Crash. Everything froze, except for the plate I saw tumbling from the shelf.

It was my mom’s birthday, and we had all woken up early to make her breakfast in bed. We were all so excited to see the look on her face when she saw the house decorated, and the delicious meal on the table. Quietly, we all woke up at six in the morning on January 14th.

“What should I do?” My sister Jackie asked.

“Me and Allie will do the cooking, if you decorate the house,” I answered, “The streamers are in my bedroom.”

Allie and I walked into the kitchen to begin cooking. We chose to make crepes and an omelette, served with my moms favorite kind of tea: Earl Grey. While my sister was flipping the crepes, I decided to set the table. Making sure not to wake my mother, I carefully walked over to the room we keep the plates.

“Use her favorite plate!” My sister said, “The one with the strawberries!”

I looked all around the cupboard, but still couldn’t find it. Finally, I climbed up on the mini ladder, and spotted the plate. I still wasn’t quite tall enough. I stood on my tippy-toes. Maybe if I could grab the edge, it would slowly slide into my hands. But that wasn’t the case. I grabbed the edge, and the small strawberry plate went crashing towards the floor, seven feet from the ground. I froze. The kitchen went silent, and I was sitting in the room for what felt like twenty minutes. Seconds later, my sisters came running.

I decided that if I hid the plate, no one would know. Quickly, I grabbed the broom and shoved the pieces of broken China under the table.

“Is everything ok?” Allie asked.

Her twin, Jackie suspected something was wrong: “Don’t tell me you broke another one of mom’s favorite plates...”

Being clumsy and very stubborn, I usually break a plate at every big occasion, so my family was used to it. We had a set of six china plates from Italy. Each was homemade, with a different fruit, and we only had the strawberry, blueberry, and apricot left. I had broken the other three.

“Don’t tell mom!” I said, about to start crying, “I broke the plate, what should I do?”
My ten-year-old-self started freaking out, and burst out into tears, because instead of making a delicious breakfast for my mom on her birthday, I had broken one of her favorite plates.
“Maybe hide it, and she won’t notice!” Jackie responded.

Little did we know, my mom had woken up to the sound of the crash, and was watching from the doorway. Allie turned her head, and ran up to my mom.

“Happy birthday mommy!!”

“We made you breakfast!” I added.

“Eggs and toast and crepes and tea,” Jackie said, with a grin.

“Wow, it looks delicious! Is everyone ok?” My mom asked, “I heard a crash.”

“I’m so sorry mommy,” I began, “I broke another plate.”

“Don’t worry! We’ve all gotten used to your obsessive plate breaking, thanks for making me breakfast!”

My mom was very understanding, and taught us all that it was just a thing, and that the nice breakfast was infinitely times better than the plate that I broke.