Mother's Day

I'm back!

Taking a little break was really good. It ended up being exactly what I needed to recharge my creativity and come back with plenty of new posts planned.

So yay.

Today is Monday and I know we're supposed to talk about the new dare for this week, but first I want to take a quick second to talk about mother's day.

Normally this is one of my least favorite days of the year.

I feel like it's over hyped, and unless you have older kids or an amazing husband/boyfriend/partner, it ends up being kind of depressing.

BUT.

This year it was not.

Thanks to some very sweet and thoughtful friends, it was quite honestly the sweetest mother's day I've ever had.

So thank you, to those people who went so far out of their way to make it a good day.

You're almost definitely getting into heaven now.

I'll be back tomorrow to lay out this week's dare.

Until then, let's all have six cups of coffee and just try to hold on for Friday.

Happy monday!

Our Weekend: Mother's Day and a Sort-of Birthday

This was a nice weekend.

It started with me having Friday off, which really kind of guarantees a good weekend ahead, and ended with a nice Mother's Day with the kids.

Friday I spent my day off taking my dad to the DMV to get his license, for the first time in about 30 years. 

{It's a long story}

After he passed all his tests, and got his first license in three decades, he was the most excited I've seen him since Jackson was born.

Look at that happy face.

After DMV we celebrated with some delicious pizza and celebratory beers at De Falco's. What else do you do after finally getting legal permission to drive other than go ingest alcohol?

{don't worry, we each only had one and then ate an entire pizza and hung around for a good two hours before we drove again}

Friday night we hung out at Bill's with him and his son, swimming and pigging out on pizza and frozen yogurt. 

Unfortunately I didn't get a single decent picture of the kids all together, clearly:

Saturday Bill and I celebrated his birthday together, which is actually on Wednesday, but we did it early.
Here he is trying to be super serious in his new Ray Ban Aviators:

But don't worry, he couldn't keep it up for long...

Sunday was a very nice mothers day, probably for the first time ever.
I woke up in Bill's arms, I picked up my dad and the kids who were all actually in good moods, we had a delicious breakfast (THAT I DIDN'T PAY FOR-which is honestly a first) and then spent the day at the Scottsdale Library. That might sound lame, but the kids played in the water, and I picked up three really good looking books for $3.00

All in all, it was a pretty damn good Mother's day, and a very very good weekend.

Last but not least, Happy Mother's Day to all of you mommies out there.
And even though it sounds weird, thank you too, to the single daddies who pull double duty for their kids who don't have mothers. Like my dad did, and like so many dads do.
You're a shining example of what fathers should be.

Monday Momisms: The Mother's Day Let Down

Well, Mother's Day is about a week away

{On May 13th, for you slacker ass kids and husbands who don't know when the fuck it is}

and this year, like every other year, I am not looking forward to it.

See, no matter what situation you're in, Mother's Day usually sucks balls for you.

It either never lives up to your expectations, or it never happens at all, or you spend the entire day hosting a holiday for other people just like every other fucking holiday, and it never seems to be about what it's supposed to be about: celebrating and rewarding you for not only giving up crack during your pregnancy, but actually managing to sacrifice day in and day out for a bunch of tiny people who really don't give two shits about the fact that making dinner for the entire family is hard, or that you once upon a time had a life and friends before someone started calling you Mom.

Mother's Day is supposed to be our day,

Our one day of rest and relaxation where we get to do as much nothingness as we want, all in the name of "Hey you're a good mom. Thank you."

I've been a single mom for almost every single Mothers Day of the past 9 years, and almost every single one of them was depressing as hell.

My kids are still too little now to get actual gifts or take me anywhere, but they make me handmade cards, which is fine, and I end up taking them out to breakfast or lunch or something, like every other fucking day of the year that we go out, and I sit there depressed as Hell while they fight, and then I pay our bill and we leave.

There was also a time though when they were too little to even make handmade gifts, or even speak.

So unless my dad said it to me, I was lucky to even hear happy mother's day.

And I'm not feeling sorry for myself.

I know lots of older women who raised their kids alone, who all have the same stories. 

Even if you have a husband or a boyfriend or someone around that tries to make Mother's Day nice for you, I think most of the time it gets ruined because unless you ARE a mom, you don't really understand what Mother's Day is about.

Unless you are a mom you have this weird idea that mothers day is about the kids.

It's about spending sweet quality time with your lovely children and being rewarded and thankful for being a mom.

No.

That's what every other day of the year is for, except the other 364 days of the year, you're emotionally rewarded and not given nice gifts and cards with glitter on them.

Mother's Day is supposed to be just that: YOUR DAY.

A day when you get to eat pancakes until you feel sick and lay in bed while someone entertains your children and possibly cleans your house.

It should be a day when everyone smiles at you, and people are genuinely grateful for what you do for your family.

Because you do a lot.

Now I'm not saying men have it easy.

I'm sure Father's Day for single dads is just as miserable as mother's day for single moms. 

And maybe a lot of wives and girlfriends don't get Fathers Day right for their man any more than a man gets Mother's Day right for his girl, but the moral of the story is these holidays are bullshit.

They seem to be the days when you're kids are the most grumpy and difficult, you are the most depressed and emotional, and absolutely freaking nothing goes right.

Maybe we should all just get really bombed on Saturday and sleep straight through Sunday, so nobody has to be disappointed or cry alone in a booth at IHOP while two small children try to hurt each other with pitchers of syrup.

Happy Mother's Day.