not my style

Valentine's Day means preschool parties. Little paper bags hung outside the classroom waiting to be filled with valentines. Sticky fingers, red-stained tongues and the type of tantrums that only follow a sugar-high crash.
Last year I bought little valentine cards only to discover that other mom's bought valentines that had tattoos or stickers or pencils. And suddenly my valentine looked cheap. So this year I was determined to do better. I bought a fun candy pack, bags of skittles that came with valentine label stickers. And I remembered to buy cards for the teachers too. I was so proud of myself. Until I watched the other moms. They stood out in the hallway helping their four-year olds find the valentine bag of each and every one of their fourteen classmates. "Let's see...Amy is next. What letter does Amy start with? It starts with A. Do you see an A somewhere?"
They handed gift bags to the teachers. And I'm not talking about little bags that might hold a candy bar. These bags were big enough to contain a 9x13 casserole. They brought whistles and play-doh and bags of candy. They dressed their kids in red.
Meanwhile, I didn't even bother to have Jem try and find his classmates bags. I just sent him into the classroom while I dropped my tiny bag of skittles into each child's bag. I put the teacher's cards into their bags and dropped in two extra packets of skittles that were left over to ease my feelings of inferiority. Truett had some red on his shirt but that was just a coincidence.
My mom would tell me to cut myself some slack. I have two preschoolers and a new baby. But the truth is, I'm not too busy to make homemade valentines cards or put together small favor bags filled with candy and bubbles. I would just never even think that it was necessary. And most of the time I'm perfectly content with not being one of those moms. But every once in a while I feel inferior. Like maybe there is something missing in my mothering make-up because I don't spend weeks planning birthday parties. Or because I'm more than happy to sign up to bring napkins to the class halloween party instead of a snack. I'm just not that kind of mom and I'm convinced that half of those other moms aren't really that type of mom either. They would much rather be bringing napkins but they too feel inferior thanks to that one mom who is wired to be a gift-giver and is just dying for any excuse to pull out her new hot glue gun.
I wish we could just all agree to ease up on ourselves and on each other. Until then, it helps me to know that my worth isn't found in my role as a mom but rather in being a daughter of the King. It also helps that the boys brought home chocolate from school today. Yum, happy endorphins.