AM Collective, Stokes Family
Hollie Stokes
Season of Motherhood June 2023 Rooted
Season of Motherhood June 2023 Rooted
AM Collective, Stokes Family
Hollie Stokes
Artifact Motherhood May 2023
Artifact Motherhood May 2023
AM Collective, Stokes Family
Hollie Stokes
Artifact Motherhood September 2022
Artifact Motherhood September 2022
AM Collective
Hollie Stokes
A Mother's Prayer

One of the hardest lessons I learned as a young woman is to never put people, especially those you love, on a pedestal. For years as a child, teenager, and young woman, I held my mother in such high regard that I thought she could do no wrong. She was absolutely perfect in every way. Unfortunately, I was setting up our relationship for failure. When I discovered her brokenness, the glass house I meticulously built around her in my head shattered. It was devastating to find out she had flaws that ran very deep and parallel to my own. Oh how my pride and vanity melded into anger. It took a long time to accept the person, the mother, I discovered in the wreckage. I now realize how unfair it was to put her up on that perch in the first place. This is a lesson I certainly learned the hard way, and one I desperately want you to avoid.

A Mother's Prayer
Stokes Family, AM Collective
Hollie Stokes
Wonderfully and Perfectly Made
Wonderfully and Perfectly Made

Stokes Family

,

Like a Child

,
Like a Child

At this very moment I’m sitting in our living room watching the sun slip below the roofline. It’s last rays illuminating a trail of legos and trucks strung across the floor. I have no intention of picking any of it up. I’m utterly exhausted from a weekend full of lots of adventure and exploring.  Right now I'm wanting nothing more than to climb into bed and close my eyes. This is how many, many of my evenings end. Your dad and I put you three to bed. I come down stairs and analyze everything that wasn't able to get done; making mental notes for the next day. The house is quiet and in this little bit of time, I can be still.