Just wondering how everybody fared with their Mother's Day celebrations. I was pretty much golden before the weekend ever started. Bubba presented mom with his illustrated biography an a special Mother's Day Tea at his school on Friday. The book was touching and hilarious, and she was overjoyed. That one goes in the archives. Ri-ri, our late sleeper, was up before 7, crept in to the bedroom to wake me for some help. She made a breakfast in bed that consisted of instant oatmeal, an orange and a Diet Coke. Awesome. I came through with the rather lame pedicure gift certificates. But the highlight was collectively celebrating the Moms at Maggie's pool. Kebobs and good wine.

How was yours?

I cleaned the house top to bottom, even ceiling fan blades and ac vents. Was looking forward to mom's return when a flat tire and dead battery kept them out of town for another evening. Spent mother's day with the dog.

I also folded all the laundry after she went to bed.

I spent the day trying to see the world and do things as my wife would do them. Her pace. Her goggles. Her swim goggles. We went to Deep Eddy, a downtown spring fed swimming hole in Austin. Of course this was after someone had unsuccessfully tried to steal my wife's car. Had he known it was the a mother's car, would he have chosen a different one? It was after my daughter had almost bit through her cheek, but before she fell and almost broke her fingers. She is getting X-rays as I type.

Think this Daddy did ok. Like Daddy Clay, my 5 yr old did Mother's Day crafts and poems in school that came home Friday, so Mama was riding a wave by the time Sunday arrived.

We actually spent the day with the kids at the NC Zoo. Seemed to be a popular family choice all the way around and the weather was perfect.

My biggest gift to Mama on Mother's Day was declaring it a diaper-free day for her. She actually started singing "Happy Mother's Day to me..." to the tune of Happy Birthday, as she handed me our 4 mos old after the Lil Stinker had completed THE dirty diaper of the day.

It's a standing rule/philosphy in our house...no one should have to wipe anyone else's bottom on their own Mother's/Father's Day or their own birthday. If you have little ones (pre-potty training), I highly recommend implementing this rule. It gets you great big Daddy points.

A year ago, we had just gotten home with the baby. At least it felt like it. So this year was a little lower keyed. When Walgreens was offering free 8x10s on their web site, I tried getting one, but the offer ran out as I finally completed the process. It took 2 hours because of the rush of traffic for the promotion. But I decided I could spend the $5 and get the same picture for her to have at work. It was a photo from a painting class deb had signed us up for in February. Duncan and I both have "paint" (probably just Condensed Milk with food coloring) on our faces and on our white Tshirts. It was a nice moment and she made it happen. So she really like them. I'd gotten her a package with 1 8x10, 2 5x7s and 4 4x6s. She can share all she wants.

Probably the bigger event of Mom's Day weekend was that she got to see me come out of my vocal retirement. I sang with the Fort Wayne Philharmonic Chorus in a performance of Carmina Burana. We traded in some vouchers for her and Duncan to go. What could have been a miserable experience turned out to be great. Duncan paid close attention to the first half, Rachmaninoff's Symphonic Dances, got upset at the intermission, and then fell asleep for nearly all of Carmina Burana, which isn't an easy task. I think she took great pride in me returning to real singing again. And Duncan's behavior at just one year old sure gave her pride.

All in all, nothing big. But I think she enjoyed it.

And then this evening, my lovely wife comments that she didn't understand why I'd forgotten to get her a card for Mother's Day. I'd even mentioned to several people that I'd been in Hallmark nearly every week in April. So I remembered where the cards were stashed (she frequently finds the bag and opens the cards to remember what she bought them for) and scrambled to get messages inside. It was still touching. Just different.

We'll see how next year works out. Her birthday, the first birthday party, our third anniversary, and Mothers Day are all crammed into 4 weeks. At least I think I messed up on the minor-est of the least important one. Hopefully, she'll remember it that way.

I too went with the "diaper-free" days... Those are always good for points. We went to church, where the first 'loaded' diaper occurred. Gotta love that.

We had planned to hit the zoo, but figured it would be crowded so we spent the day at home. And the boy got his first hair cut.

OH, and she got a Nintendo DS. She LOVES word puzzles and such, so she got the Brain Age series of games.

I'm the MacDaddy! (For now, until I screw something up, or want another skate weekend...)

I got hosed at work and could not leave early any day last week, and things at home required me to be home in the evenings. I got a nice card and gave her the promise of an afternoon with her friend and a pedicure while she's at it. She went on bragging about my friend and how smart he was for suggesting it... Guess that part backfired. I pointed out after she told her mom that it was my idea, but it was probably a little late.

Oh well.

Champaigne and O.J. followed by a big breakfast.

Full day of reading for mom while I made dinner from scratch. Ending the day with a massage.

The kids got her solar tealights (from the 3 year old) for the balcony coffee table and a starbucks gift card (from the 10 month old).

**Starbucks gift card proven difficult to pry out of the babies hands so he's still hanging on to it 3 days later. I think he likes Chai Lates.

Ah, this year....

We had a baptism on Sunday and I sang in a concert on Saturday. To compensate for all the work involved, I had her open her card a day early and came home on Friday night with flowers for her to discover Saturday morning.

There's a good chance that we'll be in Walt Disney World next year for Mother's Day. I wonder if they do anything special.