Happy Mother's Day!

I'm either really early saying it for next year or just really late saying it for this year.  Let's go with the latter. 

As the years have passed by with 5 kids, I have learned that days designed to honor mother's and shower them with appreciation are not often all they are cracked up to be.  My kids act like they do any other day of the week and usually I end up cooking.  But, I am blessed with 5 kids who are funny and smart and sociable and make me proud, that's for sure.

And I also have a great mom who does so much and every year she uses creativity (which I so lack these days) to help the kids express a warm fuzzy Mother's Day wish to me.  This year, the kids spelled out M-O-T-H-E-R and added something relevant to the letter:

M read by Laurel: M is for Magic.  You do magic when you fix my hair.  I love the braids and fancy things you do to my hair.  Sometimes it hurts when you brush my hair but I don't mind too much because I know it will look beautiful when you finish. (I think I need to post this at our hair do station every morning!!)

O read by Gregory: O is for opening our eyes to new ideas and the world

T read by Luke: T is for Terrific you are the most terrific mom in the world and you are a terrific cook.  Terrific means really good! ( I think I need to post this by the dining room table!)

H read by Jacob: H is for Hero. You are my hero.  You are always there when I need you most.

E read by Eric: E is for expert.  You are an expert mother.  You know what to do and when to do it.  You are amazing at cooking and you know what we like.  You do our laundry and if not for you, I would not have any clean clothes!

R read by Laurel: R is for Reading.  When you read to me and my brothers I love it.  Reading makes me imagine.  I like it when you use different character voices too.  My favorite right now is Little House on the Prairie.

S Read by Jacob: S is for Special.  You are so special that there is nobody else like you.

D read by Eric: D is for Disneyland.  This is where we had so much fun last year.  I remember sitting next to you on the roller coasters.  I was afraid but felt braver sitting next to you.  We creamed together!

A read by Luke: A is for Alert.  You always watch out for us.  You are alert for when the bus comes.  You always are alert that we are safe and nothing hurts us.

Y read by Gregory: Y is for Your. Your love for Dad, Jacob, Eric, Luke and Laurel and me too.  Also YOUR cooking which keeps us happy and satisfied.  Your cooking especially keeps Jacob happy.  My favorite is when you cook steak...yum!

So, I guess I'm not totally failing in the mom department.  Maybe this means my kids are resilient to their lunatic mother who go off the deep end when the house is a mess and the laundry is piled up and I don't like what they pack themselves for lunch and when I make them get out of bed to wash their faces and brush their teeth (darn teenagers) and when I remind them to practice their instruments and do their chores and when I yell HURRY UP about 25 times as we leave the house.  And when I cook something that's not so good for dinner! 

Bill and the kids had fun doing a 'Let's make a deal' game with me.  I picked a bag and if I wanted to chance what was in another bag, I had to relinquish the first gift.  I ended up getting to choose between a slice o matic veggie slicer (they picked some 'As seen on TV' gifts!), a cake pop pan, a fancy hard boiled egg cooker, or a set of new glass mixing bowls and new spatula and veggie peelers.  I chose the glass bowls.....truth be told, I ended up returning the bowls and I just recently decided I wanted to give the cake pop pan a try, so I re bought it on Amazon!

This was a pretty nice Mother's Day I must say.  Lots of smiles, the kids behaved decently and had such sweet things to tell me and the creativity shown by Bill, the kids, and my mom was pretty sweet too (I actually was slightly creative this year...the kids spelled out NANA and said nice things to her too!).  We shared dinner with my mom and dad and my Grandma. I am a very blessed mother.  I just need to remember that more often!

Even though it was only about 5 months ago, I see so much change in the kids. They are growing up too fast!