My Wonderful Mother's Day!

Mother's Day began for me around 9:30 a.m. (This is already good!) with four-year-old Katie wishing me a "Happy Valentine's Day!" It was full of sweetness, and I didn't care that her days were confused. She gave me a big hug and kiss and then left the room. A couple of minutes later, all three of my children entered my bedroom singing "Happy Mother's Day to yoooooooouuu!" They carried in a tray with my breakfast on it (a very yummy bacon, egg, and cheese biscuit, made by all four of them), some pretty little purple and yellow flowers held in a glass Coca-Cola bottle, and hand-made cards. They smiled as big as they could and sang with great enthusiasm as I worked to open my eyes and make myself sit up in bed. Did I mention that Callie had her camera? Yes, those pictures will be lovely, for sure.

After eating my breakfast, I joined everyone in the kitchen, where Callie handed me a Mother's Day fun page that she created for me on her typewriter. First I was to complete a word find, and then I had to write an acrostic for "LOVE." Next we moved into the living room, where there were more festivities. I was given some beautiful potted pink flowers, which Katie picked out herself and was very proud of. Callie gave me a box of brownie mix. Perfect! Caleb gave me a hand-held fan that he made for me at school, and he was so excited about it--had been for a couple of weeks! And they had all worked together to create a coupon book for me with all sorts of wonderful things to redeem. However, there was a note at the beginning of the book letting me know that each coupon may only be used once. And as I redeemed them, Callie--my little rule-follower--was right there to check them off for me. I went ahead and redeemed one for a dance from Callie and a massage from Caleb. Both were quite nice.

After several minutes, I noticed that our dead palm in the corner of the living room had been replaced by a very large, very beautiful, and very living new palm! And then I noticed that Kevin had stained and put together two of our kitchen chairs (that we've had for FOUR years!), so that we no longer have to use random chairs around the table. YEA!!!!!!!!!!!!! Another wonderful gift from my husband is that he is going to let me hire a lady to come out and do some of the deep cleaning that I just really don't like to do and, therefore, don't do. I'm pretty pumped about this!

After the gift-giving, Callie wanted us to play some party games. She had prepared "Pin the Tail on the Donkey," but we didn't really play it. She also laid a broom across two of my newly-assembled chairs to play "Limbo." I pretty much just watched, because I don't think I would have even made it through the first round. Uncle Rico ended up winning. He's our dog.

When we were all dressed and ready to go, we set out for a picnic at Friendship Park. Kevin and Callie made sandwiches for all of us. The kids had fun on the playground, and we had fun pushing them in the swings. Then came our next treat--a little snowcone machine that Kevin and Caleb had purchased! We had three flavors to choose from, and Kevin really earned bonus points for remembering to bring along the sweetened condensed milk to pour on top of our snowcones. A wonderful treat!

From the park we went to the movie theatre and watched Earth. This was actually my request for the day, because I knew that we would all enjoy it. It is so beautifully done and so appropriate for Mother's Day, since all of the animal moms in the film are responsible for feeding, protecting, and teaching their young about just about everything. I could write a lot about my thoughts while watching this, but I'll save that for a later post. Each of us had our favorite moments in the film, but I think we all loved watching the baby birds take their first leap from the tree the most. So funny and so remarkable! The entire movie--observing the animals and their majestic surroundings--was a very worshipful experience for me. And Caleb thought it was cool that Darth Vader was the narrator.

Following the movie, we came back home, and Kevin grilled a delicious dinner of chicken, zucchini, squash, and potatoes, which we all enjoyed. He then asked the children to each say something that they love about me, and then we prayed together. As a last sweet treat for the day, Kevin and the kids surprised me with homemade vanilla ice cream from our new ice cream maker!

It was a really, really wonderful day. I am so spoiled by my family, who shower me with love and affection every day. These feelings are simply intensified on these designated holidays, and it means so much to me. Mother's Day is very special to me, because being the mother of Callie, Caleb, and Katie Partridge is so much of who I am. And I wouldn't want to be anyone else.