Stop! Step away from the petrol station! That last-in-the-bucket bouquet and hastily lunch hour-bought bubble bath will not cut it this Mother’s Day. If you want to show a mum REAL thought, give her back a little of the simple luxuries she enjoyed pre-kids, and best of all, it doesn’t cost much money at all. It’s true, the best things in life are free – except drugs, they’re quite expensive – so here are eight (almost free) gift ideas guaranteed to be met with gratitude by the old girl…

A mammoth lie-in
We’re not talking some piddly, pathetic 30 minutes of extra kip here (meaning she’s still up before Bill Turnbull on BBC Breakfast), we’re proposing the sleep-like-a-teen kind of comatose slumber. Let Mum roll out of bed at noon, grunt as she troughs a bowl of Cheerios and when she slumps back to her pit and the smell of reefer wafts down the stairs, rest assured, her Mother’s Day is off to a flying start.

The remote control
When she emerges later, treading heavily on empty packets of Monster Munch, Mum will probably be in the mood for some TV. Today there will be no Cbeebies or anything involving a pitch, track, court or Gabby Logan. Once the zombied channel-hopping subsides, she will most likely settle on the sort of trash that requires little or no exertion – we’re talking Keeping Up with the Kardashians, Dinner Date, Come Dine with Me and pretty much anything that involves competitive cooking in a cul-de-sac. Satisfied she is happy and not likely to choke on her own vomit, everyone may now wordlessly leave the room.

A poo in peace
When you’re a mother of small children a trip to the lavatory is rarely alone and if it is, your backside has barely touched the toilet seat before a pair of pudgy hands are hammering on the door demanding the retrieval of a toy from a grabby baby sister. So when Mum eventually moves from her very comfortable, catatonic position in front of the telly to attend to the call of nature, allow her, on her day of worship, a leisurely pee or poo in complete solitude and silence.  And if she feels the need to let rip a fart that resounds loudly around the toilet bowl, NO ONE IS TO JUDGE OR LAUGH.

A long, leg-shaving shower
Next on the agenda is a lovely, unhurried, hot shower. Today, she will not be using the lather of her shampoo to hastily wash the rest of her bits – she will cleanse her hair twice, condition, exfoliate and shave the unsightly forestry growing where it is not wanted. Yes, those hairy legs have served very well as contraceptive, but after a horribly embarrassing experience involving a dressing gown malfunction which left both her and the postman scarred for life, it’s time to de-fuzz. It might take several shaves – and a Flymo even – before all that hair is gone so give her a good hour.

Hot UNINTERRUPTED meals, cooked by someone else, served to her FIRST
So what if her idea of cooking is violently stabbing a film lid and resentfully opening a can of beans? She’s still the main provider of stuff vaguely edible, and deserves a day off from slaving over a hot microwave. Let her dine without cutting anyone else’s food, hiding vegetables inside chips or bobbing up and down for the correct colour of toddler spoon. In fact, no one is to touch their own food until she has finished, and signalled her last mouthful of fish fingers, chips and beans with a gentle dab at each corner of her mouth with a piece of (unused) kitchen towel.

Adult conversation all about HER
After letting her digest her fish finger supper, invite Mum to retire to the living room. Then, as she reclines like a less graceful, more cumbersome, Botticelli on the sofa, indulge her in some adult conversation. Not the saucy kind – the sort of intelligent repartee that doesn’t involve impressions of elephants or a billion questions (“Why is that tree there?”; “But who put that tree there?”; “What man put that tree there?”) Laugh heartily at her jokes, ask insightful questions and listen attentively when she wistfully regales you, for the seventeenth time, with the story about how she once got off with someone who was quite famous in the late 1990s.

A vat of wine and a straw
With her earlier buzz gone, Mum will now need a new high. Empty several bottles of wine (the good stuff, none of your cheap plonk), in a big pot and hand her a straw. Stick on a rom com – something about a career woman who moves to a rural town, upsets the locals with her big city fancy ways, before falling in love with one of them who she previously hated. Now look at her knackered, little face – she really does believe Reese Witherspoon is her…

Folded pieces of coloured card with bits of pasta/ tissue paper/ bog roll glued on
Get ready to barf – here comes the sort of schmaltz that keeps Richard Curtis in business. You can keep your mind-altering drugs and booze, because there is no high like a small chunky fist proudly brandishing a homemade card with ‘Mummy’ in scrawly, forced letters. When it’s time to scoop Mum back up to bed, red wine splattered all over her greying nightie and the credits rolling to She Was All That And Now She’s Not, you will see clutched tightly in her own chunky fist, a folded piece of coloured card with some bog roll stuck to it. Happy, happy days…

 

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