Am I the only mother who wonders why Mother's Day is just once a year? The day a woman brings a child into the world she becomes a mother and she's a mother for the rest of her life.

The way I look at it, children who have been given the gift of life should find ways to thank their mothers every day. Unfortunately, the other members of my family don't see it this way - yet.

I've waited for this day for three hundred sixty-four days. If I waited for my family to bring me breakfast in bed, I'd miss half my day. Besides, by getting up I avoid having very brown, toast crumbs in my bed until sheet-changing day.

I don't change sheets on Mother's Day. I don't do laundry or clean bathrooms or scrub the kitchen floor. In fact, I don't eliminate one task from my growing list of need-to-be-dones. Instead, I ask for my gift.

I can't be placated with a store-bought card or won over by a bunch of blooming blossoms or bought off with a box of chocolate calories. For Mother's Day I want a gift of time wrapped in effort.

One year I asked to have walls washed. Another year I wanted my car waxed. Last year I requested the living room furniture be rearranged. Later we moved it back to its original position, but rearranging is cheaper than re-decorating.

Some years I ask for a family outing. Everyone has to come and everyone has to have fun! One year we took a lunch cruise to nowhere on the HMS Queen Mary. Another year we rented a hotel room so we could lounge by the pool. This year I'd like to go to an Angels baseball game without binoculars or oxygen masks.

Of course, every year I want to go out for dinner. In the past my family has made special dinners for me and left me souvenir spots and splatters all over the kitchen, but Mother's Day is one of the few chances I have to go to a slow food restaurant. That's where orders are taken by waiters - not yelled into microphones; and tables are covered with tablecloths - not carved initials.

Yes, I'm looking forward to my one day; but because it's just one day, I think Mother's Day should be celebrated on the first day of November - All Saints' Day.