A Wonderful Mother's Day!

Well I had a really great Mother's Day weekend!

It involved spending time at the beach (on Saturday)...

One cute little (almost) 2 year old had fun driving his cars in the sand with Grandma.

I also got to have some personal time Saturday morning with my sister-in-law where we got to go to the temple (a beautiful place indeed) while Will babysat Preston and our neice Gwenevere.

My Mother's Day also involved one messy toddler...

And one funny husband...

And me shaking my head, just being grateful that it was not I who was going to have to clean that kid up.

Last year (2009) was my first official Mother's Day as a mom, even though I was pregnant on Mother's Day in 2008 and sort of considered myself an official mom that year as well.

Either way, I've always considered Mother's Day sort of "Womens Day", regardless if you are a mother or not. To me, it's a celebration of women everywhere who play the role of a comforter, friend, nurterer, and more. So in my own way, I always celebrated Mother's Day long before ever becoming a mother.

Though, I have to say, since having a child of my own, Mother's Day has taken on an entirely new meaning. And a special one at that.

My awesome husband, (whom as you may have noticed hijacked my Belly Diaries blog yesterday and freaked me out because all I saw was the blog title and had no idea that he had written a blog for me - the sweetie), made sure that I was free of any motherly duties yesterday.

- He got Preston ready for church - all dressed, shoes on, hair combed and styled, diaper bag packed and all.

- He made brownies all by himself - which I think may have been his first time. (I won't mention that he forgot to turn the oven off and our house was super hot when we got home from church from the oven being left on for so many hours).

- He took care of all the diaper changes throughout the day.

- He also took care of any meals for Preston - which got kind of comical for me to watch. I am the type of person who tries to keep Preston as clean as possible while he eats so it's not too big of a cleanup job afterwards. Will, on the other hand, takes Preston's shirt off and lets him make a huge mess (as seen above with the mac 'n cheese all over the face).

As fun as it is to let your child get this incredibly messy while eating - it usually leads to needing a bath afterwards because there is way too much to clean up with a cloth.

Which, in Will's case, he got unlucky and Preston decided to take a poo in the bathtub.

Seriously this never happens to me. But of course it would happen to Will on Mother's Day when he is charge - Haha. I would like to think that it would have never happened in the first place if he didn't let Preston get so messy because he wouldn't have needed a bath and would have then just pooped in his diaper instead. :)

But it's moments like that, where I appreciate the turn of events as it only makes husbands appreciate their wives even more.

- Will also took care of naptimes and bedtimes, which, um, didn't really happen. Preston wouldn't take a nap for him, and then later (at bedtime) after being in bed for several hours he decided to wake up around 11:30 and play with his trains. This is when I finally decided to take some pitty on my poor Will and help.

I got Preston back to sleep within 20 minutes with very little fight.

To top it all off, I got two very sweet homemade Mother's Day cards from my two gentlemen.

And I also got a giftcard to go get an hour-long foot massage - which WOW I was not expecting that! I'm saving that baby for when I really really need a good foot massage. I'm so excited.

The best part of Mother's Day was something very sweet and simple, which surprised even me...

Every year, our church makes Mother's Day very special for all the women. They make sure that none of the ladies have to teach classes that day or have any responsibilities so that they can just enjoy themselves. All of the talks are centered around mothers (and are always very sweet), and during the last hour of church, all the women go into the gym where they have tables set up and they feed us a very delicious brunch (which I might add, the guys made themselves).

While we are eating our yummy food, the primary aged children (4 yrs old - 11 yrs old) come out and sing to us. It is sooooo sweet and I always love it every year - regardless of whether or not I have kids in primary.

Yesterday, I was a bit sad knowing that I wouldn't get to see Preston singing to me because he is still in Nursery (ages 18 months - 3 yrs). When they opened up the curtain on the stage, I noticed that even the nursery aged kids were up there as well! I got SO excited and looked all over for my little Preston.

I finally found him, he was off on the lefthand side, holding a basketball of course, and looking right at me. He would see me, get all excited and then get distracted. A few minutes later he would find me in the crowd of women again and get all excited. I had tears in my eyes - it was so exciting for me. I don't know why, but just to see him up there with all the other kids. I just felt so loved, and really, it was the best part of my Mother's Day.

After the kids got done singing, they all came down from the stage and gave their moms hugs. Will helped Preston to find me, as it was kind of hard being he was one of the younger kids. But as soon as he found me, he came running over to me and climbed up on my lap. Ahhhhh my heart melted. I got a nice big hug and again, I just felt so happy to be his mother.

Once we got home from chuch, the only thing I did do yesterday was make a broccoli cheese quiche (for some weird reason I was craving quiche).

But other than that, I had a wonderful "day off" filled with lots of love, attention, and smiles.
I love my family. Thank you Will and Preston for making my Mother's Day so memorable. I love you.