A Meaningful Mothers Day

A normal mother's day to me means not having to make meals, do dishes, and maybe a card or a small present. And while all of these things happened this year, there were lots of extra complications that made the day more meaningful for me.
Lesson 1: Being a mother brings pain and sacrifice sometimes.
Ethan came down with a cold on Monday and each day after that someone else in the house got it. Isaac on Tuesday, Miles on Wednesday, me on Thursday and Taylor on Friday. Isaac's cold turned into an ear infection and mine turned into Mastitis. So after Isaac crying about his ear and me suffering through fevers and chills and painful feedings for 2 days, he and I spent a good portion of Mother's Day morning at the doctors office. Would I rather have been at home enjoying "my" day. Yes, but it was also kind of nice to have alone time with Isaac and nice to get to cuddle him since he's only cuddly when he's in pain. And was the mastitis painful? Yes, but it's sometimes the price you pay for nursing and I'm loving nursing Miles. He's so sweet and snuggly when he's nursing and so not all the rest of the time. He finds all the other boys in the house much more interesting than me and is quickly becoming one of them. He eats when they eat at the table. Plays with them when they play on the floor with their toys. He only can't follow them when they're running around but that will come soon enough I'm sure. So sitting there in the doctor's office I realized that even knowing all the pain of becoming and being a mother puts you through, and knowing all the sacrifices of time and energy it requires, I'd still do it again in a heartbeat because I love these kids so much.
Lesson 2: Being a mother means your nice things always get messed up.
We have these large, concrete planter boxes out back and there hasn't been anything growing in them for as long as Taylor's family has lived here. Because my boys are boys, they inevitably end up digging in the dry dirt every summer and getting dirty even though I lecture them not to. So for mother's day I asked Taylor to plant flowers in the boxes. Kill 2 birds with 1 stone you know- nice flowers, and maybe the boys will stay out of the dirt.
Taylor spent most of Saturday afternoon out back digging all the dry dirt out and replacing it with soil and good fertilizer for the flowers he chose. He even did all this research on which plants would grow best in the shade since this area doesn't get consistent sunlight. He let Ethan help (Isaac was kept away so hopefully he doesn't thing he's ever allowed to dig in the dirt with flowers- "planting" would seem too much like "digging" to him I thought and he might try that later).
It was cute to see him teaching Ethan about plants and letting him help out with the project. I love my flowers. Taylor did a great job. We both went to bed Saturday happy with how it all turned out. And then Taylor's mother was over for Sunday dinner and asked if we'd been out back to see the flowers today yet. We hadn't with all the sickness and stuff. Poor Sonia had to then inform us that she'd walked out that morning to bring the dog inside and was confused by the large mound of dirt on the sidewalk. She was horrified to discover the newly planted flowers UNDER the dirt and assumed that Oscar (who never normally digs) must have LOVED the smell of the fertilizer and so he dug out all the flowers and then all the dirt. She kindly put it all back but we'll see what survives. She feels so bad poor thing. Taylor's heart broken and I'm annoyed but really, it's just like every other thing I own. It's nice to have something nice but without fail one of my children finds it or spits up on it or colors on it or something. Nothing "stays" nice and so really there's nothing "nice" inside the house and now even the outside of the house is that way too- even though it wasn't my kids fault this time.
Taylor did make his mother and I this amazing french toast and strawberry breakfast.
I'm actually glad the day wasn't just a relaxing day off for me. Having the issues come up gave me the chance to recognize what being a mother truly means sometimes. And I'm willing to make those sacrifices and deal with those challenges because these little guys...
they're worth every minute of it.