My mother always insisted she didn’t want anything special for Mother’s Day. She’d say, “just be nice to each other and me every day”. She always appreciated the cards we made or the personal items we wrapped up like favorite toys or trinkets. One year my brother gave her the blanket off of his bed. He didn’t do it knowing that he’d get it right back that night. He wanted to give her something and it was useful. But he did get it back that night.

Anytime I have expectations for Mother’s Day, I am put in my place. I think this is generally true ANYTIME I have expectations. I’m disappointed in one way or another. On Mother’s Day, I usually wake up to a sick child, have to take someone to the emergency room or some other thing happens which promptly reminds me that being a Mother rarely leaves room for self-orientation and I’m always grateful for the reminders. In fact, I think anytime I’m thinking of my own needs, the day becomes a disaster.

I’ve never expected lavish gifts or to be treated like a queen. I’m too practical for expensive flowers or jewelry. If Mark insists on buying a gift, I usually suggest something that we need for the house, something useful for the kitchen or maybe a book that I’ve been wanting.

The “expectations” relate to my ideal Mother’s Day which includes visions of a little laziness, a dinner that I don’t have to clean up after and everyone getting along. Mark always works on Mother’s Day-he teaches kids and while lessons usually cancel later in the day, his Sundays start at 7am. As a result, I’m usually flying solo in the parenting department for most of the day. Since my expectations of a perfect day and the kids’ ideal don’t match-we all end up a bit out of sorts-not the way I want to spend the day with my treasures. That brings me to another expectation….I’ve never wanted to spend Mother’s Day away from the kids. The one year I arranged for Mark not to work so that I could run the Race for the Cure, I hated it. Not the Race…THAT is totally inspiring and I would encourage anyone who can to participate. But I hated not having the kids with me.

Little Mark has been battling some sort of virus. He’s been feverish and sluggish. He seemed better last night and will likely be fine for mass. I’ll consider that my first Mother’s Day gift-going to mass.

The kids were up late for different reasons, they’ll probably all sleep in so I’ll have extra time for the Rosary and some reading-might pick up the psalms. Gift #2.

Finally, I decided that I really want to be a good mom today. I kind of understand why my mom didn’t want special attention, I think she felt like she came up short in the mothering department. Don’t we all? We’re only human. But in our eyes, the eyes of her treasures, she didn’t come up short-we did. She was our everything and we wanted to prove on that one day that we knew it.

The difference between my mother and me is that she was a single parent. I’m not. She wondered how she’d pay the bills, I don’t for now. She wondered how to put food on the table, I’ve never had that worry as a parent. She wondered whether her kids were safe when she had to work, I haven’t had to work since becoming a mother (although I did work 2 days a week for a few years). I’m not saying that I think I’m a horrible mother. I’m saying, I fail sometimes. Lose patience, get distracted, react or just don’t SEE the kids because I’m preoccupied with the jobs around the house.

Today, in thanksgiving for the privilege of being a mother, I will pray to see Jesus in these faces that I imagined nearly my whole life. As I pray the Rosary, I’ll beg for Mary’s heart to turn to each of the kids in patience and gratitude when they call me. I’ll smile at their dad if he walks through the door with something completely impractical-just to show how much he loves their mother. Finally, I’ll hold each of them for as long as I can and thank God for overlooking my weaknesses and humanity and trusting me to be their mom.

Happy Mother’s Day to you, too. Enjoy your treasures!

Mark was able to get reservations for the Oprah show so we flew to Chicago last week for 2 days. Neither of us had ever been there so I was looking forward to seeing the city and EATING really good food. I love to eat-it’s my weakness. I don’t like to snack or eat candy. I like to eat meals. This could be a really long post, instead, I’ll just share a few observations.

1. It was great being together, it’s nice to know that we enjoy each others’ company even after all these years (17). We tended to want (or not want) to do the same things….also good to know. Mark’s good company-even if he did ask every cab driver the same question about the best way to get to O’Hare on Friday afternoon. 😉

2. In a city where you supposedly can’t get a bad meal, we managed to get a bad meal. My dinner was fine but Mark’s was bad. Don’t get the linguini with white clam sauce at Cafe Bionda-the clams weren’t fresh and the garlic was burnt. Our lunch in the hotel restaurant was worth the trip, though and Mark loved the breakfast at the hotel. Mine was good, too. We should have just eaten at the hotel the whole time.

3. I think I was the victim of beauty profiling. The audience crew hand-picks beautiful people to sit closest to the stage (including a group of Bears’ wives)-needless to say…..I was in the back row. They didn’t pick the seat for me, once the seats in the well right by the stage are hand-selected, everyone can find their own seat-we picked those seats because they had a good view. I’m not complaining, just making an observation.

4. Chicago cab service is way better than New York cab service. You feel like you’re getting hosed everytime you sit in a cab in New York City. They should do something about that.

5. I wanted the kids to see everything we saw. I don’t like to experience new things without them. I definitely want to save up and take them to Chicago some day while they’re still kids.

