After school the next day Lena called the kids to her office. "Okay, guys, I have a few meetings that I have to attend this afternoon. So, anyone who wants a ride will need to wait around here. Otherwise you will need to walk home."
The kids looked at each other and realized this would give the perfect time to work on their Mother's Day cards together since Stef would also still be at work. Brandon spoke for the group. "We will all walk home together, Mama. It's no problem."
"Are you sure? You really like the piano here, B. You could have the room to yourself to practice."
"That's okay, Mama. I have a lot of homework tonight and it would be better to just go on home."
"Jude, Baby, I will have some time between meetings to help you with your work. How about you stay here while the others walk home. You could help me pick up pizza on the way home. What do you say?" Lena asked her youngest with a wink.
Jude was feeling kind of bad, but he knew that he really needed to go home with the others. "Can we do that a different day, Mama? Today, I really want to get home."
Lena eyed her children suspiciously. "I suppose all the rest of you would rather just walk home than spend time with your mama?" All the kids looked at the floor in order to not make eye contact with their mother. "Really? I am so bad that Jesus doesn't even want to help pick out food? Fine. You can all go and I will catch up with you at home."
The kids walked out of the office feeling like terrible people. Jude ran back to give Lena a hug and tell her that he loved her, just couldn't stay with her after school. The walk home was rather silent as all of the Foster teenagers still felt really badly. Jude finally broke the silence, "Does it seem a little wrong to you all that we actually hurt Mama's feelings in order to make cards that tell her how much we love her?"
"It will be okay, Buddy." Callie said putting an arm around her brother. "Lena will understand, I think. Mari and I thought it might be fun to have a picnic at the beach on Sunday. What do you guys think?"
Mariana smiled at Callie and linked her arms with her on the other side. The boys agreed that a picnic could be a lot of fun. Callie and Mariana were quickly put in charge of the food. Jude, Jesus, and Brandon volunteered to find towels, blankets, sunscreen, and other beach essentials. They spent the rest of the trip home discussing their picnic plans.
The kids determined that if they worked on their cards in the family room, they would have plenty of space and be able to watch a movie at the same time. The girls grabbed art supplies from all over the house. Jesus put in a movie while Brandon and Jude found snacks.
As in with any good intention, card making starting out well. Everyone was getting along, sharing and enjoying their snacks right up until Jesus reached over Mariana to grab a handful of Goldfish crackers and knocked over her water ruining her card.
"JESUS! You did that on purpose! Look at it! Now, I have to start over!" In her anger she picked up the bag of crackers and dumped them on her brother.
Jesus reacted by throwing handfuls of crackers randomly throughout the room. "It was not on purpose! This is, though!" He stood up smashing crackers with every step. He grabbed Callie's water and dumped it on Mariana.
Jude, who had green paint all over his hands, quickly scooted out of the way of his older siblings. He hit an end table with a lamp. It teetered on the edge, but he was able to catch it. Unfortunately, leaving green handprints on his clothing, the floor, the end table, and the lamp.
Callie, who had some water splash on her and saw what happened to the lamp, got up quickly (also smashing crackers with every step) and rushed over to Jude. She slipped the mixture of crackers, paint and water and fell into the end table as she crashed into Jude.
Brandon tackled Jesus to the floor thinking it would end the fight. Instead, it started a wrestling match between the two of them. They rolled all over the floor knocking over the rest of the water, some paint, ultimately crashing into the other end table.
The loud crashes of the two lamps almost simultaneously breaking was enough to freeze all of the action in the room. Hearing the front door open was enough to invoke panic into all the kids. Mariana ran through the room trying to gather up all of the cards. Most were messes by this time, but she still stacked them together before ultimately throwing them away. Jude ran to wash his hands and try to get the paint off of his clothes. Callie and Jesus tried to hide the pieces of the lamps. Brandon started scooting cracker pieces with his feet to sort of clean the floor some.
