Your mama may be so short that she can hang-glide on a Dorito, but hey, you love her anyway, right? Here are 14 Mother’s Day events in Seattle to show her you care. Take her to a drag show. Make her look at some flowers. Feed her some sliced meat. Shove her in a glass pod and serve her some salmon while she floats through the sky. You know, stuff moms like.
SATURDAY, APRIL 30
Annual Mother's Day Craft Fair
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Bellevue’s Theatre33 is holding a craft day for Mother’s Day, which sounds kind of awesome after a bit of digging—the theater seems to have an East Slavic bent, with many productions performed in the Russian language and lots of Ukrainian names on the staff. They’ll have a mom-themed market with unique handcrafted gifts for sale, like candles, carved wooden artworks, soaps, crocheted items, plants, and books, as well as baked goods; the funds raised will help the theater buy costumes for upcoming youth productions. Here’s hoping someone’s selling rummy-hazelnutty Kyiv cake!
(Theatre33, Bellevue, free)
THROUGH APRIL 30
Natasha Marin: Motherland
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On display through April 30, conceptual artist Natasha “Tashi” Marin’s installation at Vermillion features the third in a series of “mothers” she’s created, comprising 15 textile pieces of African Ankara, kente, and tribal cloth that highlight the breadth and diversity of African textiles. The name is a nod to psychologist Harry Harlow’s Wire Mother experiments on rhesus monkeys in the 1930s, wherein he substituted the babies’ mothers with wire or cloth dolls. Instead, Marin has built three mothers to honor her ancestors: a plant mother from plants she nurtured during the pandemic, a lamp-headed mother named Russum made of Black joy (from Marin’s 2018 Black Imagination: Ritual Objects exhibition), and the colorful cloth mother that’s the focus of this exhibit. This seems like a major improvement upon Harlow’s concept, in our opinion.
(Vermillion, Capitol Hill, free)
SUNDAY, MAY 1
Mother's Day Maker's Market
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Bale Breaker & Yonder Cider Taproom in Lower Ballard (is that a real name? Er, term? We just made it up, but uh, y’know, like Lower Queen Anne) will be supporting women-owned small businesses with their Mother’s Day Makers Market. Among the featured vendors are Nightshade Botanicals, a purveyor of weird and fascinating houseplants, and Firefly Kitchens, which makes very good naturally wild-fermented kimchi and sauerkraut. If there’s one thing that moms love more than flowers, it’s…
(Bale Breaker & Yonder Taproom, Ballard, free)
MAY 4–8
Portrait of an Artist's Mother
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First Hill’s Museum of Museums, whose very initials spell MoM, asked a simple task of contributors last month: Draw or paint a picture of your mom. All portraits in the show are either 5”x7” or 8”x10”, so they’re relatively petite, and the results are pretty weird and wonderful. Opening night is May 4 at MoM in the Kitchen, which was originally the kitchen of a midcentury medical building, and the show ends in the same place just a few days later on May 8–with a Mother’s Day closing reception, replete with mimosas. Midcentury medical mimosas for mommy.
(Museum of Museums, First Hill, $0–$10)
MAY 6–7
Dining on Seattle Great Wheel by Fisherman's Restaurant
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Laugh if you want, but this sounds fun as hell. Stuff your mom into one of the giant waterfront Ferris (er, non-Ferris) wheel’s glass “gondolas,” it having been equipped with a dining table, and feed her a seafood dinner from the ultra-touristy Fisherman’s Restaurant, which is in that weird Gold Rush-themed pier-mall down the street with the carousel inside. While she gazes upon the sweeping expanse of Elliott Bay. This event happens most weekends, not just Mother’s Day, and it’s so cheesy that it’s genius. This wouldn’t work if it were any other restaurant, by the way; it has to be the Fisherman’s.
