My Mother's Day ended with my older two children having a bath in my bathtub. They are addicted to the jacuzzi jets and think it's really fun to play in the swirling water amongst the bubbles. On one occasion several months ago they made the horrible mistake of adding an entire bottle of my Philosophy cinnamon bun bubble bath from Nordstrom's and then turned my bathroom into a wintry wonderland as piles of bubbles accumulated like fluffy newly fallen snow. I was less than thrilled. In fact I was furious. Justin was out of town having dinner with a client but that didn't stop me from calling him in near hysteria and screaming about what the kids had done. Once I had given him an earful I called my Dad and my older sister (who happened to be out to dinner together) and told them what the little wretches had done. I also sent photos via e-mail to their respective Blackberry's and iphones to show just how truly horrible the scene was and to elicit as much sympathy as possible. To my dismay everyone thought it was hilarious except for me.
My children were shocked that I was upset because they had called me in to see the glory of their own personal north pole, they couldn't figure out why I was upset with them. I'm sure they thought I was going to think it was really delightful and magical to have the entire bathroom covered in bubbles. Well, lets just say that by the time I was done with them they knew to NEVER EVER do anything like that again...until Mother's Day apparently.
What had been a perfectly lovely day ended with a reenactment of the bubble scene (this time with an entirely full and much less expensive bottle of Johnson's and Johnson's lavender baby wash purchased the day before) and me saying something like, "well Bracken you are the oldest and you know that this is completely unacceptable behavior, so I am just not sure what to do with you. Is this how we treat our house? Do you know how damaging water can be? I guess you are going to have to go live somewhere else because we cannot have someone live in our house who does not treat it with respect. I guess you are going to have to go and live with grandpa."
At first I could tell that he sort of agreed that this was a good idea. After all, grandpa frequently sends him gifts and never tells him no. I'm sure that he envisions living with grandpa to be akin to Aladdin living with the Genie, "poof what do you need, poof what do you need." I had intended the threat to make him remorseful not giddy. However, I was too distraught with the state of my bathroom to continue to try and make him fearful so I didn't bring it up again. Later that night as I lay on his bottom bunk, after story time but before he had nodded off, I could see where his five-year-old brain was at that second when in the dark he said, "mom, am I really going to have to go live with grandpa?"
Happy Mother's Day to me!! After some contemplation my child chose me over his own personal Amex fueled Target/toy store source of instant gratification in the form of grandpa. Now I truly know how much I'm loved.
Other Mother's Day events: I finally opened the present that Bracken brought home wrapped days before and begged each day to have opened (it was a calendar with various pictures made out of his little painted handprints), the kids sang in sacrament meeting (well, Bracken sang and Abbie stared like a zombie out at the congregation), Justin got the kids ready for church so I could get myself ready for once (I always do my make-up and hair in the car on the way, plus I had laid all of the kids clothes out on Saturday night so that we wouldn't miss sacrament meeting like last year when Justin volunteered to "get the kids ready"), we had a lovely breakfast for lunch after church of my favorite yummy french toast, I was treated like a queen and my family was the BEST!!!
p.s.--Bracken gave his first solo prayer in primary (despite me asking if I could please help him, sometimes in his prayers he recounts entire episodes of Diego) and he did a wonderful job. On his own he said something like, "We are thankful for our mothers and that it is Mother's Day, and that we could come to earth and have a family, and that they are here to take care of us while we grow up." What a sweetheart, I was so proud...and relieved.
