Happy Mother's Day to Me

This is my third Mother's day.

Technically it's my fourth since I spent one with Elizabeth hanging out inside me while my husband underwent the extreme sacrifice of cooking me pancakes (he was forced to handle eggs! eeeeeeeeeee!) in honor of the day.

Third, or fourth, whatever, I actually look at Elizabeth's birthday as the day I became a mother. My momiversary so to speak. But I still like the Hallmark holiday version since it stops all the men and children out there and forces them to think about what we went through to become their mothers, whether it was labor pains or a pile of hellish paperwork. It also forces them to attempt to put their appreciation into words in the form of a card, flowers, edible goodies and random other booty. You have to love that.

Of course during all this contemplation of motherhood and What it Means to Me, I spend time thinking of my four moms. Yep, four. I've got a birth mother, a foster mother, who knew me for less than three months but loved me like her own, my real mom, and an awesome mom-in-law. They've all helped make me who I am, and since I'm pretty happy with how I turned out, I'm thankful for all of them.

I also spend a lot of time thinking about the sweet little girls who made me a mom. Even when I'm tired and feeling pulled and pushed in all directions (frequently literally), or even feeling really annoyed by them, I love every second I'm with them. And I love every part of them from Elizabeth's unruly curls down to Lilli's funny looking big toe. I have a hard time, now that they're so big, wrapping my mind around the fact that they came out of me, and that Elizabeth's foot was once the length of my pinkie and Lilli's foot was once the length of my ring finger. And now they're so big and fun and chatty and so gosh darn CUTE, and I'm just more grateful for them than I can say.

Happy Mother's Day everyone.