A Mother Goose Story



Some of my favorite mugs......



Once upon a time...........   I was a member of the Mother Goose Club.  This was a Home Extension Group in Greene County.  I remember joining when Ryan was just a baby in my arms, close to forty years ago.  The group was made up of women from the Cedarville area and all were fairly close in age and were doing the same things I was doing, raising a family.

Being in this OSU Extension group required monthly meetings, each meeting had a subject matter that one or two members would bring back to our club after they had attended the county meeting. 

As the years progressed, the size of the group grew and so did the number of children.  We held our meetings at each others homes and often hired a babysitter to watch the little ones while we held our meeting.

This was the highlight of my young married life.  I was able to interact with other mothers that were going through the same growing pains I was going through.  Of course after the planned subject matter was presented and talked about, things usually came around to our individual concerns and questions.  We grew close and became very good friends.  Living in the same community we found a common interest in the school, farm life and even church.  It was a wonderful time of sharing, taking care of each others children, fixing meals when friends were going through difficult times and even gathering as couples as time went on.  I will never forget my friends from that moment in time.

Funny how things change as children grow up.  Interests move to what our children are involved in and not so much about ourselves.  Membership changed, some friends could no longer participate, many homemakers who had children in school all day took jobs away from home.  New younger members joined and continued the Mother Goose tradition. 

All too soon, I participated less and less, kids events pulling me this way and that.  It was difficult to say goodbye to that special time.  Today, maybe twenty-five years later, I cut another tie to that past.  I cleaned a cupboard that kept protected and safe all my favorite coffee mugs.  I managed to collect mugs with geese on them.  I am ready to let them fly away, on another adventure.  I am donating them to a local coffee shop in Cedarville.  Maybe, just maybe, a former Mother Goose member will sip hot coffee from my mug and be reminded of simpler times, when our children were small and friends for life were made.