So much more

There is so much more that will be added here. If your still checking keep coming back! Many of my favorite pieces have been found since Laura passed away. If you have something she wrote to you or even just a special experience/ memory please let me know and I will add it to her book.

He trusted me with you

A frantic search to validate my life,

I bring each recognition to your view.

A gentle hand touched my heart:

How can I doubt my worth?

He trusted me

He trusted me with you.        

(Another poem I hadn't heard until her funeral)

Need to add the rest of the these pictures:)

Cuddly Mothering Joys

(we came across this poem shortly after Laura passed written between Laura's 3rd and 4th babies, Heather and Holly)

I feel sublimely blessed

when cradling your sleepy head

at last upon my breast.

So suddenly your days were filled

With running squeals and toys.

I find I'm sorely missing

Those first cuddly mothering joys.

Big Can Be Beautiful

I would like to have the bishop read a little bit about what Laura is about, in a letter to the editor that she wrote after a lady observed a young mother in a story trying to take care of a bunch of little kids in a shopping cart and trying to shop in a store.  So this is Laura’s retort to that letter.  And I keep it in – I have a book, a little special book of mine, and this is it.  And I keep it with a great picture of her  – this is next to my patriarchal blessing.  This is what Laura’s about.  And she was not afraid to be vociferous about it.  

  

Big Can Be Beautiful. 

As a pregnant young woman with three small children, I’d like to respond to Mrs. Hart’s letter ‘Plan for Parenthood’, November 6^th.  I do not appreciate her grief for my children or myself.  My children, like many others, were planned, and welcome.  They are a full time job, I'll admit, but no child will be left out, as she put it.  Love is unlimited, and a child can just as easily share his mother’s time and attention with other children who also supply love and attention to each other, as a job, community service, fancy cooking, immaculate housekeeping, social activities and/or hobbies. 

I enjoy raising children, and am quite proud of my profession.  Please don't pity me or my sisters in fulltime motherhood, and please, Mrs. Hart, don't judge the quality or the lives of our children by the supermarket scene.  A shopping cart is hardly the place to teach and entertain three small children.  A home can be.

I’d also like to respond to the idea that large families on low incomes are miserable because they are crowded, hungry, uneducated and uninvolved.  I am one of 9 children.  My father was still in school with 4 children, so our income was extremely limited.  Mother never worked.  Few women have to work.  We were a little crowded, I admit, but I like to think of it as close.  There is no price tag on love, and that was rich in abundance.  My mother was a great teacher, and even if I did have to work my way through college, it was a course in time and money management which I'll never regret.

Big families can be beautiful, even on low incomes.  I know.

Laura Savage

The Gardener

The Gardener

Dear Mom, I’ve been trying to write poetry,

And wond’ring where I got my start

Thinking maybe I do have an avenue here

For wringing things out of my heart.

I’m sure you were there the first time two words rhymed

saying “That was great – lets try some more”

Making “Glittering, glittering comes the snow”…

Feel like red carpet strewn on the floor.

As I I’m thinking of you as a mother

I see a sweet gard’ner in plaid

Focused on each seed she’d found or might find

In each of the children she had.

I remember hours over the piano

Or at least within earshot of my violin.

Listening to practice, especially on strings,

Couldn’t have been where you’ld like to have been.

And yet you were there for each lesson,

Each recital and concert and game’

Every school play, campaign or audition

You were ever there fueling the flame.

So I pray as you look on your garden

It reminds you of all you do best.

In the rearing and nurture of children,

No garden on earth’s been more blessed.

With All My Love and Admiration

Laura

My Mother

My Mother

My mother is the beauty that caught my father’s eye.

The sweet and tender girl that fit the dreams he’d built so high.

My mother was my cradle through many a sleepless night.

The font of life.  But more, the well of warmth, and love’s sweet light.

My mother was the pillar that calmed my childhood fears,

Doctored stub toes, shared feverish nights, and kissed away the tears.

My mother taught me how to pray, to trust my Father’s care,

To help me through the trials of years when she would not be there.

My mother taught me how to work, to read, to think, to try,

The light of simple faith in God, the darkness of a lie.

My mother taught me how to smile and struggle on through life,

To seek for joy and growth and friends, and not the things of life.

Yes, Father knew he’d need some help.  I’d lots to face on earth.

