near the backyard patio and on the steps leading to our front door. In their faces, you can see the optimism of another year. Their backs are adorned with new backpacks, not yet dirtied with smashed up sandwiches in plastic bags and torn granola bar wrappers.

As my sons grew into middle school and high school, the mix of little boy and young man shifted, in favor of  young adult with a zest for video games and War Hammer gatherings and cheat codes. Still to come: learning to drive, getting that first summer job, and dating. 

But I get ahead of myself. Today is Mother's Day 2009. My 13-year old made me a breakfast of scrambled eggs, toast, and juice. My 16-year old remarked that he should have made lunch instead of me. Motherhood has been a privilege and an honor and a bittersweet experience, knowing that all we have is this moment. And our memories. Thanks, boys, for enriching my life and giving me the gift of motherhood.