As Mother’s Day approached, local artist Cynthia Strozier Jordan began to miss her mother. She took pen and pencil to paper and sketched, as she often does, and the pictures that resulted are a tribute to her mother.

“It still seems like yesterday,” Jordan said. “Oh, how I still miss her.”

Jordan’s mother, Daisy Mae Strozier, died in 1989. Jordan has been creating her black-and-white drawings since she was a teenager. They have an African theme and an obvious spirituality to them.

She doesn’t name every sketch, but some of the latest she’s created while thinking about her mother are titled “Listening,” “Mother,” “Praying Faces” and “God,” which she said is her favorite.

“I’m close to God and was fasting a lot at the time,” Jordan said. “There’s a piece of me in all of them.”

Jordan said the faces of the women she draws could be anyone’s sisters, daughters or mothers. The artist said she appreciated her mother when her mother was living and that her mother was a good woman.

“She loved everyone and did everything for people she could,” Jordan said. “I’d like to give the honor to her on Mother’s Day.”

Jordan said her mother raised nine children without a husband.

“She taught me how to treat people like I want to be treated,” Jordan said. “She taught me everything — how to be a mother and how to be a friend.

“She taught me how to be a lady and a woman at the same time. I love God and I love people. I’m saved.”

Sometimes Jordan uses her art to pull herself out of a depression or sense of sadness she’s feeling. Other times, she’s at peace and in the mood to draw.

Jordan, who works at Shoney’s, said she has always had the dream of being a fashion designer. That dream may become reality. Jordan said an agent in Atlanta has some of her fashion designs and she hopes to see apparel that features those designs in stores soon.

“I encourage kids who draw to keep doing it,” Jordan said. “The more you do it, the better you get.”