Sweet Boy!

What Mother wouldn't love to get a wonderful card like this?

The real card is four sided but I thought the front was the best.

My son made this for me on a Tuesday...just because.

If this isn't a fine example of how easy stamping can be, I don't know what is.

Remember to remind your children that Mother's Day cards needn't be extravagant or very difficult. To me , this card is the most beautiful card I've ever received--especially becasue it was "just Tuesday".

Do you have your craft supplies out so your children can find time to be creative? If not, you should grab a cup and put some pens/pencils/marker/crayons next to a stack of paper. You'd be amazed how creative your children can be when parents give them the space to work.

My children have their own stamps, markers, paper (solid and patterned), scissors, adhesive, scrubbing pad and mist. I didn't spend much money on these supplies. Mostly they are my extra/retired stamps/scraps, and my son knows how to keep his stamps clean and put away. We are working on his sister's tidying skills, but most of all I am proud that he will spend 3 hours in his room working on beautiful treasures for his loved ones. Grandparents LOVE these treasures and he's setting a great example for little sister to learn how to make hand crafted gifts.

Good with Scissors!

On Mother’s Day, I woke up to discover that my DD’s diaper had EXPLODED during the night. If you have never dealt with the bits of wet fluff that burst out when a diaper finally reaches its breaking point, I hope you never will. It is like trying to wipe up fluffy boogers. What you wipe off, you immediately wipe back on with the next swipe. I can’t for the life of me figure out how it happened, but my DH woke up to a sight that at first made him concerned she had thrown up in the middle of the night. So while drippy wet from my shower, I got to suck up the fluff balls into our dust buster and try to clean off the slats from her crib. And then for that extra treat, two days later I realized I had not immediately cleaned out of the canister in my morning haze, and now I have a mini-vac that smells of perpetual pee. Lucky me, the Mother’s Day gift that keeps on giving!

But later that day I did get the best round-about compliment. During Sunday school my DS’s class was using stencils and when we arrived, DS was the only one left at the table still working. DS had decided to cut out each stenciled dinosaur to give to his cousins later that day, and he was diligently still working on cutting around several dinos. So while DH and I waited a minute before rounding up all his papers, his teacher told me he was very good at maneuvering the scissors. Now for some parents this would not seem like much of a compliment but this particular lady is the director of our preschool (saint that she is for volunteering her free time to children’s church too), so coming from her I felt this was a BIG compliment (not only to DS but for myself as well). After all wouldn’t it be a shame if I was unable to pass only my love of art to my own children? So while the rest of Mother’s Day was a basic blur of family activities and fluffy boogers, this tiny exchange was my one shining moment where I could say, “Yes! I did that!”

So for all you mothers out there who spent a harried Mother’s Day carting children to and fro for supposedly “fun” activities…remember to savor those moments when even the tiniest exchange reminds you that yes, I did that. Parenting is so very important and yet we are all so often left feeling ill-prepared for the daily struggles of child rearing.

Remember that even the little things you do matter, and hopefully you will be smarter than me and IMMEDIATELY flush out the fluffy diaper boogers from your mini-vac!