Celebrating Mother's Day can look different from family to family. Although some moms prefer much-needed alone time or pampering, others opt for a family brunch or doing something special with the kids. Still others set aside time to spend with their own mothers and grandmothers.
What it boils down to is: There is no right or wrong way to celebrate the moms in our lives. A TikTok mom named Emily Wehner, however, recently shared her family's Mother's Day rules. And the internet is solidly divided over the approach.
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Emily Wehner posted a TikTok video about her Mother's Day rules in late April.
Emily posted a video on TikTok on April 28 outlining the rules she and her family agreed on for celebrating Mother’s Day. “I will be taking mothers day to do what I want to do,” she declared in the caption.
Thus far, her video has attracted more than 2.4 million views and over 181,000 likes.
In her viral video, she declared, 'It's Mother's Day, not Grandmother's Day.'
“It’s Mother’s Day, not Grandmother’s Day,” Emily began the video, noting that she talked to her mom about this and “she’s fine with it.”
Emily explained: “After my first Mother’s Day, we established these rules because I was pretty sad I had spent the whole Mother’s Day coordinating grandparent visits and I didn’t get to do anything for myself. And I was like, ‘I’m not doing this again.'”
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Emily then shared how she spends Mother's Day.
In the clip, Emily shared that usually, she and her husband talk about Mother’s Day ahead of time and make a plan.
“I like to usually go out to brunch and then we come home and we all garden,” she detailed. “And I like to have some alone time gardening, and then read my book for a little bit and get a pedicure. Then we have like a family dinner. It’s usually just very chill at home.”
They celebrate grandmothers on different days, and they do the same with Father's Day.
“We celebrate my mom and my mother-in-law on different days,” Emily explained. “We do the same things on Father’s Day. My husband gets to choose what he wants to do, and then we see my dad and my father-in-law on different days.”
The TikTok mom continued: “This may ruffle feathers for some people, but that’s what I wanna do. And I made the boundary, and I’m the one deep into the mothering right now. And so I’m gonna take the day how I wanna take the day.”
In the comments, TikTokers were divided.
They didn’t shy away from sharing their reactions to Emily’s Mother’s Day rules. One person strongly disapproved, writing, “Ya selfish women want your husbands to forget about their moms for you, can’t wait until your kids grow up and do the same to you ♀️.”
Another TikTok user shared a different perspective. “I was resentful that we spent time with my husband’s mom on Mothers Day. But now both of our moms are dead — I’m glad we celebrated them when we could. We have to remember we are here bc of THEM.”
Others supported focusing on moms with kids still in the house. One person commented, “Every year my MIL calls with her plans she wants for herself & every year my husband goes ‘thats great, were gonna do whatever my wife wants tho’ .”
“I pack up the husband and kids and send them to MIL’s house for the day and spend the day to myself. 10/10 recommend ,” someone else shared.
Yet another TikTok user pointed out, “It honestly shocks me that more people dont just celebrate mothers day/fathers day as one big family get together and celebrate all the moms/dads in one … theres enough love to go around for everyone!”
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