Written by The Vaux Children
Photography by Will Guscio

nd that’s what Mary Bolen Vaux’s children say about their mother.

Mary Vaux moved to Bluffton from Greenville in the early ‘70s and worked at Moss Creek Plantation where she met Roberts. They were married in April of 1979.

They were understandably overjoyed at the birth of all their children, but Emily’s welcome into the world was especially funny. It was a normal day in court for Roberts Vaux (Roberts is a local attorney) that is until the bailiff interrupted and served him with a subpoena. As the judge read it aloud, he along with the rest of the people in the courtroom learned that Mary was in labor. His immediate presence was required in the delivery room at Beaufort Memorial Hospital. This subpoena is now framed and hangs on the wall of his office.

They soon had a house filled with children, precious little ones to nurture: Mary Gwinn (26), Emily (25), Tabor (23), and Anna Pepper (20).

These children have come together to recount a few memories about their Mother for the May issue of the Bluffton Breeze. So...Happy Mother’s Day Mary.

The four of us are so truly grateful for the gift of our mother. We could not begin to imagine life without her. She is beyond doubt our best friend and a gift from God. They say when you have your own child you develop a new respect for your mother; but for Mom, she already has our respect and admiration.

Our mother is one who is filled with warmth and laughter and has dedicated her life to God, her family, her friends, and her community. She’s like a lovely Southern meal of fried chicken, fried okra, black-eyed peas, cucumber salad and homemade biscuits.

All of us have happy memories of our younger days and as we’ve grown older we share many laughs at the cute little things said and done by our mother. It’s funny how each of us remembers something different. Our own unique moments and occasions that have happened over the last 26 years.

Having four children under the age of five is bound to make a mother go a little crazy. And that might explain the day Mom decided to change her name. It was one morning when all four of us were calling “Mommy” at the same time... “Mommy!”, “Mommy!”, “Mommeeee?!?.” Well, she had had enough and stated firmly, “That’s it! I’m changing my name and not telling you what my new name will be!” That very second we all immediately stopped in our tracks, thinking... “What are we going to call her if her name isn’t Mommy?” Our eyes welled with tears. Seeing the horror on our face she quickly reinstated the “Mommy” name we all knew and loved.

Like many other families we had a van big enough to haul everyone around. But ours was different. Mom drove her two-toned blue diesel van. When we were little, we thought it was really neat because it was so roomy inside. As we got older, we nicknamed it the “Mother Goose Mobile” and saw it for what it really was- the biggest, loudest vehicle ever! We always laugh and cringe when we remember the times she would pick us up from school. We could hear her rumbling around the corner from a mile away. We definitely knew she was on her way before we could see her. Fortunately, by the time Anna Pepper went to school, the “Mother Goose Mobile” had been traded in for a smaller, quieter family car.

When we look back over time, our Mom’s wisdom has been invaluable. She had us (two older girls), a son and was about to give birth to our younger sister. Mom had the insight to give us Cabbage Patch Dolls so when Anna Pepper came home from the hospital she would have her baby and we both would have a little one as well. We tried to treat our babies with as much love and tenderness as Mom treated hers. As for Tabor, he didn’t really care either way, so they brought him a couple of Tonka Trucks to keep him occupied.

Before we went through the “Terrible Teen” stage, we wanted to be just like Mom and do everything that she did. Anna Pepper remembers when Mom told her about a time when she was a little thing. She told me that I always would ask her if I could sit in her lap while we drove down our driveway. When she allowed me to, she said that I was grinning from ear to ear and waving towards the right and then to the left with both hands. When she asked me what I was doing, she said I told her “I’m doing what you do!” I must have been referring to the way she would smile and wave to everyone when we drove through town.

The chapter of Motherhood that gave Mom a little trouble was when it came down to the Birds & the Bees. The subject presented itself sooner than she had expected. While we were watching television, one of the teenage characters had gotten in trouble with his parents for having a condom in his wallet. “Well, of course I needed to know immediately what a condom was,” Mary Gwinn said, who was about eight at the time. “When I asked Mom about it, she spent the rest of the day trying to convince me that they must have been referring to a condominium, not a condom.” We tease her about this to this day.

Mom’s sense of humor comes out when you least expect it. Recently Mom and Anna Pepper took a trip to Steamboat Springs, Colorado to visit with Emily and her husband Chris. The girls spent one of their days at a nearby hot springs. Anna Pepper and Emily were waiting on Mom to change into her bathing attire, when they spotted her: she was wearing a pair of shorts, calf-high snow boots, and a snow jacket. What a sight! They couldn’t help but cry, they were laughing so hard. Needless to say the crowd at the hot springs had never seen a Carolina girl like her before.

When you really think about it, Moms are the reasons why we think, behave, and feel as we do. Genetics and family history run deep, even when we do not know why. A big part of our childhood was going to church. Mom has always had very strong faith; she and Dad made sure we were at the Church of the Cross every Sunday morning. We never went to the nursery, there was always a pew full of Vaux kids during church service. Mom would say, “for everything God does, you can at least sit still for one hour a week for Him.” Surprisingly, we were behaving as good Southern children and didn’t even know it! People would comment about how well mannered we were during the entire service. We now know it had something to do with our beliefs that had been taught about tradition, respect, and common courtesy. Although to make it a little more bearable, she would scratch our backs during the sermon.

Mom’s faith was a big cornerstone in teaching honesty. If she thought that one of us was not being completely truthful about something, she would say “You think about this, while I go ask God...” she would let you remember that inner place of truth you know is there and most of the time, the truth did set us free. As a result, we’ve never really been good at lying.

As we have become older there are some things that Mom always reminds us girls of; put on a little make-up when you go out for the day, always wear earrings and always have good posture. And the most cherished words she has taught us; put whatever it is into God’s hands, and something that her mother always told her, “leave things better than you found them.”