Turns out my toddler son and baby daughter are rubbish at getting mother’s day gifts.

They had plenty of time to plan it, but somehow they still managed to balls it up.

To be honest I can understand the difficulties of present buying. If, for example, you’ve been with your partner for several years, is a card enough on valentines day? Should you get them chocolates? Flowers? A romantic diner? What’s appropriate? Gift etiquette is a confusing minefield.

My son and daughter really should have known better on mother’s day though.

They could have asked me to get something when I went to the shop for ketchup the day before. My son even came with me but he was too busy trying to break the portable bar code reader to get his Mum a thoughtful gift. Maybe he forgot about it, despite the huge mother’s day banners in the super market. Or maybe he decided that the card with the splodgey foot print butterfly on it that he and his daddy had made would be enough. What ever the case, we left with nothing for poor, long suffering Mum.

We even forgot the ketchup.

Maybe my son and daughter started to seriously doubt their decision not to get their Mum anything when, on mother’s day morning, their Mum gave their Grandma not one, but two bunches of flowers, a card, a box of chocolates and a bottle of bubbly. Perhaps at that moment they really started sweating. They didn’t seem worried at all though. They seemed entirely relaxed about it.

In the end Daddy had to step in and save the day. Late mother’s day afternoon he panicked a little and excused him self on the flimsy pretext of going to the shop for ketchup. He got some panic chocolates, panic flowers, panic magazines, and put it all in a nice panic gift bag, along with a bottle of ketchup with a panic bow on it.

I think I saved my children’s skins. Just. But they really need to work on their gift buying skills for next year.