Happy Mother's Day...every day!

My mother was so precious!  Everybody loved her!  I always knew I wanted to be a mother.  Just before my husband and I got married in 1974 we already had names picked out for a boy (Joshua) and a girl (Jennifer)!  

After a difficult time of getting pregnant and then staying pregnant, I had given up on motherhood.  But God had different plans and gave us an actual promise!  After 11 years of trying, our daughter was born.  She didn't get the name we picked in 1974 because a lot of time and experience caused her daddy to change the name to Hannah Elizabeth five years before she arrived!  (During labor, I even asked Joe if we could change the name if we had a boy.  Our son would have been named Joseph Sturm Green, after his wonderful daddy!)

Hannah is 37-years old, a wife and mother, and Sr. Creative Director, Global - Warner Bros. Discovery.  All the sketch pads, crayons, colored pencils and pens we bought when she was a kid turned out to be a pretty good investment!  She graduated from the University of Tennessee in Knoxville with a degree in Graphic Design, was the managing editor of CityView magazine (a Knoxville publication) and went on to work for the company that brings you networks like HGTV, Magnolia, TLC, Food Network, Cooking Channel, CNN, HLN, Motortrend (one of my favs), TBS, TCM, and so many more!  Hannah came on board years ago at Scripps, Inc. and that company has grown and changed and is now Warner Bros. Discovery

Joe and I are proud of all the accomplishments Hannah has made and she'll go on to do so much more!  She has her biggest cheerleader by her side...her husband Andrew...and that is the best part of all!  Both of them are awesome parents to two brilliant and beautiful daughters who will welcome their baby brother this fall!  We are so excited to meet him in November!  

Before Hannah was conceived, God made a promise that Joe and I would have the desires of our hearts...that we would have a child of our own.  And we did!  She has several siblings in Heaven but we are so thankful God fulfilled that promise He made through a total stranger, who had no way of knowing all that we had been through!  That stranger told Hannah's daddy that she would come!  And I promised God that I would share that miracle with anyone who would listen.  In concerts I performed, in speaking engagements, I shared the miracle.  That's a lot for a kid to grow up hearing over and over.  God made a verbal promise of HER LIFE through one of his followers!!!  A total stranger!  

How much pressure can that put on a girl who is discovering the gifts and graces that God bestowed upon her?!?  Did this promise that God fulfilled in her birth mean she had to be a minister, a missionary, a biblical professor, or the next Mother Teresa?  No!  She doesn't have to be any of those things because she is busy being exactly the woman God created her to be!  We pray that she will always keep in mind who she is and WHOSE she is.  We gave her back to the Lord the day she arrived!  

Happy Mother's Day to all you women reading this!  Happy Mother's Day to Cindy, the woman who gave birth to our wonderful son-in-law!  And I especially wish a Happy Mother's Day to Hannah...with so much love and admiration I could burst!  (I love watching you be a mom!)

Remember this: if you have a pulse, you have a purpose.  Make your life count!