Mom’s Day Scenes

Yesterday was Mother’s Day.

My Mom and Dad came down to visit from Michigan for Kayla’s graduation.

Can we all pause and revel on the words “Kayla’s graduation”? Two kids graduated and one just finished his freshman year.  We are on a roll. Now if the world of employment will be equally as kind. More on graduation later…

On Mother’s Day, I grit my teeth, literally, while the kids and Mr. Wonderful take care of lunch after church. The kids each have a dish they make, Mr. W directs, and it usually involved my son making his Papa’s famous steak sauce and steak on the grill. He  has inherited the secret taste bud for making this sauce and makes it better than any of us.

I say I grit my teeth, because in general this is the way it goes in the kitchen while the kids and man cook…

“Mom, where’s the slicey thing to cut the strawberries with at?”

“We’re out of butter, who wants to run to the store?”

“Should I make the ice tea with ice, or not?”

“Oh crap, who spilled that flour?”  (guilty party smiles and looks silly).

I grit my teeth because, as much as I want to jump in with my “over active Mom instincts” to help, I stay away, FAR away so I don’t see things like someone cutting carrots with a butter knife or hear the grinding of a dinner spoon in the disposal.

Does anyone else have a drawer of spoons with razor sharp edges?

Mr. Wonderful was a great organizer and the kids got really excited to help, so I herded my Mom, Mother-In-Law, Sis-in-Law and eventually my Daughter-in-Law out to the patio where we sat and sipped ice tea and completely ignored the chaos that was, for one good hour, the kitchen.

We do this one only during the entire year and we take full advantage of it.

In the process, the kids perfect their own special dishes as well as learn to manage working in the kitchen together. They are old enough now, and we don’t believe they will kill each other over a spatula.

And oh my gosh, the food was fantastic!

The patio was gorgeous and in an hour or so we had grilled steak and chicken, mac n cheese, green bean casserole, fresh green salad from our garden topped with berries and thin shavings of Pecorino Romano, grilled corn with peppered kernels of charred goodness and fresh Amish butter that my Mom brought with her and a pumpkin pie (yes, in May!) that my sis-in-law made by breaking the rules yesterday.  Incidentally, pumpkin pie tastes delicious in May.

Afterward, the gang played cornhole, a game involving throwing bags of corn through a hole in a box.

And then the young uns and Mr. Wonderful moved to the front yard where they wore him out with a basketball game.

Hello? Mr. Wonderful? Are you alive today?

Incidentally, my girls can hold their own against most guys at basketball.

Except the Thunder.

Cuz they’re in the playoffs and GOOD!

Again, we sat in the shade with parasols and little petite fans and sipped mint juleps and had our toes done.

Okay we didn’t go that far, but we did relax.

These are Mr. Wonderful’s (seated) and my (standing) Moms.

Here’s a shot of my Mom-in-Law.

I took this shot of her playing with her iPad with MY iPad.

Here’s my daughter-in-law Lindsay on her very FIRST Mom’s Day ever with little Madilyn.

Here’s one of Madilyn’s great Auntie Cheryl who got her to sleep soundly during a basketball game.

And here’s one of our family right after church, before everyone took off their nice clothes and dressed down into holy pants and stained t-shirts that would be basketball worthy, but not really picture worthy.

It was a wonderful day.  To all of you who spent it with your Moms I hope you had as much fun as we did.  And to all of you who spent it remembering your Mom, I hope your memories were good.

Katie