Happy Birthday, Mommy!

This is a picture of my mom at our Utah reception. I love this picture. She looks so cute.

This is a picture of Chelsea Goodman and my mom at the temple on our wedding day. It's such a cute picture that I kind of wish it was me and not Chelsea in it. :) 

Six things that we love about Mommy:

1) She is very, very talented. She can sew just about anything. She made all of my high school dance dresses, my wedding dress, bridesmaid dresses, flower girl dresses, and she makes beautiful drapes for the house. She can also reupholster anything. She will find a couch at a garage sale for $25, use fabric that was $50 for the whole spool, and then resell the couch for hundreds of dollars after she is bored with it. Besides her sewing abilities she is an amazing artist. Her oil paintings are beautiful. She painted Asialene and I (and Emerald will get one too) each our own portraits of ourselves in our wedding dresses to display at our receptions and she has tons of other great pictures. 

2) She is a bargain shopper. She goes to garage sales all the time and finds really good deals. She has also recently started using Craig's list and is just about addicted! She found a wedding dress, for free I might add, that she cut up to use pieces for my own wedding dress, then she found lace that was normally $79.99 a yard and ended up getting it for less than $10 a yard. My wedding dress was less than $100 and I loved it more than any other dress I had seen. If there is a sale at the super market she will buy everything in bulk. They have probably twenty boxes Smart Start cereal in their pantry because it was so cheap. As a child I remember getting sick of Fruit by the Foots because we had so many boxes. 

3) She is really smart electronically. You wouldn't guess it, but she is a genius when it comes to computers. Her favorite store is Fry's Electronics and every Black Friday she is up at 4 AM ready to wait in line for cheap laptops and computer accessories. She may not know all of the brands that I like or have the best eye for fashion, but I never complain when I get electronic equipment for Christmas or birthdays!

4) She is so giving of her time and talents. She will do anything for her children and grandchildren. Often times my sister Asialene and her husband will travel to different countries. They have a tradition of going to another country every year. My mom is always very happy when they leave because she gets to take care of Savanna and Makenna. Growing up she was always such a selfless mother. I remember in first grade we had twin day at school. I wanted to dress up with one of my friends, so my mom stayed up late sewing white and pink striped dresses. To me I felt like she stayed up all night, but maybe that was just my prospective as a child. Anyway, my friend ended up not coming to school that day so the dresses were never worn. I remember feeling so bad, but my mom did not mind at all.

5) She is a perfect mother. I realized something when I was older and ended up talking to my mom about it. I told her that I remembered growing up if I ever broke something in the house or ruined something she never got mad at me. I remember having the feeling that I should have be getting in trouble instead of being let off the hook. She explained to me that she did not want me to remember her getting mad at me over an object. Of course she disciplined us, but she did not want us to remember getting in trouble over a material thing. Her intentions were so sweet and they really did leave a lasting impression on me. Instead of remembering that I got in trouble over breaking something, I remember that my mom purposely showed love so that I knew that I was more important than something temporal. I could go on forever about how patient and loving she is with Emerald. One time my parents were having a garage sale. Some of my mom's paintings were in the garage, but not for sale. Someone asked Emerald how much a painting was and Emerald ended up selling it for five dollars. She was so proud to tell my parents how much she sold it for. My mom didn't get mad at all, instead she just laughed! I might have mentioned this before (I know I wrote it in my journal, but can't remember if I wrote it on the blog) A Filipino lady came into the jewelry store a couple months ago. She had a disabled daughter with her and the whole thing reminded me of how my mom is with Emerald. Watching the two of them even made me cry because it was so close to home for me. I was thankful for that experience because I was able to recognize the special relationship that Emerald and my mom have even though I am living away from them. I hope I can be even close to as wonderful of a mother that my mom is. She really has unconditional love for all of us.

6) She loves the Lord and has taught us to also. My brother, sisters, and I were so blessed to have had parents who raised us surrounded by gospel principles and we all have such strong testimonies because of this. We joke that if my mom doesn't do a few bad things every once in a while she'll be transfigured. She really is the closest person to perfection that I have ever met.

So, today on April 13th we celebrate Angelina Malari Gozun Elmore's birthday (otherwise known as Mommy even though I am 22 years old and should probably call her Mom by now :).