In my experience, Mother's Day is much like the person it is named after. It demands no day off, as it always falls on a Sunday, it demands no parades or fanfare, no lavish decorations or special songs, no particular symbols or traditions, no costumes, and no fictional characters that bring gifts and goodies while you're not looking.
Most Mother's I know wouldn't want all the razzmatazz that other holidays get anyways, but I don't know if that makes it easier or harder to come up with a way to make the day special. I have never been that good at being sentimental, and I don't suppose I'm getting any better, but so far I've managed to stay on this side of offending anyone, so at least I still get fed.
My Mother loves her grandchildren, and so our gift to her was to let her babysit Emma for a whole day while Tammy and I went down to the temple (if you think that's a weak gift, you should see what I got her when I was still living at home). The day we went was Tammy's 6th anniversary of going through the temple for the first time. I wish I could claim credit for the timing, but it was a ward temple trip, so the credit goes to the Bishopric. I also wish I could have gone through a session with her, but I was working in the baptistry with the youth, so we were separated until meeting in the cafeteria. Tammy ended up running into her Aunt and Uncle who were going through the same session as her, so I ended up not feeling quite so bad about her being alone. After the long bus ride back to the church, we picked up Emma, and some flowers, and finally called it a day.
We called the next day "Mother's Day" right from the beginning, as celebrations were going to start early. I woke up with plans to make some breakfast in bed for my wife, but found that she had already been up for an hour with Emma, who had woken up extra early to surprise her Mom. They had already eaten, and it was time to get ready for church, so morning celebrations were put on hold. Afternoon celebrations didn't really happen either. My plan was to let Tammy nap as long as she wanted while Emma and I made her Mother's day cards, but they both ended up sleeping until 5pm, when I woke them up to go to my parents for dinner. Emma and I managed to sneak in our card making time while Tammy got ready to go, so all wasn't lost. We ate a delicious lasagna feast at my parents house with the whole family in attendance, and that rounded out the weekend for us.
Not a lot of fanfare, but at least we're approaching sentimental.
On a side note, I was a little choked about the breakfast in bed thing, so Emma and I put together a "complete breakfast", as shown on cereal commercials, and surprised Tammy with it this morning. Happy Mother's Day Reloaded!!
