Emma Kelly gets to sleep in my bed on the weekends — a VERY big deal. And we woke up Sunday morning and lay there for a little bit. I was waiting to see if anything registered with her about this being Mother’s Day. It wasn’t happening. So I got up and said, “Well! I guess I’ll go make you some breakfast and serve it to you in bed!” She looked at me like, “Wha–?”

“Because it’s MOTHER’S DAY.”

She suddenly got all excited and then raced to her bedroom to find the Mother’s Day card she made for me at school. We snuggled up in bed and read it together, with me thinking this was the start of what would be a most awesome day.

But as it turns out, giving your mom a card you made at school fulfills all the obligations a 6-year-old has to her mother on Mother’s Day.

“Mom….Can I have my breakfast now?”

And she proceeded to lounge in my bed as I fed her, dressed her and fixed her hair and then raced off to church. After services, she said she’d rather go home with Grandmama. Fine. I had some things to do around the house thanks to the mess left behind from the day before. I don’t know why I thought cleaning up a mess she made would’ve struck her as something nice to do for me on Mother’s Day, but oh well.

After I got the house in decent order, I headed over to my parents’ house for a Mother’s Day cookout with my brother and his family. Once her cousins walked in the door, all I remember is a blur of curls racing and squealing from one end of the house to the other until it was finally time to go home.

I semi-argued Emma Kelly into the bathtub where she amused herself with toys I’m sure have surpassed some health code limit for acceptable amounts of mildew. And when I told her it was time to get out and go to bed, you would’ve thought I was sending her to the electric chair. In fact, she was actually wishing death upon herself.

“I wish I was never born! I don’t want to be alive anymore! You don’t ever let me do ANYTHING!! When is it EVER going to be KIDS Day?!?!”

Oh, was she serious.

So I spent the remainder of my Mother’s Day talking my child down off the ledge until we both drifted off to a merciful sleep.

And how was YOUR Mother’s Day…