A Great Mother's Day

Yet another mother's day has come and gone, and let me just say it was great. Jared and Gavin have both been saying this whole week that they're just dying to tell me what they made for me and begging me to release them from their unspoken promise to not reveal what it was. Gavin slipped, but Jared stayed strong! I woke up to an amazing pancake breakfast and beautiful roses! While we ate breakfast, Jared serenaded us the song they've been practicing for a month now in primary. He would try having Gavin sing the kid part and then he'd strike up the chorus and sing Mary Smith's solo part (specifying its Parker's mom's part). Then, they'd trade, with Gavin asking 2 seconds into it "What's next Jer?" This continued all morning and I was presented Gavin's gift that was a cute handprint and poem paper. The card on front says "I love my mom because: she takes me on dates and gives me popsicles." Jared then proceeded to present his gift; a plate they made at school (the kind where you color on the paper and they send it in to the company to have it transferred onto a plate that's actually dishwasher safe). It was perfect! They were both so proud of themselves, and I was proud of them too!

We all scrambled to get ready for 9am church! That's hard enough when its not a special day, let alone a day where we're set back a few minutes by fun stuff. But, we made it! Thanks to Scott and Jeri Boyle who save us a pew faithfully every week! Again we were serenaded by Gavin and Jared's warm up rendition of the song they were going to perform, in the car on the way to church. When they went up to sing for all the mothers it was so sweet. Gavin struggled to peek over the heads of the taller kids standing in front (poor short kid), so that was a little sad, but I could see one cute brown eye peek above. At least he could see that I was looking intently for him! The kids sang beautifully and as always, made me reflective of just how fast life happens and how quickly my babies are growing.

After church, we came home to rest and Michael took over. It was great. Jared made the PB & J's for everyone, Michael got the kids changed out of their church clothes, and I got to veg on the couch! It was great! Michael took an afternoon nap and I snuggled with my boys while they watched one of the Liken The Scripture shows. I highly recommend those - my kids love them and you'd be surprised just how much of the actual scriptural account they retain!

Then, it was off to my sister's house where Michael, my Dad and my one brother in-law that lives locally, made dinner for all the rest of us! My Mom and my grandmother (Gee) along with (not so) little sister Kim came too. I tell you - I could get used to this - having the men cook for us! I even got to have a warm dinner which is an anomaly for any mother! Michael fed Scott for me too. We just hung out after that and enjoyed each other's company. The kids had a great time playing with cousins. They played outside in the backyard, and I'm not sure why, but they decided to draw pictures of King Tut???? Then they proceeded to argue about what his full name was. Jared was told Tutankhamun and his cousins insisted it was something like Tutensonamoon ( I think maybe they've seen the movie "The Mummy" and confused it with one of those characters). It was so funny, because they were determined to prove each other wrong and when my sister's oldest boy Shawn asked me about King Tut's real name, he gave me the most quizzical look like "Are you really sure you know what you're talking about Aunt Kari?" Funny kids!

It was a great day. Michael and the boys also spoiled me with getting me the movie "27 Dresses." When the boys went to Costco with Dad to pick out flowers, they saw it and told him "Mommy would really like that." It was sweet.