On the second Sunday of every May, Australian children young and old show up at their mums’ front doors with fragrant flowers, delicious chocolates, vouchers for spa days and arms wide open ready for a hug.

Mother’s Day is about celebrating the most important women in our lives – a day dedicated to the person who taught us how to tie our shoelaces, made sure we ate all of our lunch at school and watched us leave the nest to pursue life out in the world.

But not everyone in this world has their mother around any more, for many reasons.

Chris Jones, a 95-year-old resident at Sheridan Aged Care in Kyabram, is one of those people.

When she herself became a mother, her own mum, Emma Jones, wasn’t around to see it.

At just 24 years old, she and her brother lost both parents within a year.

The support system that had been there for 24 years had completely left, all she had was her brother.

Now every Mother’s Day, not only is she celebrated by the family she has made for herself, but she also raises a glass to the woman who brought her into the world.

Ms Jones was born on August 18, 1929 in New Gisborne and grew up in Trentham.

She said her mum was “very strict”.

“She could be quite frightening sometimes... she was quite opinionated and always believed she was right – and most of the time, she was,” Ms Jones said.

Despite her strictness, she said she only has good memories of growing up under her mum’s wing, and she was a “good mother”.

Her mum was a writer, with some of her pieces being published in Women’s Weekly and The Weekly Times.

“She was a clever lady, and she raised us right – her son became a policeman, she must’ve done something right,” she said.

Ms Jones said her father passed first, then her mum about a year later from a brain tumour.

“It was hard to lose my parents, it’s hard to lose any parents – but both?”

“It sort of meant my children never had any grandparents on my side – so it makes a difference.”

Ms Jones is now a mother of two daughters, Susan Key and Sharon Crilly, but before she began her own family, she and her husband faced challenges from the get-go.

“I lost three children before I had any,” she said.

“Getting pregnant was no problem, it was getting them out in the world that was difficult.”

She said she still thinks about a world where those three children are in her life.

“You can’t dwell on the past, but I suppose up to a point I do think of them,” she said.

“But you have to dwell on what you’ve got, and what you’ve been fortunate enough to get – I’m lucky with my children.”

Flash forward to 2025, Ms Jones has two children, seven grandchildren and 10 great-grandchildren located all around the country.

She said she wanted to build a family to surround her to make up for what she didn’t have as a young adult.

“I’m very family orientated — I think you have family forever,” Ms Jones said.

“You may have one or two friends in your life that stick around forever, but all your other friends change as you get older, or they shift away – your family though – they will always be there.”

She remembers her life as a mother as being quite mundane.

She fondly remembers taking her kids to sport, such as squash, and watching them head off for school in the morning.

She said she tried to keep their lives as ordinary and balanced as possible, but also tried to pass on the values her own mother installed in her.

“I probably taught them to be caring, and truthful for other people,” Ms Jones said.

And as for passing on advice about being a mum, she said the most important thing was to just be there for your children.

“You can only hope for the best, you can only do the best you can and hope other things don’t influence them too much,” she said.

“I think, no matter what they do in life – it doesn’t matter if they do something that you don’t approve of – you’ve got to give them the feeling that you’re there for them.

“There’s got to be a rock waiting for them when things unravel. There has to be somebody that’s there permanently – and usually, that’s the mum.”

While her daughter, Mrs Crilly, visits at every opportunity she can, her visit on Mother’s Day is a special occasion for Ms Jones, and this year will be no different.

And, while her own mum passed away many years ago, there’s one thing Ms Jones always wanted to talk about with her.

“I would tell her about my family that I have now,” she said.

“I would say sorry if I did anything wrong as a kid.

“And I would tell her I love her.”

On behalf of the Free Press, happy Mother’s Day.

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Friday, 1st August 2025

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