You know Mother’s Day is going well when, halfway to church—which you’re only ten minutes late for, so far—the five year old looks over at the baby in the carseat next to her and asks: What about his pants?

(thinking… thinking…)

(He has pants. I swear he has pants.)

(Doesn’t he?)

(I laid them out the night before! I put the shirt on him, I remember the shirt, I… don’t remember the pants.)

(Dane would have noticed if the baby had no pants when buckling him in, anyway. Ergo, the baby must be wearing pants!)

(Oh crap we do not even have time to go back home we will have to skip church which is not a big deal except the kids will be thrown off by the change of plans and I don’t want to skip church but it’s too cold to be pantsless how could we forget pants?!)

So I asked, with understandable trepidation: What about his pants?

Oh, she said. They’re blue.