Mother's Day

I had a lovely, low-key Mother's Day yesterday. The day started when S told me I should stay in bed and read while he and the kids finished my "surprise" -- BJ insisted that I needed breakfast in bed.

S did most of the work, at BJ's direction. It was an impressive job -- I'm not elaborate with my breakfast preferences, but I am quite specific about them. Apparently my boys have been paying attention! Because they got everything right: a steaming mug of Irish Breakfat tea (my preferred way to start the day), a small glass of orange juice, and cold cereal (Frosted Mini-Wheats, which are actually his favorite but I enjoy them as well. These days I've been eating a lot of Kashi, so it was a nice change.) BJ selected some ripe cherries for me -- "Purple ones, because that's your favorite color!" And note the paper flower that BJ made for me. Because no breakfast tray is complete without flowers! I'm told it's a tulip.


After breakfast, I had hoped to do something fun outdoors as a family, but it was raining pretty hard so we cancelled those plans. Instead, I spent a bunch of time on the phone trying to arrange the details of our summer trip back east to visit my family. Not exactly a luxurious way to spend a chunk of Mother's Day -- nothing that involves being on hold with an airline would qualify as "luxurious," I believe, though heaven knows the total cost of the tickets for all of us should count as a luxury purchase. But it is quite satisfying to have it taken care of, and I appreciated the kid-free time to attend to such details.


I opened my gifts, which were very nice. Last week, I'd picked out a big, summery tote bag for myself as a gift from the kids -- it was pink, BB's favorite color, and the fabric print was a fish design, which BJ is all in favor of at the moment, so they both approved. S gave me a gorgeous handcrafted mug for my tea, a very appropriate card, and a book about the abolition of the slave trade: Bury the Chains. No, it was not a symbolic commentary on the correlations between motherhood and slavery; it was a thoughtful nod towards the fact that Mommy Does Indeed Have A Brain And Interests Beyond The Kids. (While slavery isn't quite on my list of top ten topics of interest, I am indeed intrigued by the history -- we'd also re-watched Amazing Grace recently, which was an apt reminder of how fascinating that historical period can be.)


During naptime, I took some time for myself to go shopping and run a few errands. Wish I'd been able to find a pair of summer sandals that I liked, but ah well. Was nice to be in my own head for a while.


In the afternoon, the weather had cleared enough to head outside for a bit. I have a tradition of taking a picture with the kids every Mother's Day, and that was the one thing I'd really asked for. Someday I'd love to do something more professional, but for this year I'm quite satisfied with this shot that S got:
It very much captures where we all are these days. Including the princesses and the stuffed snowman toy that BB insisted be part of the picture.

It's certainly better than the best one from last year, Mother's Day 2009:

Though clearly the weather was more cooperative....
Hunting for that picture got me started on a little stroll down memory lane, so I figured I might as well post the results:

Mother's Day 2008:

Mother's Day 2007:

My parents were visiting, so my dad gets credit for that nice family shot. He also got a nice pic of me and the kids with my own mom!



Mother's Day 2006:
Mother's Day 2005, my first year as a mom:


Ah, how far we've come in these 5 years.... my life is so much richer, so much more. Or, as S put it the other night, "Do you remember back before we had kids when we used to think we were busy? What were we thinking???"

We finished the day with takeout from Aqui's, a favorite restaurant, and then our weekly Family Movie Night -- and I got to pick the movie! So we introduced the kids to Yellow Submarine. All told, a very good day.

Happy (belated) Mother's Day to all the moms out there -- I hope you had a wonderful special day!