A few days ago, I stepped out the back door to find John, our seven-year-old, and Joey, five-years-old, working away at my flower pots. These pots are old wine barrels cut in half. We have two right outside the kitchen door. The dogs have taken over the barrels, sleeping there, so I no longer bother to keep flowers in them.
“What are you boys up to?” I asked red-haired John, and blond, curly-haired Joey, watching them take dirt from one pot to add to the other pot.
“We’re making you soup,” the boys said in union, grins on their dirty, little faces.
“Soup, huh? What kind of soup?”
“Don’t know yet,” said John.
“For dinner,” said Joey.
I was in the middle of making dinner myself, and though, I could see a mess brewing, I decided at least the boys were playing by the door where I could easily keep an eye on them.
For nearly an hour, the boys labored there at the pots. Sometimes I would see them race across the yard coming back with weeds and such, but for the most part, they worked beside the back door.
When I was nearly done with supper, I decided I needed to get the boys cleaned up before sitting them at the table with the rest of our crew. When I looked out the kitchen window, here came John with the dog pan. As I stepped out the door, he poured the contents of the large pan into the pot. It was now brimming with mud, water, weeds, and so many of my spring flowers that I wanted to scream. Many times I have told the boys, “No picking flowers from Mom’s planters.” This year they’d been so good about it. I thought I finally had my sons trained to leave my flowers alone.
Standing beside the pots, I smelled something stinky. I looked around for Garry James, our two-year-old, thinking perhaps he had a poopie diaper.
“It’s done, Mom,” said John proudly, stretching out his hand to present the finished pot.
“We made you dog poop soup!” cried Joey. He too was standing about ten feet tall with their accomplishment.
“For Mother’s Day,” added John, his face sweaty from his endeavors, his blue eyes sparkling with little boy joy. “I used the shovel to put all the dog poop in the pan so I didn’t touch the poop!”
That explained the smell, even though the pot was bursting with my roses, sweet peas, Juniper’s beard and other flowers I love that had been stripped from my planters.
The expectant looks on the boy’s dirt-covered faces forced me to swallow the fierce words on my tongue. Instead, I sweetly said, “I’m getting Daddy. He has to see this.” Smell this right under our dining room window… I was thinking not so sweetly.
“Come look what your boys did,” I told Scott when I found him sitting with Garry watching Dora. “What did they break now?” he asked, shoving aside his school work.
“My flowers,” I said, singing that song in my head, You’re Gonna Miss This. The wistful country tune has become my mantra while raising our six children. Often I remind myself that someday the children will be grown and gone and my flowers will be beautiful in the flower beds instead of clenched in the grubby, little fists of one of my boys and presented to me in a wad of petals.
I followed Scott to the back door and watched his face as the smell hit him.
“What did you boys do?” Scott asked calmly. Scott is always calm, at least on the outside. Years ago, this made him a good pilot. Today it makes him a good high school teacher. And a really good daddy.
“We made dog poop soup for Mom!” Joey’s grin can light up the planet.
“I see you used a bunch of Mom’s flowers.” Scott looked at me. He knows picking my flowers is a perfect way to unleash my wrath.
I smiled at him. “It’s my Mother’s Day present.”
“Well, Happy Mother’s Day, babe.” He turned back to the boys. “So whose idea was it to add the dog poop?”
“Joey’s,” John announced.
Joey could not have looked more proud of his ingenuity.
“Of course it was Joey’s idea,” said Scott.
“We wanted it to smell for Mom,” John explained.
“And it is going to smell wonderful while we eat supper right beside this window.” I patted the boys’ sweaty heads before returning to the kitchen to put dinner on the table.
“You boys go wash up,” said Scott as he stepped inside the door and promptly closed the window.
Scott came over to help me put the food on the table. “Should they be in trouble?” he asked with a smile.
“How can I be mad at them? They made me dog poop soup for Mother’s Day.”

Prayers for patience and joy with your children this Mother’s Day 🙂 Happy Mother’s Day!