6. Even the people at the Bentley store were pretty friendly. They tolerated us and when Mark had the audacity to ask how much a Porche was that some rich couple was test-driving (or maybe they just bought it), some guy in an expensive suit with slicked-back hair said in a foreign accent “two hundred, seventy five thousand” and briskly walked back into the store. They should have shooed us out because we were making their cars look shabby, but we didn’t stay long.

                         

Maybe you have a Kate in your family. (Ah, but you couldn’t because ours is so……Kate) Kate is 3rd in a family of 4 children. All the nurses in the hospital told me “My 3rd was the EASIEST baby.” I couldn’t believe it but it was true. When I brought her home, she didn’t make a peep. She did projectile vomit-but never complained about it. The summer she was born, we went to the beach with my mom and by brothers and their families. A house full of people and nobody could believe how QUIET she was.

Well then I think she got tired of being ignored-I’ll have to admit, when your 3rd and easy,the other kids get things first and more often. At 18 months, she did a 180. She was still sweet but not quiet anymore. Her voice became the loudest when she needed something. I was just saying to her the other day that when she’s arguing with the others, I hear her and she usually gets in trouble for it-sorry Kate-my ears don’t like loud.

Kate almost wasn’t a “Kate”. Her name probably had more debate than any of the kids. It’s a good thing, too, because it fits her so well. Her real name is “Kathryn Virginia” (after a favorite aunt of mine) but “Kate” is so her.

Kate has an interesting birth story. The day she was born was “take your daughter to work day”. I rode the elevator up with my doc who had his daughter with him. I asked if she was going to see a baby being born today and he was so surprised. Apparently, he wasn’t dreaming of asking any of his patients for that privilege. So he said, “do you think she could?” and Kate had her first audience.

Kate is nurturing and funny, creative, generous, dramatic and a linguist (she makes up her own words-that actually work). One of the reasons that she and her brother, Mark are so close is that she’s always anticipating his needs and taking care of him-they fight, too, but I know her caring is genuine.

She cracks me up-she wears 2 different colored crocs and sometimes 2 altogether different shoes. People might think she’s doing it for attention-she’s not at all, she just likes it and honestly, so do I. I think it appeals to her artsy side and-it’s her. Any adult can make Kate laugh by saying a potty word-it cracks her up.

She’s horrified by nakedness. She doesn’t even like to see the boys with their shirts off-she thinks they’re flashing. We made the mistake of going to “Hooters” on vacation one year because they were showing a Steelers game and she almost couldn’t eat. But that was funny, too. This preference could have gone either way-she’s the one who came into the kitchen one day with the “Pretty Pretty Princess” earring on her belly-she was 3.

Kate could be an actress but doesn’t like the stage-so she’ll have to settle for Hollywood, I guess.

Here are some of her made-up words…

“Delicious this” this she told me at 2 meant to take a bite of something and say “Mmm Delicious”

“Shiver me up” this meant to pick her up in my arms and say “oooh” and sort of shiver. I don’t think at that point she knew the word “shiver”.

and a more recent one…”Come-offable”, meaning “removable”.

Kate would give all her money to the poor box at church if I let her-I don’t know why I don’t. Instead, she sort of spreads it out over the year. She used to take her change in a little change purse and dump it into the collection basket every week. She always takes extra coins for Mark, too.

Every morning Kate looks at me from her bed and flips herself over, violently sometimes, so that I can rub her back. She was like a little lion cub as a baby. If I was on the floor, she’d roll all over me, it was like she couldn’t get close enough.

Kate’s always finding things. She always finds coins and interesting things on the ground. One of her favorite things to do at the beach is find shells with her dad. She finds more 4-leaf clovers in the yard than anyone.

My mom watches my nieces. When she first agreed to take the job, she asked my older daughter, Hannah, if she could help sometimes. Kate, who was almost 8 at the time, thought she could do the job. I let her try and she was just as good with them. She’s always making up games for them-like treasure hunts and thinking of ways to help them do something. When the older niece was going to be a flower girl in a wedding, Kate made a little flower crown and collected a basket full of flowers to help her practice-and it helped.

Finally, the thing Kate probably loves to do most is DRAW! She’s so good at it, too. I wish I had her eye and imagination. She’s been drawing for as long as she could hold a pencil-I’m certain Hannah’s love and aptitude for it rubbed off naturally on Kate. I’m a relentless purger and it’s the one thing I can’t bring myself to pitch-the kids’ drawings. They have notebooks and drawing pads and stacks of looseleaf paper full of drawings. She and Hannah fill both sides of good art notebooks. To watch them draw is fascinating because I’m not especially capable of it. It’s incredible how the pencil moves and creates the things exactly as it’s in their brain.  I don’t watch them draw often enough. For me, keeping all their work is proof that the process is more important than the product-but in their case, the product is also pretty impressive. I’d include some pictures that Kate has drawn here, but that would be bragging.

Kate is a character. She’s her own person and I really hope that doesn’t change.

Happy 10th Birthday, Kate. We love you and hope you have a fun day!

Love,

Us