It was 11 months ago today. The then 42-year-old mother sat next to the hospital bed, her eyes filled with tears. Her 15-year-old daughter was fighting for her life after a shark took the girl’s left hand and right leg the day before. And as the girl opened her eyes at Ascension Sacred Heart Pensacola, she looked up at her parents and whispered, “I made it.”

The Mother of the Century wept some more.

It was a week ago when they traveled to Seacrest Beach, Florida. “We didn’t go in the ocean, but we sat on the beach yards from where it happened,” Mountain Brook, Alabama’s Joe Gribbin told me. “We took time to reflect on what happened to Lulu last June.”

Said Lulu Gribbin, who welcomed the chance to travel back to where she was attacked, “It was closure for me, and closure for my family.”

They met some 20 years ago while they were students at the University of Alabama. Joe Gribbin was from Vestavia Hills, Alabama, while Ann Blair Holloway was from Mountain Brook. They married on Jan. 13, 2007, and started a family.

Lulu and Ellie came first as identical twins. Maggie, and later Tripp, followed. Four kids, six years apart. Sports and travel and fun. “My mom has always been very organized and very detail-oriented,” said 16-year old Ellie.

“She’s the heartbeat of our family,” said Joe.

It was June 7, 2024, and the Gribbins’ first mother-daughter beach trip was in full swing. Several moms from the Mountain Brook area chatted as they walked along the beach in Walton County, Florida, while their daughters dove for sand dollars in waist-deep water.

A few of the girls saw a shadow.

Ann Blair Gribbin heard the screams. She ran toward the crowd that gathered around the girl. Lulu Gribbin’s mother let out her own screams as she saw others gather around to save her daughter’s life. People like Stephen Beene and Matthew Lidle and Sterling Duncan and Cole Booker. People like Cathy Dougherty, an ER nurse. People like Dr. Ryan Forbess and Dr. Moh Ali, people like nurse Delanie Richardson. People like the first responders and the paramedics and the doctors and the nurses and later, rehab technicians in Pensacola and North Carolina and Birmingham.

Sixteen-year-old Lulu can’t remember much about June 7, 2024, but she remembers her mother never leaving her side. “As I was being put on a board to be carried off the beach, my mom ran to me and said, ‘I love you’,” Lulu told me.

The spring of 2024 stretched into summer, and as each morning arrived, Ann Blair Gribbin gave thanks that her daughter was with her. “My mother never left Lulu’s hospital room,” Ellie told me. “She never left Lulu’s side. She would sit next to Lulu and watch her sleep.”

Said Lulu, “She was always there to hold my hand when I received stitches or a shot. Her funny jokes kept me going, and she helped me keep pushing.”

As the weeks and months wore on, Ann Blair Gribbin was there for Lulu, but she had three other kids she worried about as well. She wondered how they were digesting it all. Said 10-year-old Tripp, the Gribbins’ youngest, “I remember the first time I walked into Lulu’s hospital room, my mom and I blew up a balloon and tapped it back and forth. We played the game where you don’t let the balloon touch the floor.”

Added Ellie, “My mom was the light during dark times.”

Said Lulu, “The ongoing love she has for our family is amazing.”

Ann Blair Gribbin also found a way to spread her love to others, including many of the other mothers who witnessed the unthinkable.

Mountain Brook’s Ellen Faust also heard her daughter, McCray, cry out in pain. McCray suffered a deep gash to her foot/ankle in the attack. And as Ellen looked after her daughter, she learned from Ann Blair while the two grew closer.

“With her fierce determination and unrelenting strength, Ann Blair proved to be a true force of nature,” Ellen told me. “There’s no feeling sorry for yourself when you’re standing beside someone like her. We are now more than just friends. We are mothers bound for life by something greater than fear: fierce, protective love.”

It was last summer, and the heartbeat of the Gribbin family was on her game. Surgeries and prosthetics for Lulu, rehab sessions, worry about Lulu’s state of mind. “She was always in mom mode,” said Ellie. And when fall arrived, Ann Blair had it down pat: Lulu would head back to school with the family doing their best to adjust to their new normal. Said 12-year-old Maggie, “My mom is very determined. She has been there for my volleyball and basketball games.”

Added 10-year-old Tripp, “She cheers me on in baseball, golf and swimming.”

Today is Ann Blair Gribbin’s first Mother’s Day since the day that changed her daughter’s life. It’s her first Mother’s Day since her life was changed, too. Over the last year, Ann Blair has felt it all: shock and pain, worry and grief, pride and joy. And she’s stayed busy as ever making a difference to others.

She has led the charge in creating the Lulu Strong Foundation, a non-profit organization that helps support amputees by advancing prosthetic technologies and innovative therapies.

She’s also been supporting Lulu’s Law – a new measure from the Alabama Legislature that establishes a shark alert system for Mobile and Baldwin counties in Alabama.

The Gribbin kids are doing well. Lulu and Ellie will enter the 11th grade at Mountain Brook High School this fall. Lulu is working on her golf game, and she just got her driver’s license. Joe and Ann Blair both work full time while adopting Ann Blair’s favorite saying — “When life gets hectic with kids going everywhere,” said Joe, “Ann Blair has always told us to just go with the flow.”

And Ann Blair’s friends like Ellen Faust? Ellen’s daughter McCray is doing well, and Ellen feels grateful for the friendship she has formed with Ann Blair.

“The shark attack was a terrifying moment that changed everything, but in its wake, it brought Ann Blair and me closer than we have ever been — not just as friends, but as soul-connected mothers. What we went through forged a bond that runs deeper than words, a connection built on raw emotion, resilience and unshakable love for our children. We would walk through fire for each other’s families, without hesitation.”

Ann Blair Gribbin isn’t quoted in this story because Ann Blair Gribbin didn’t know I was writing about her. The Gribbins thought a surprise Mother’s Day story would be a nice way to honor one of the most dedicated mothers around.

“She completes who I am,” Lulu told me when I asked what her mom has meant to her during her journey.

Days after the Gribbins sat on the beach a few yards from where Lulu was attacked, I thanked Joe and his four children for their time, and said, “I guess your mother really is the Mother of the Year.”

I heard a voice yell back, “She’s the Mother of the Century!” I thought the voice came from Ellie, then again, it could have been any of the four Gribbin kids. I heard squeals and laughs, and the happiness I heard reminded me that Joe and Ann Blair’s children are really good kids, and happy in the challenging journey that has drawn them closer.

Eleven months after she cried out on a beach while seeing her daughter fight for life, the Mother of the Century is likely enjoying a wonderful Mother’s Day.

Because Ann Blair Gribbin feels blessed that Lulu made it.

And the family feels blessed that Ann Blair made it, too.

Learn more about the Lulu Strong Foundation here: https://lulustrong.com/ Rick Karle, who writes a weekly ‘Good News’ story, is a 25-time Emmy winner and a 43-year veteran of broadcast news who has lived and worked in Alabama for 35 years. You can find his work on Facebook at RickKarleGoodNews and email him at RickKarleGoodNews@gmail/com