Stef watched the futile clean-up efforts of her kids from a distance for a few minutes before clearing her throat. "I see that Mother's Day came a little early this year…. At least that is what I am assuming has destroyed the house. From the looks of things, not only will your mama be expecting something from your little hearts for her, but I will also be taking the herd of you to Ikea on Saturday to buy lamps as a store bought present for me. Luckily for you, Mama says she likes to help you clean up from these types of messes and she will be home in a few minutes. For now, I am going to go upstairs to relax and try not to think about whatever was going on in here."
With that, Stef walked up the stairs. The kids sighed in relief when they heard the door to the master bedroom slam closed. "That could have been worse. Mom's getting soft." Jesus commented. "Are the cards going to be okay, Mari?"
"No… It turns out there is a reason why teachers have elementary aged people make cards, but not high schoolers. Between the water, paint, and general uncraftiness of most members of this family, I just decided to throw them all away. You would understand if you saw them." Mariana looked a bit guilty about throwing out the cards, but in reality by the time they were stacked together all were certainly ruined.
"Now what?" Brandon asked looking at each of his siblings. "We will obviously be going with Mom on Saturday to buy new lamps. Sunday we can still do our beach trip. What else can we do for Lena that can come from our hearts?"
No one spoke for a few minutes as they were lost in thought. "I have an idea…" Callie started of quietly, but gained confidence as she gained the attention of the others. "Lena loves us more than she loves anything else, right? What if I used my camera that I got for my birthday as well as pictures that we have taken with our phones to make a large collage picture that could be hung in here somewhere? We could all work together on it and it would be of the people she loves the most."
"And here I thought that you said last night that you knew nothing about Mother's Day. Today, you come up with both the picnic and the picture idea…" Brandon teased.
"Hey, I helped with the beach idea!" Mariana protested.
Jesus was ready to jump in and argue, but before he could Lena came in the front door. She was smiling until she saw her children and their yet to be cleaned up mess. "Where is your mother?" The Foster kids all looked at the ground silently not wanting to even give Lena eye contact for the second time that afternoon. "She sent me a text a few minutes ago saying that you guys wanted to spend some time with me. I hurried home expecting something different than this mess. So, where is she?"
"Mom's upstairs, but Mama, we are going to clean up ourselves…" "Mom's going to take us to replace the lamps…." "We are so sorry, Mama…" "I was just trying to get out of the way…." Four out of five of the kids spoke up at once. Callie was the only silent one.
"Yes, you will be cleaning this up and I am glad you realize that you all will be replacing the lamps." Lena stopped at smiled a little at the group. "You are not going to clean it up alone, though. I am going to go get your mom to help while I start dinner. May I ask what you all were making before this occurred?"
"You may ask, but you will probably never know." Jesus replied cheekily.
Stef did come back down the stairs to help the kids clean up, but only in a supervisory role. Lena glanced into the family room and watched her kids and her wife. "Cals, you missed a spot over there by the table." Stef called casually from the couch peering over a magazine. "Jesus, make sure you move the end tables some to sweep so that you get all of the glass off the floor."
"I brought you another cup of water, Mom. Is there anything else I can do for you?" Jude asked quietly as he had already finished getting paint off of the floor and end table. He had also helped Lena treat the clothing with paint on it in hopes it was not all ruined.
"Yes, Little Man, there is something else." She said patting the empty space next to her. "You can come sit by me and help me tell the others what to do next…"
Jude gave Stef a shocked expression and took a step back. "I am much smaller than any of them and I value my life… How about if I just help Mama make dinner instead?"
Stef gave him a playful swat to send him toward the kitchen. "Weakling."
"I prefer the term alive, Mom." Jude joked as he walked back to the kitchen.
Lena watched the interaction between the two and smiled. Jude had adjusted so well to living in their home. "Stef, remember that we don't hit our children… at least not the little one, we still like him. He doesn't have a bad attitude like the others yet."