Our mom, Maria Giovanna, was born and raised in a small town called Trinitapoli in Puglia, in southern Italy. It was the kind of town where you bought your food at the outdoor market in the center of town -– that is, if you didn't grow it on your own. The butcher was across the way and it was our uncle who owned the bakery on the other side of the street from the market.

Mom's earliest memories were of the war, the Second World War. Money was scarce but her dad had a farm in the countryside so they always had food and he sold his produce to provide what the land didn't.

When the war ended, mom along with all her sisters, started attending sewing lessons provided by a neighbor. In her teens, Mom met a guy named Pepino and everyone thought they'd marry eventually. But Pepino was a bit domineering, telling my mom what she could and what she couldn't do.

Then along came my dad. He was born in an even smaller town called Sant'Elia a Pianisi in Molise. He had immigrated as a fourteen-year-old to the United States with his father who we'd later come to call Nonno Mike.

Dad and his parents were in my mom's hometown visiting relatives. My dad saw my mother walking down the stairs of the local church after services on New Year's Day and was love-struck. He and his wingman cousin followed her home. Or tried to. Trinitapoli is a maze of little streets and at some point, he and his cousin lost the trail.

As it's a small town where everyone knows everyone, they found out who she was and where she lived. Dad and his cousin went over on a Saturday morning and asked her father (later to be known as Nonno Peppino) for permission to court his daughter. Mom and her mother eavesdropped from the other room.

"Did you know someone was following you?" my grandma asked my mom.

"No, I didn't.

"Well, take a look at him. Do you like this American boy?" her mother asked.

"Well, I don't like his moustache." (That was an early sign of how blunt our mom could be!)

"Oh, don't worry about that. He'll shave it off," her mom told her.

Dad courted her. He came over while the rest of the family was present as that was the convention, and helped her with her sewing. "He used to hold the threads for me," Mom told us in later years. And one day, she told him she didn't like his mustache and the next time he came over, it was gone.

Mom told us that she was initially interested in Dad just to get Pepino jealous. But then she fell in love with Pops and forgot all about Pepino.

Three months later my mom and dad got married and, as heart-breaking as it was for her to leave her parents and seven brothers and sisters, and friends and all that she knew, she moved to America to be with our dad, Francesco Salvatore Falcone aka Frank.

They settled in Tuckahoe, New York, and started a family. Mom learned English out of sheer necessity. Keeping up the home and three children didn't allow her time to attend formal lessons and throughout her life we loved to tease her about her malaprops– her funny way of mixing up expressions; we called them "momisms."

One time during a big fight with my dad – they were fiery Italians after all! – she told him to go "kite a fly" at which point they stopped, looked at each other, and started laughing.

Dad, a gentle but fun soul nicknamed Frankie-boy, drove Mom crazy sometimes when he'd go off to practice and sing with the church choir; she wanted him to help around the house. And God forbid she asked him to pick up some bread. He'd be gone for hours looking for the right kind of bread, getting distracted, and maybe squeezing in a visit to his beloved older brother, Tony.

Mom maddened him right back with her quirky ways. But they were each other's worlds. Best friends, they were. They got the biggest kick out of each other and finished each other's sentences. We taught them to play charades and when they were on the same team, they got the answer with just a look!

While dad was off working as an engineer on the Twin Towers and other large projects, Mom ran a business as a dressmaker. Those lessons from childhood came in quite handy. The wealthy ladies of Scarsdale would buy sizes too small and then have "Marie" let the material out just so that they could kid themselves that they were a size 8 rather than a size 10. Mom obliged.

Mom knew clothes. She had an eye for what went together, what would look good, and how to make it look better. She sometimes made clothes for us and they were gorgeous.

After we three kids were out of the house leaving an empty nest, Mom started throwing her famous Halloween parties. She'd invite over her "paisons" from the Old Country and her American friends as well. Mom coaxed them to dress up with costumes. Mom and Dad were very entertaining and boy, could Mom cook.

People would fall over themselves to get an invitation to our house for dinner. Big holidays were always celebrated by our place because no one could make food as delicious as Mom. One time we went out for an Italian meal and Mom said, "God, I cook better than this." And she was right.

They retired in Florida because Dad was darn tired of shoveling snow out of the driveway in New York. They really enjoyed the sunny weather, made lots of new friends and many of their friends from up north ended up retiring in Florida as well.

Rosemarie, the oldest daughter soon moved down to Florida herself buying a house about a mile away.  Their middle daughter, Terianne, was living in Rome teaching English. Michael and his wife, Antonia, settled in northern Westchester about 45 north of where we'd grown up.

During the summer, we'd all head down to Florida, as that was when Michael and Antonia's twin girls were off from school. Mom and Dad got such a kick out of those two little rascals, Savannah and Isabella.

We lost Dad to cancer in 2010 and Mom was devastated. She told us through tears that she no longer felt like she had a purpose in life. They had been married for 56 years.

Luckily, Rose lived near her and they spent lots of time together and the rest of us continued to come to see her every summer. Her darling granddaughters, Savannah and Isabella, kept Mom enthralled. The twins adored her and would take turns sleeping in bed with her at night. Nonna Maria was happy to listen to their chatter, songs, and secrets.

It was soon after Dad's death that Mom was diagnosed with Alzheimer's. Rose worked tirelessly to keep her as well as possible and the saddest moment was hearing that our mother could no longer cook. It had been such a joy for her and everyone around her.

In fact, Rosemarie, is taking part in a walkathon to raise money for the Alzheimer's Association.

If you'd like to contribute, please visit Rosemarie's personal fundraising page to make a secure, online donation or write a check to the  Alzheimer's Association. All donations count—every dollar makes a difference in this fight.

Here is the online address to make a donation: http://act.alz.org/site/TR?fr_id=13363&pg=personal&px=17603128

Her daughter, Terianne, created a video tribute to their mom: https://youtu.be/c7v8BasDD3c

We've been missing our Mom for a while since Alzheimer's began to steal her away years ago. Ironically, it was on this past Mother's Day that we first realized she no longer knew who we were.

We can only hope that Mom is throwing big parties in Heaven with Frankie-boy serenading her with their song, "You Belong to Me."