Some of the pots of flowers I planted each year at our old house.
This is the first year I didn’t send flowers to my mom for May Day. It was a touching tradition that began when I was in first grade at Emerson School a block away from our house in Snohomish, Wash. Mom died earlier this year, so May Day brought fond memories, but also regret that I wasn’t ordering a bouquet with a card that said “Happy May Day, from ???”
Mrs. Iverson, my first grade teacher, had us make construction paper baskets and color them. She’d staple on the handles before the bell rang. On our walk home, the neighborhood kids would pick wild flowers or flowers from yards to fill our little May Day baskets.
When we got home, or stop at a neighbor’s house that we’d want to “May Day,” we’d hang the basket of flowers on their doorknob, ring the bell, run for it and hide. We’d watch behind a fence or bush at the surprised mom or lucky neighbor.
I wrote about that tradition HERE.
When I left for college, I always sent Mom a card for May Day. Later on when we could afford it, I ordered flowers.
“I got the most beautiful bouquet of flowers,” Mom would call and say. “Thank you!”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. It wasn’t me,” I’d answer.
“I wonder who it was?” she’d reply.
When my kids were little, I showed them how to make the baskets and they’d fill them with flowers from our yard. They loved to hang them on our door knob, knock on the door and hide. After they left for college and moved on with their lives, my husband picked up the slack.
Monday was May Day and he got busy with work and forgot — in spite of my daughter texting him the night before to make sure I got flowers. He left a few minutes ago for a mysterious errand, so we shall see.
I do have one special friend who remembered. She sent me a Happy May Day text.
Did you celebrate May Day as a child?
What are family traditions that you’d like to keep alive? What ones have faded away?
.
P.S.. I heard the doorbell ring. Couldn’t find anything. Hubby was inside peering out the window. “Maybe it was UPS?” Later found this inside the house.
