Wow. My 5th mother’s day. Hard to believe. And yet, they keep getting better and better.

You know how some things, the more you do them, the more mundane they become? If you run the same trail 100 times, by the last time you start to not really see what’s around you any more and it becomes just muscle memory. If you drive the same route, you eventually get to the point where you arrive at the destination, and forget having made the right turn or that you had to stop at a red light to get there.

Mother’s day is the complete opposite. The first it’s surreal that you actually get to celebrate it. You find it kind of silly, after all, you’ve only been a mother for maybe a couple months (weeks? days?). The second, you feel a little more deserving. I mean, heck, you survived a whole year. But yet, your child is too small to understand it, or make you a card, or to really celebrate it. Still seems kind of silly.

Dinner out the night before… because 6 people, including 3 highchairs/boosters, is just a bit much to fight the crowds on Mother’s Day proper.

Then they get a bit older. The view changes. You start to realize how much life has changed in the last year. Your now toddler/preschooler might come home from school with a craft they made for you.  Or they don’t, because they didn’t want to (yes, that would be my child who didn’t want to make the bracelet because it wasn’t Mother’s day yet).

And you realize that next year is going to be even better. Because by then, he’ll be able to write his entire name himself. And maybe the craft will be made by him with his own intentions without having to be coerced. Or he’ll still decide not to do it. But either way, it’ll be a choice by a child, not a toddler or an infant.

(Not made by the toddler… This was intricately crafted by a local jeweler, James and Company Jewelry Repair, just for me!)

Aiden picked out his own card this year. It was a beautiful card – pink, with a bouquet of flowers, and it played music. Never mind that it was in Spanish and neither he nor I had any idea what was written or what words were being sung. We tried to talk him into a card that we could read, but I guess in his mind, what’s the difference? He can’t read the English letters either, so why is this card any better or worse than any other? So he got it. And it was beautiful. Even if I don’t have a clue what is written (I’m assuming that in there are the words Happy Mother’s Day, but for all I know it could be a graduation card or a “Congratulations on the New House” card!).

Nevertheless, he had a say in this Mother’s Day celebration. He chose when to open the gift (thanks for choosing the day before, Aiden, you win favorite child for that!). When to open the cards. And maybe next year he’ll pick out the gift himself, and we’ll both be able to read the card, together. Wouldn’t that be something?

Today I’m joining Multiples Monday over at Capri + 3 (You should check out this blog, Theresa’s got a great story!)