How's this for an ego boost?

Bryce, who is in kindergarten, came home from school yesterday and proudly handed me this masterpiece:

I took it from him and hugged him, praised his stick figures and attempts at lower-case, but inside I was alternately giggling and seething. First of all, I'm assuming that this is what the kids made their moms for Mother's Day, and if so, why does the teacher want to focus on why moms are pretty. I mean, we are pretty, but we're so much more than pretty.  Why not ask the kids to draw a picture of when their moms are the smartest or the kindest or the most fun. It just seems sort of shallow to focus on when they're the prettiest.

While I'm ranting, you've got to know that I am not prettiest when I'm driving to the store, especially not when I'm going to Wal-Mart, which is where he shows me driving in the picture. Going to Wal-Mart I'll usually wear a dirty shirt, cutoffs and flip-flops, just to fit in with the rest of the riffraff there. In fact, that's exactly what I wore this morning when I went to Target-- and I had wet hair and let Isaac wipe his chocolate frosting covered hands (yes, it was only 8:30am) all over me when he got sick of sitting in the cart.

And c'mon Bryce, driving to the store? That's so ..... mundane. Don't you think I'm prettier when I'm getting to go on a hot date with your dad, or reading a book or going for a run? If he had written that I was prettiest when I was running, I would have been thrilled and kept this little piece of paper for posterity, even though I'm sure that the picture would have shown me with saggy boobs and a jelly roll around the middle.

So my question is this, on Mother's Day, do we hug our kids and praise them and content ourselves with "it's the thought that counts" or do we try to get them to see their moms as women who do more than look pretty when they take them to the store?

--originally published 5/11/06