He pondered all the blessings he could give me at my birth,

And loving me, he blessed me with the greatest he could send:

A mother’s love, a guiding hand, a teacher, and a friend.

Laura Workman

(That was her vision of motherhood.  And she was successful- Her Father Dan J. Workman)  Read at her Funeral

Daddy's Eyes

DADDY’S EYES

A girl asks if she’s beautiful

Not of mirrors or a prize

But of her own reflection

In her Hero Father’s eyes.

She asks if she is loveable.

She asks if she’s enough.

If she’ll be strong and ready

When what lies ahead is tough.

She asks if she is valued

For whatever she can be.

If she’s trusted to be capable

When life has set her free

And if she finds that.beauty,

That she’s trusted to survive

She’ll find strength enough for all life holds

In what she’s seen in Daddy’s eyes.

All My  Love Always

Laura

Why is there war? Written By Laura Workman 1968

(Read by her Father Dan J. Workman at her funeral)

published on June 7^th, 1968 in the Herald Journal in Logan , where she was attending school.  She was in the 6^th grade, so she was 11 years old.  It was during the Vietnam War, and this is what she writes:

Why is there war?

To kill and fight and murder and destroy.

To part a family, happy, full

From the father, son or boy.

To burn the homes of other men,

Our brothers, like us all.

To leave a family fatherless,

A little child or fighting man,

Helpless, wounded, lame.

We could stop this war and strife

If we could see one thing:

The joy and radiant happiness

That peace, pure peace on earth could bring.

Let's Start at the Beginning..... Laura's earliest poetry

(Laura’s poems, we think from second grade. Written one after another on a small piece of paper.  I found them yesterday going through

moving boxes.) Sent to Laura's Daughters from Her Mother a few months ago.......

This was another one of those "gifts" from her. To be able to read her thoughts from childhood is so fun. I am just beginning to teach these darling poems to my own kids. 

 Night

Stars are shining in the night

Shining, shining Oh so bright

See them shining, O just see

Looking down at you and me

Shining in the pretty sky

Now it’s morning, say goodbye.

Smiles

Smiling, smiling

Through the day

I’ll sing, I’ll laught

and I wil play

Yes I will smile all

through the day

And in a happy smiling way

Snow

Glittering, Glittering

Comes the snow

Here it comes so

Light and slow

Moonlight

Moonlight shining in the night

Shining with glory light

Shining, shining

Oh so bright

The Park

I went to the park

and what did I see

A small, small turtle

Looking at me

Hellow[sic] Mr. Turtle

I happen to say

Hellow, he said back

How you doing today?

Mr. Giraffe

Mr. Giraffe has

A neck so high

That it reaches

Way up in the sky

Mr. Giraffe has

A perfect view 

Of the land so

Green and the sky

So blue.

Laura

EULOGY by Barbara Workman

            We wish we had a way to express our gratitude for your being here, and for the love and support we have felt.  I hope you'll  forgive me for reading this; it’s the only possible way of getting through it.

            Laura Workman Savage was born on August 26, 1954 in Logan , Utah , while my husband Dan and I were college students.

            She married Mylan Savage on April 26, 1974 in the Logan LDS temple. 

            Her daughters, who composed her obituary, wrote:  “She thrived on and excelled at being a mother and grandmother.  Her creative mind and compassionate soul made her a truly remarkable person.  We will miss her beautiful smile and her desire to make everyone around her comfortable and happy.  She was always first to the rescue.

            “She received her bachelor’s degree from Utah State in Early Childhood Education and Family Life.  She was pursuing a master’s degree in Gerontology. 

            “She was a founding member of the Young Mothers Association of Cache Valley, and organized many large craft boutiques. 

            “She is survived by her parents, Dan and Barbara, husband Mylan Savage, daughters Jennifer (Mark) McBride, Melinda (Michael) Loman, Barbara (Justin) Lether, Heather (Paul) Wykstra, Holly (Mark) Egan, Laura Lee (Bryce) Wheeler, and Monica Savage, serving an LDS mission in the Canada Toronto East Mission, 15 grandchildren, 8 brothers and sisters, and many other family members.

            “She will be greeted by her beloved grandson Maxwell and her grandparents.”

            Laura is our oldest child.  Her father and I chose her name sitting on the banks of Logan River one spring afternoon, when we knew we were going to marry each other and we were talking about the fabulous family that we wanted to have.

