Mothers Day

Happy Mothers Day!!

I woke up to two very excited girls ready to shower me with gifts galore.  Ethan and the kids had hidden the presents all over the living and dining rooms and watched with eager glee as I found them:

Hand-made card from Julia

Hand-made flower pin from Julia

ANOTHER hand-made card from Julia.  I am truly touched to know that thras stars all arownd me.  And also that...

 I give lots of love.

This was the pièce de resistance: plaster letters spelling out my title, each letter made by one of my family members.  Julia did the first "M," and had a lot to report to me about the finished product: "Mama?  My 'M' kind of looks like the 'L' you made for Madeleine, because it's messy all around the edges.  And Mama?  Daddy kind of COPIED me with a pumpkin, because he saw I made one, so then HE decided to make one too.  Mama?  I got your FAVORITE kind of finish on it, SHINY."

As I thanked the kids effusively for their wonderful gifts, Madeleine showed just how good her secret-keeping skills are:

MADELEINE: Mama?  Remember yesterday, in the car, Daddy said: "DON'T tell Mama where we GOED."  So...we DIDN'T TELL YOU we goed to the BOOKSTORE.

I guess I had some books awaiting me, too.  I continued my gift-hunt and discovered a present from Ethan:

As we were sitting down to a home-made pancake breakfast, courtesy of Ethan, I suddenly remembered the gifts that had come home from preschool with Madeleine on Thursday, with the strict instructions not to look at them until Sunday.

ME: Oh, wait, I forgot some of my presents.  There's a few Madeleine presents!

MADELEINE: Well Mama, who made them for me?  Oh!  Mama made some presents for ME!

ME: No, honey, you made them for ME.  

With the program as usual, Madeleine.

I had two lovely gifts that she had made at preschool:

ME: Ohhhh!  Madeleine, I LOVE them.  Look, and you wrote your name!

MADELEINE: Yeah.  And I kept MESSING UP on my D!

Really??  I wouldn't have noticed.  It's not like she started writing her name and then scribbled pink marker over it, then started again and made a *completely* unacceptable "D," then started AGAIN and made about six thousand "D"s one on top of the other until one finally met her approval.

Even though it's Mothers Day, Madeleine couldn't quite find it in her heart to let Mommy be the Camp Champ when we got home from church.  And though I was perfectly agreeable to her decision on who should enter the house first, somehow her perception and mine didn't match.

MADELEINE: Mommy?  I want to go into the house THIRD.

ME: Okay.  Julia, go ahead on in.

MADELEINE: And let me go THIRD.

ME: Okay.  (going inside to let her follow me and be third.)

I guess when Madeleine says "third," what she really means is "second," because she simply couldn't handle about me going in before her.  In fact, we actually had to go BACK onto the landing of the stairwell and re-enter the house in Madeleine-approved order.

She's not OCD or anything.

Anyway, I am truly grateful for all of my lovely gifts, but of course, the best gift of all is that of motherhood to my precious daughters, and all of the joys that come with watching their kooky personalities unfold with each passing day.

To all the blog-readers who are mommies too - Happy, Happy Mothers Day!