Easter, Mom Frances and Sketches

I've been thinking about Mom Frances, Gene's Mom, all morning.  So has Gene.  She died a year ago today at 94 years of age.

Mom Frances making her daily rosary in the summer of 2010.

She was an amazing person.  She had art and talent to spare.  Frances is a real inspiration to me as she never gave up on anything or anyone.  She was determined to get educated and get ahead.  She tried so many things and was good at many things.  She was a strict mother raising nine children.  She still had three at home when Gene's Dad died in 1964.

She didn't finish high school because "girls were to marry and have a family".  She did finish and get a high school diploma when her youngest daughter graduated from high school.  She went on to be a teacher's aide in Magdalena and worked at it long enough to retire.  I can't think of anything that she tried and didn't do.  In her nineties she was living alone, climbing on the roof to uncover and turn on the evaporation type air conditioner.  She redid her kitchen cabinets and carpet about the same time.  She was a seamstress and made her living at that for a time.

Her father was a carpenter as were her brothers.  She took a great interest in that.  They bought an old historic home in Magdalena in the late fifties and she remodeled the upstairs making an open attic into several rooms and adding insulation.  She built the kitchen cabinets in that house.  She could crochet, needlepoint, plastics and made a rosary a day forever it seems.  She and Gene figured at one time a few years ago that she had made over 10,000 since she often made several a day.  She sent them to missions all over the world.  She repainted the statues and saints in the Magdalena church and for other people.  I posted about Frances her accomplishments before, so I won't keep on here. 

There are photos there, too.

Mom Frances always encouraged me to keep painting and told everyone that I was an artist.  We did many art and crafty things together including painting and tole painting.  We should all strive in our endeavors to do the best we can, never give up and continue to learn.

We miss Mom Frances.

I sat out on the porch this morning to sketch and think.  Looking at the remnants from the fire I saw things that reminded me of Mom, too.  The chile pot I sketched last was one she gave us.  The shoe anvil and the old irons for ironing clothes.  Sigh.....

I sketched for Scavenger Hunt 263 in the brown paper sketchbook with the Prismacolor Premier 08 pen/marker.

Number 1, ecology, the dam for the lake out from the house.  Number 2 ellipsis, some of the cups and a broken bowl on the edge of the porch.

Gene went to Magdalena the last few years for Easter week to take his Mom to church so his sisters wouldn't have to take off work.  He missed that this year.  I hope you have a Happy Easter.