Because I said so, that’s why!

It’s Mothers Day today and I thought it would be nice to dedicate a few words on my blog to my amazing Mum.

So first of all I’ll make a quick introduction to said lady – and I use the word lady deliberately because that’s exactly what my Mum is. Tina O’Grady is a wife to Mike, mother to Fiona, Shelley, John and me, grandmother to Sheryl, Amy, Louis, Eva, Amelia, Matilda and Nate, good friend to many, lover of animals (last count 3 dogs, 1 cat, 2 miniature goats one of which is pregnant and 1 cockerel – now there’s a mix!) and at the same time runs a highly successful business.

She’s also very beautiful and most cannot believe that she is a mother of children our age as she looks so young. Our age being early 20’s of course! I know that Fiona, Shelley, John and I hope that we share those particular genes she possesses.

And speaking about genes, it is often said that Motherhood has the greatest potential influence in human life. And I see how true that is now now as I watch my own children copy what I do and say.
In particular as I watch Amelia, my three year old, as she uses phrases that I recognise as my own every day. So knowing this now, it makes me think about my Mum and the lessons and traditions that my siblings and I have learned from her. And really the greatest gift Mum gave to all of us was that of creating a bond in our family that is titanium.

For those that know the O’Grady family they will know that we are a close knit bunch. As Daddy said in his speech on my wedding day, we’re so close it can be a tough job getting into the inner O’Grady circle! And that in part is due to how hard my mother worked when we were kids to instill in us all the importance of being there for each other and loving each other always. She did this well because now if I close my eyes and think about my childhood, first and foremost I see my siblings, Fiona, Shelley and John. The advantage of being one of four children with only 2 and a 1/2 years between us all means that we were best friends growing up and have stayed that way to this day. So ALL of my childhood memories have these three special people in the frame.

The official definition of the word Family is that of a group consisting of parents and children living together in a household. But I have a much better definition for Family.

Family is a little world created by love.

I have so many happy memories of our little O’Grady world. If I smell fried onions now I am immediately transported back to Saturday nights. Mum would send us four kids into the sitting room with Daddy and she would prepare a feast. We would all sit in anticipation for the sound of squeaky wheels as that would mean that Mum was on her way in with her beloved hostess trolley. Oh we were fierce sophisticated down Wexico way! And her hostess trolley would be groaning with the weight of goodies that it was transporting in for us. Burgers, hotdogs and those sweet sticky caramelised onions would proudly sit on top of the trolley and underneath on the bottom shelf would be bags of crisps, sweets and chocolate just waiting for our attention once the savoury was devoured. On would come blankety blank and and that was it, family night had begun. Sometimes on family nights, Mum would surprise us because she would have prepared her very own quiz show for us to partake in. Fiona, Shelley, John and I would be the contestants in Tina’s very own version of Family Fortunes. And with Daddy as quizmaster there was a lot of laughter on those nights.

Mum had a way of making things fun when we were kids. The magic of Christmas was in no small way due to the months of preparation Mum would put into the holiday. O’Grady christmases would always have pillowcases for Santa stockings, Mum tenderly placing all our presents under the magnificent tree and then the ceremony every Christmas morning as Mum would sit at the tree and hand out our presents one by one. And many of those traditions are now carried on by my siblings and I with our own families, as we in turn create our own little worlds with love.

And so today on Mothers Day, on behalf of Fiona, Shelley, John and myself, I am saying thank you to Mum.

I’d like to acknowledge one more thing our mother taught us all as children, Logic.
I’ll give the final word to Mum quoting this phrase we heard often as children.

“Because I said so, that’s why.”

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