            Her sensitivity to others’ feelings showed itself early.  When she was 5, she missed a couple of days of kindergarten.  Went back to find that they had planned a picnic for the day and had gone without her.  She was brokenhearted, but the next day when her sad teacher apologized, she tried to soothe her by saying,  “Oh, that’s all right, Mrs. Berrigan, I've been on a picnic before.”  For the rest of her life she was still trying to make someone else feel better.

            Her bright and sensitive mind expressed itself early.  The first poem that I remember was from the second grade:

“Glittering, glittering comes the snow.

See it fall, so soft and slow.”

            As she was growing up, Laura had a wonderful combination of creativity, initiative, and confidence to attempt and achieve hard things, coupled with the wisdom and spirituality to want those things always to be in harmony with eternal values.

            She was bright-eyed, brilliant, and beautiful; and devoted to everything that really matters.  And she still is all of those things.

            She served on the student council at Orem High School , being elected less than a year after we moved to Orem .  The principal said to me, “I never had a better student friend than your daughter. “

            She earned her own way through college with scholarships and employment.

            She has been a writer all of her life.  Her last written message that we will receive in mortality came on October 11.  It closed with these words:  “I can do hard things.”

            The two weeks following her injury were incredibly hard for her, and for all of us.  But I will never forget, and I will always be grateful for watching those who loved her with their faces right up next to hers, expressing their love, and commending her for how well she was doing, and begging her to keep fighting.  Her eyes watched them intently, even though she could only respond with her eyes.

            We didn't have nearly as much time as we wanted with Laura, and we know she wanted more time to be with us.  To be at Holly’s wedding, to welcome Monica home from her mission, to love and be loved by her grandchildren.  She wanted to watch them grow and to teach them and to encourage them, as she had been doing.  She wanted to continue to build her celestial marriage. 

But as I have reflected on her life, mourning its brevity, I have come to understand that she did have enough time to do all she was sent to do.  Enough time to hold on to those marriage vows for 34 years. 

She had enough time to give birth to and instill in 7 remarkable daughters a love of life and of each other, and to develop the skills and to gain the wisdom to be wonderful wives and homemakers. 

She saw each of them grow to maturity and six of them choose choice companions. 

She had enough time to inspire every one of them to want to be a mother. 

She had time to welcome 16 incredible grandchildren into her heart and her arms.  She had time to nurture their growing testimonies along with her own.

And with Mylan’s help, she had enough time to create an eternal, ever-growing legacy on the foundation of 7 spiritually strong, faithful Latter-day Saint women.

Life brings joy and sorrow.  She had enough time, as her brother Russell said last night, to experience truckloads of both.

She had enough time to write poetry, to reveal the depth of her understanding and her emotions.

She had enough time to care for me during illness, and to give love and empathy to every person she could spend even 5 minutes with who was ill or elderly or friendless.  Nurturing was her innate spiritual gift, and she continued to cultivate it all of her life.

She had enough time just a few short weeks ago to drive down and spend two sweet days with us helping me tie three quilts for weddings.

She had enough time to be in the temple with her husband and her seven daughters and spouses of the married girls before Monica left on her mission.

She lived long enough to convey to her love to each grandchild in a thousand ways.

She had enough time to thank me over and over and for helping her want to be a mother.  It was her greatest joy, her greatest fulfillment, and it is mine.

She had enough time to keep her temple covenants, to plant her feet firmly on the path, and prove to her Heavenly Father that she intended to stay on that path. 

Thus, she had enough time to fulfill her mortal probation and earn her exaltation.  Because she has done that, she now has enough time – she has forever – to do everything she ever wanted to do, to create a world of love and beauty and peace, and to have a fullness of joy. 

And I will forever be grateful for the privilege of being her mother. 

She had the time to earn that adulation all of us would be grateful to receive:  “Well done, thou good and faithful servant; enter into the joy of thy Lord.”  I know she lives.  I know He lives.  And I bear that testimony in the name of Jesus Christ.  Amen. 

I Believe in Miracles

Last year my aunt Julie, Laura's younger sister, came across this poem in one of Laura's high school yearbooks. I believe it was a family member of my cousins new wife who had gone to high school with my mom that showed it to her. What a gift it was to read these words for the first time. It's interesting that she wrote them as a teenager and they were exactly what I needed to hear all these years later. I've had multiple experiences like this since she has passed and it confirms to me that she is not gone only somewhere I cannot see.