About 26 years ago, my mom began an embroidery project. It wasn’t intended for me, but for my younger brother. I don’t know how the sewing kit came into her possession. I don’t recall ever seeing her sew. Maybe it was a gift, or a group effort with other moms at her church. I like to imagine that she picked it out as a relaxing self-care project to work on once her three children had gone to bed. I can definitely relate to that—and also understand why she never finished it. Whatever the case, she only completed some of the stitching, then began to stitch my little brother’s name, but later took out those stitches.
One day, she tucked it away in a wooden dresser. It sat in that drawer, forgotten about, for many years. You see, my mom had a habit of hanging on to things—things she thought she might need again one day, and things that I couldn’t imagine her ever needing again but for some reason, she couldn’t bring herself to part with. The same clothes, furniture, even paper receipts or cards hung around our house my entire childhood. When we moved to a new place, every last one of her belongings went with us. That habit agitated me for ages. I couldn’t have dreamed of how thankful I’d be one day, for what might have once seemed like a pointless knickknack to me.
That dresser, full of unfinished craft projects, sat and collected dust in our attic for awhile and then it moved out to a loft in our barn. One of us kids would occasionally visit and rummage through it, hoping to find lost treasures or inspiration for a new project.
It stayed in that barn loft even after we grew up, moved on, and moved out. I moved to a new city; my sister got married and moved to a different part of town. Then in 2014, my mom was diagnosed with cancer. Her healthy rapidly declined, and I went to Houston to be with her as often as I could. By this time, I was a mom too. Juggling the time I spent with my mom and with my young daughter, was a challenge. My sister was there much more often, keeping my dad’s business afloat and caring for my mom. As my mom became weaker and was eventually limited to her bed, keeping up with their large house was way too much work, and affording that house while also drowning in medical bills was even more impossible. A close family friend, my sister, and some family members rallied to find a new home for my parents. Moving, during a time when my mom needed constant care, was a huge undertaking, but it wasn’t optional. My sister worked tirelessly to go through hundreds of boxes and drawers of their possessions. I know she must have been tempted, like I was when I came to help, to just throw it all away. But per my parents’ request, she carefully sifted through every item, one by one.
One day, she went through that dusty old dresser and found the sewing project my mom had begun ages ago. And because she is a thoughtful and golden-hearted human, my sister thought of me and held onto it.
In March of 2015, my mom passed away. My sister was by her side. I was hundreds of miles away, in San Antonio. Just a couple of hours before she passed, I called to say a final goodbye. It’s impossible to know what to say when you’re telling your mother goodbye. I let her know that I was thankful for her, that I loved her, that we would be OK, that I was going to talk about her every day, and that her granddaughter would always remember her fondly. Once I hung up, so many other things that I wanted to say flooded my mind, but one stood out to me. I quickly sent the following text to my sister: “Ask her to send a baby boy to Ryan and I when she gets up to heaven.”
My sister texted back: “I told her. She isn’t responsive, but I think she heard me.”
In 2018, after years of planning and many months of trying, I got pregnant! I knew that welcoming a new baby into our family would be the hardest thing that I’ve had to do without my mom. My daughter was so lucky to be loved the way that she was by her Mimi. This baby would never get to experience that love.
Halfway through the pregnancy, we were overjoyed to discover we were going to have a boy! It brought me peace to imagine that my mom had already met the little one whom I would meet in a few more months.
For all those years since helping my parents move, my sister had kept secret what she’d found.
When I told her I was pregnant, she celebrated with me, but didn’t tell me about her surprise.
When I told her it was a boy, she knew how much it meant to me. She celebrated with me again, but still kept her secret.
She called me a few days before our baby shower. “Have you picked a name yet?” she asked.
“Yes, I think so! We seem pretty settled on it: Jaxon Drake.”
“Jaxon? With an x, right? J-A-X-O-N?”
“Yes.”
“And you’re sure about that?”
“Yes!”
I wondered if she didn’t like the name, or if she was buying him a personalized gift or maybe just writing his name in a card. What I know now, is that she stayed up almost all night, spending the last few nights before my baby shower completing a priceless gift.
She took the piece my mom had sewn and added colors. She added lace around the edges, then carefully stitched Jaxon’s name. She decided to turn it into a pillow, so we could hold onto it for generations. But then, she did something that still gives me chills. She created a way for Mimi to sing her grandson a lullaby.
My mom often communicated her love through music. She wrote songs, and we would hear her singing them around the house while she worked. She sang in church, and she sang us things she was teaching us in school. She sang a personalized birthday song to her friends, and she sang custom lullabies to her children. The sound of her voice singing me to sleep still floats through my mind.
My mom stayed with us to support me after the birth of my daughter, and during that time she even wrote her a lullaby. We have it printed and hanging in her room now.
Another mini-miracle that occurred to bring this magic into my life, is that my mom had recorded her songs using her church’s recording equipment, just a couple of years before she got sick. My sister found the CD and chose two songs to put on an audio player inside the pillow.
On the day of my baby shower, toward the end of opening our gifts, my sister handed me a card. As I read it, I ducked my head and tried to hide the tears brimming up.
“Anna,
I’ve been waiting for the right time to give this to you for awhile now. I’m excited today is the day! It’s an embroidered baby pillow for Jaxon. I found a nearly completed embroidery piece with a baby theme in Mom’s craft drawer. I asked her about it, and she said she had started it when she was pregnant. I knew I could hold onto it and repurpose it for a future baby, if and when there was one. Now Jaxon will have a keepsake that was made with a lot of love from Mimi, just for him.”
With family and friends surrounding me that day, I hadn’t given in to really feeling my mom’s absence, but now as I read on, I began to sob. My daughter picked up the pillow and set it in my lap. I was in disbelief. My mom had a hand in making a gift for my baby?! Then, I heard my mom’s voice, and I lost it. A reverent silence fell over the room as we all listened to Mimi sing and let our tears fall. I couldn’t do anything but hug my sister and shake my head in disbelief. I’ll never find adequate words to thank her. It feels as though she reached beyond the grave and brought the essence of my mom back to be here with Jax. I remind her often how fortunate I am to call her my sister.
Although my son will never get to meet his Mimi, he will know her through the stories we share about her. When I tuck him in or rock him to sleep, he’ll clutch his pillow that his Mimi and his aunt made for him, and he can fall asleep to the sound of her voice, just like I used to. This pillow mended a piece of my heart that I thought would be missing forever.
