Mother's Day

Mother's Day is always a little sad for me. I love being able to have a day to celebrate, but it always makes me super sad that my mom isn't around any more. She was such a giver that she is the exact type of person that holidays like Mother's Day were invented. I hate that I didn't give her the appreciation that she deserved. I took so much for granted and just wish I had some way to turn back the clock just for one day to tell her how much I appreciate everything the did for us. My kids are so awesome and I'm so proud of them, I wish so badly that my mom could have known them.
There were alot of tears this weekend over that.
There were also two more big reminders of our mortality too. My boss, for whom I've worked for about 6 years now lost his sister on Friday to breast cancer. I don't know her exact age, but she is his younger sister and he is 44. She had a family... small kids! I am so sad for them, I know how hard it is not to have a mom and I didn't lose mine until I was an adult. I just can't imagine.
Then, Brandi's most recent ex-boyfriend died Saturday night in a motorcycle accident. I didn't really know him very well, but Brandi is pretty broken up about it.
It is heart breaking, but death is part of living, so although there are tears, it truly makes me more apt to pay attention to today.
So, on that note, I'll move on to tell you about what a fabulous day I had on Mother's Day with Lily. Moms get in free to Butterfly World on Mother's day and I took Lily last year. It is the first thing she talked about when she heard that Mother's day was coming up so I told her we'd certainly go again this year. Eric still naps and Butterfly World is kinda pricey so the boys stayed home and cooked dinner for us.
Lily was so excited for the day that she had been drawing pictures of us & butterflies for about a week. She even set out her butterfly underwear to make sure to wear them on Sunday! She woke me up at 6:55!! Ross is the one who gets up with the kids everyday because he is a morning person, I'm not, and... I do my web-work at night so I don't get a chance to get to bed early like he does. So, on a regular day, I get up at 8. Mother's Day, the day that moms are supposed to SLEEP IN.... Lily woke me up at 6:55. I grumbled that I was supposed to sleep in on Mother's Day and she started to cry telling me that it was a special day and she had something she wanted to give me. Even though I'd been out late at a party the night before, I dragged myself out of bed to receive their gifts. Lily had picked out some gummy fruit snacks for me and a spool of ribbon. She & Eric drew me a picture on a big piece of cardboard. Eric even sat up at the table while I looked at it pointing and saying "draw, draw" (this explains the mysterious green marker arms late last week). It was very sweet. I gave them bagels and snuck back to bed. A few minutes later Lily joined me (she usually has to be woken up for school, so 6:55 is early for her too).
After a little more beauty sleep, we got up and headed out to Butterfly World. Lily likes to sketch things so we stopped at the dollar store and bought two sketch pads, a pack of new crayons, a box of markers and treated ourselves to sodas.
Not long after being there, one of the workers told us that if we put our finger out slowly to a butterfly when it is on a leaf, it may crawl onto our hand. This picture is of how upset Lily got about that silly butterfly not wanting to crawl onto her hand. (Notice the finger still out and ready for the butterfly to climb on)

There was an annoyingly friendly little girl who managed to get one on her finger and she tried to hand it off to Lily
It didn't work, but after a minute of resting in the trees, it climbed onto her hand... just for a second
We bought the butterfly guide book and really took our time looking at each and every butterfly trying to identify them and checking them off in the book.
Then we had horrible pizza & chips for lunch. (*note to self: next year... pack a lunch.*)
Next up were the lorikeets. For a dollar, they give you a cup of juice that the birds are crazy for and they climb all over you. I don't care for birds climbing on me but one really liked me and landed on me twice even though I didn't have any juice. Lily loves them.
And as you can see... they love her too. I worried about her getting pooped on, but thankfully she didn't. Everyone around was taking pictures of her and she thought it was the funniest thing.
After a round of purell and a real soap & water handwash, we got ice cream
The whole day we stopped and sketched out the things we'd seen. Here is Lily drawing the millipede in the Bug Zoo.
And sketching the humming birds

She was really cute with the sketching. She made sure to get all the colors right. She'd see a bird that had a black spot on his eye, or a red feather on the tail or whatever and make sure to put that in her picture. Then she'd tuck her notepad under her arm and move on like some little scientist or something. It was very sweet. I'm holding the memories of this day very close to my heart.