Happy Mother's Day in Heaven

Norma Lorraine (Carvell) Colyer
October 17, 1930 - September 22, 2023

This is our family's first Mother's Day since our mom went to Heaven, arm-in-arm with Dad, back in late September. I want to celebrate my mother today and every day, as she was a heck of a woman.

I took digital pictures of some physical photographs of her this afternoon and posted 21 of them to Facebook. They feature her with my dad, her and her mom and sister, and other family photos. A second picture, included in the extras, shows my mom in a pretty snazzy and fashionable outfit. I always knew Grammy Carvell was a snappy dresser; as it turns out, so was my mom!

My mother, Norma, stood about 5 foot 2 and weighed around 115 pounds when my dad married her on June 17, 1950; he said he could put his two hands around her waist. (But she could make herself big when she wanted to, oh my!) 

They enjoyed a life-long love affair that blessed us all, and continues into the next world; the joy and connection that sparked and grew between them was clearly meant to be. They were always smiling at each other; always touching; always in each other's arms.

My parents eloped and ran off to Maryland to get married; then came back and moved in with my mom's parents in Richfield, where their first two little girls were born. 

My dad and his family built a house on Shade Mountain, among the woods and waters we all loved so much, and that's where they lived from then on. At full count, there were eight of us: my parents, five girls, and one boy.

My mother was the chief cook and household and financial manager for the many years of our growing up. She managed grocery shopping, paying the bills, meal preparation, chore assignments, medical appointments, clothing, Christmas and birthday gifts, family celebrations, etc., for six kids, which is a logistical feat in and of itself.

My mother was smarter than I am, and had a higher IQ. She skipped a grade in high school. She and Dad raised three class Valedictorians, of which I was one. 

She never got her driver's license; never went to college, though those are things I think she could quite easily have done. What was most important to her was raising her FAMILY and making a home for her and my father.

She was a voracious reader. She loved sappy love songs on the radio, and "making snibbles" at night (scrap-booking) after the kids were in bed, and Hershey's kisses, which she lined up on the kitchen counter and called "my little soldiers," as she ate them one by one. She was interested in the weather, and kept a weather journal for many years. She was a fabulous cook, and I miss her wonderful meals, especially at Christmas; we ALL do.

She taught me about things like fairness and equity, and kindness, and the importance of honesty and truth-telling. She modeled for me the importance of true love and romance. I have always had a soft spot for the underdog, and my parents nurtured that. My mother took pride in all of our accomplishments; we children were her treasures here on Earth. I look in the mirror; I see in me her eyes, her nose, her smile.  :-)

I realized as I went through my photos that I am NOT the first GirlWithACamera; no, that would have been my MOTHER. She was a daughter of a photographer who had his own portrait studio in Richfield, PA, and she worked beside her mother in her dad's darkroom. She always had a camera in her hands when I was a child, for every important event. 

I have pictures of every accomplishment I ever made because SHE TOOK THEM, and often sent them to me in the mail later. In the photos, now, I realize that she, standing beside me, was sometimes beaming a smile even BIGGER than my own! I like to think that she got some vicarious enjoyment, as she watched me walk through life, doing all of the things I've done.

Thank you, Mom, for being an awesome mother, wife, daughter, sister, grandmother, great-grandmother, aunt, etc. You raised us up right, and we love you. We miss you but know that finally you get to spend this Mother's Day with your own mom, Grammy Carvell, and with Barb, your firstborn, who was your right hand in our family. What a special day this must be!

Happy Mother's Day in Heaven!  

I've got two photos, so here are two songs to go with them. First, for the photo above starring my mother as a glamor-puss (!!!), here's INXS with Beautiful Girl. And my second song is R.E.M.'s The One I Love; I'm also including a lovely cover by Sugarland that is a personal fave.