Someone Asks Moms "What Do You Actually Want For Mother's Day" And 30 Deliver Honest Responses

Bored Panda was interested to find out what any mom's family members can do to make Mother's Day extra special. Blogger Samantha told us what moms appreciate the most on this day. (We hope you're all taking notes!)

"Speaking for myself at least and hearing from other moms I've talked to on the topic of Mother's Day, we really just want to be shown appreciation for all we do and are," she opened up to us.

"Hand-made cards from my kids and coupons to help me with chores are at least as welcome as store-bought gifts," Samantha said.

"My husband has helped the kids make me breakfast in bed, and that was thoughtful and adorable. Bonus points if Mom doesn't have to clean up her own breakfast in bed!"

We all know that we should show our moms how much we appreciate and care about them throughout the year, not just on a single day once a year. However, we all sometimes need gentle reminders... as well as creative ideas on how to show our love. Samantha shared a few spot-on thoughts on how everyone can do this.

"Words and hugs go a long way for me towards showing appreciation," the founder of the Walking Outside in Slippers blog told Bored Panda.

"Hearing 'I love you' from my kids never loses its luster. That said, I always welcome kids doing their chores without whining and complaining," she said.

"And spouses or partners showing gratitude and appreciation is so important as well."

The fact remains that moms and working women still aren’t as respected as they should be. Unfortunately, there is an unwritten expectation, even in the West, that women will tackle the majority of the housework and even the chores in the office. CNN recently reported on how wives who earn as much as their husbands or more still end up spending far more time on housework and childcare.

“Even as financial contributions have become more equal in marriages, the way couples divide their time between paid work and home life remains unbalanced,” the Pew Research Center, which conducted the study, pointed out. Researchers found that in 29% of heterosexual marriages, women and men earn around the same amount of money, roughly $60,000 per year.

“Husbands in egalitarian marriages spend about 3.5 hours more per week on leisure activities than wives do. Wives in these marriages spend roughly 2 hours more per week on caregiving than husbands do and about 2.5 hours more on housework.”

According to the researchers, the only marriages where the husbands spend as much time on housework as their wives is when the latter are the sole breadwinners in the family. Of course, women are earning more than half a century ago when the husbands were the primary breadwinners in 86% of marriages. However, there’s still a long way to go until there’s equity not just in terms of wages, but also in unpaid housework.

We can get so used to our local celebrations that we can completely forget that the rest of the world might do things differently. Some countries like Hungary, Lithuania, Romania, Portugal, and Spain celebrate Mother’s Day on the first Sunday of May. (That falls on May 7 in 2023, so you’d better be getting ready!)

However, the vast majority of the world marks the celebration on the second Sunday of May (i.e. May 14 this year and May 12 in 2024), from Australia, Belgium, and Brazil to Canada, Peru, and the United States.

Some nations like the United Kingdom and Nigeria, however, celebrate Mother’s Day a bit earlier, on the fourth Sunday in Lent, known as Mothering Sunday (which fell on March 19 this year).

Other outliers include Norway which celebrates moms and motherhood on the second Sunday of February (which fell on the 12th in 2023). Countries like Albania, Armenia, and Bulgaria combine Mother’s Day with International Women’s Day, March 8. Meanwhile, Poland celebrates Mother’s Day on May 26, Thailand does it on August 12, and Indonesia does so late in the year, on December 22.