In a really good way.
I got up before the guys and on my way to take a shower started rereading a book. Next thing I know, it was 20 minutes later, Houdini was up and looking for me and we went downstairs to open my cards and presents. Houdini had picked out my presents all by himself: a really cute pair of socks and a matching fridge note pad(!!) to go with it. He was so terrifically excited that I was so excited.
A longish shower, a book reading, and two phone calls (to my own mom and my sister) later, we were on our way to breakfast, after which we headed to the B* Farmers' Market (which is really a local weekly outdoor, not very upscale flea and indoor weird/useless/cheap crap market. It's really fun, done once or twice a year.) I actually scored six books--two for my various collections, and four just for fun--for myself and a few preschool/pre-K workbooks for Houdini at a really cheap price. Oh, and a 250 faux leather, zippered CD holder pouch, so I can put all the CD mixes I've received or made over the years in one place and clean up some of the frantic mess in my car and trunk.
Houdini then demanded pizza for lunch and clarified by asking for outside pizza, not home pizza, and we were happy to oblige. Back home, he suddenly remembered what I suspect had been some repeated coaching on Lemel's part from probably yesterday: he ran up to me and yelled, "Happy Mother's Day, Mommy" and gave me a huge hug. My reaction--claps and tears and thank yous and awws and I love yous, all running into one big mushy outburst--again made him terrifically excited and happy and he literally danced around us.
After that, I had to do about 45 minutes worth of work in preparation for a meeting tomorrow (boo), while the guys retired upstairs with afternoon drinks (milk for one, Gatorade for the other) and took naps. I finished my work, and headed over to my parents, where my sister and niece showed up half an hour later. (Lemel and Houdini skipped the festivities, because of Houdini's contagious eye gook situation; my parents had eye surgery earlier this year and we're definitely not risking any kind of infection for them.) We had a good time, with the exception of a not quite disagreement that I think I'll write about later, seeing how it is heavily parenting related.
After dinner , I came home to find dinner was [successfully] over. General vegging was enjoyed by all until bath and bedtime and here we are.
This is my fourth Mother's Day since Houdini was born--he was 5 weeks old at the time of the first one. I don't remember much, if any, of the previous ones, seeing as how I was still under the dark cloud back then. This was exactly what I wished for and felt was totally out of my reach, ever, back then--a normal, not spectacular, run-of-the-mill (as experienced by 95% of the parenting world I knew of) type of day which is the best kind of day in our book.