(Fisherman's Restaurant and Lounge, Seattle Waterfront, $152.50)
SATURDAY, MAY 7
Mom's Market Day
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You know what moms love? Flowers. Ask every marketing department for any product in history. It’s flowers that your mother’s soul demands, so bring her to Pike Place Market, our nation’s ground zero for flowers, where “all 9 acres will play host to an unforgettable afternoon.” Sounds foreboding, but they’re just talking about live music, scavenger hunts, kids’ activities, and more. And if Pike Place weren’t saturated in flowers to begin with, it just so happens to coincide with the 14th Annual Flower Festival
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, with more than 40 different tents selling blooms. Oh, my god, it’s almost like someone planned it this way. You can also get a complimentary fake “MOM” tattoo. Nice touch.
(Pike Place Market, free)
Mother's Day Charcuterie Workshop
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Dunno about y’all, but our moms crave meat almost as insatiably as they crave flowers. If this describes your mom as well, good news: snack-platter shop Urban Whey is holding a charcuterie workshop at their storefront in Mill Creek. A ticket includes an 11-inch round wooden board, all the ingredients to go on it, a lesson on how to do the thing, and a glass of wine or non-alcoholic beverage. It’s like they say: Buy your mom a charcuterie board and she’ll eat for a day, but teach her how to make a charcuterie board, and she’ll transform every hunk of sausage she sees into meat roses… for a lifetime.
(Urban Whey, Mill Creek, $85)
Pre-Mother’s Day Jam – Momma’s Night Out with DeChelle Monet and SoundProof
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Seattle-based singer/songwriter DeChelle Monet and band SoundProof are announcing their triumphant return to the performing life on Saturday, after a two-year hiatus, and they’ll have special guests Ashanti Proctor and Lady J on hand to help them celebrate. They’re sending out a signal to all the city’s bad mamma jammas, asking them to join them at Columbia City’s resplendent Royal Room to sing along. Is that you? Or your mom? If you know any, tell them to get in the car, ’cause you’re all going bad mamma-jamming.
(The Royal Room, Columbia City, $15)
MAY 7–8
BonsaiFest!
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Okay, so everybody knows trees, right? They’re great. But what if they were smaller? Like really small, and you could carry them around in your purse like a chihuahua? Well. Not only did someone helpfully invent this for you about a thousand years ago, but there’s also an entire museum in Federal Way devoted to them, AND they’re having a whole festival ABOUT portable handbag trees. Over Mother's Day weekend, the Pacific Bonsai Museum will host live bonsai care demonstrations, docent-led tours of the bonsai collection, booths selling bonsais, a poet who will write you a poem about your mom (or… bonsais?), and bonsai-themed kids’ activities. Also, 314 Pie will be selling sweet and savory hand pies, which are the bonsais of pies.
(Pacific Bonsai Museum, Federal Way, free)
Mother's Day at Rhododendron Species Botanical Garden
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Y’all, DID YOU KNOW that the rhododendron is our state flower?? If you’re new to Washington State, well, ya better learn it. (It is also West Virginia’s state flower, but ours is the PACIFIC rhododendron and theirs is just regular.) Anyway, there's a whole garden full of these suckers that happens to be in Federal Way, and it’s peak bloom time right now, so you and Mama are invited to look at them, explore the garden’s 13 different botanical features, have a bring-your-own-food picnic on the patio, and snap a photo at its rhododendron-themed selfie station. Don’t touch the rhodies, though. They’re kinda sticky.
(Rhododendron Species Botanical Garden, Federal Way, $8)
SUNDAY, MAY 8
Bitches Love Brunch
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We’re not saying your mom’s a bitch, but we bet she'll loves this brunch. (Correlation doesn’t equal causation, after all.) Chef Kristi Brown of Communion, who co-owns literally one of the best restaurants in the entire world, will be cameoing at The 101 in the CD, where your ticket will include brunch by Kristi, appetizers by other celebrated femme chefs, a live show by a selection of killer local performers, and an intergenerational discussion panel of femmes who’ll be talking about motherhood, bodies, and sex. Femme- and BIPOC-owned vendors will be on site to sell their goods as well. The whole thing is a benefit for H.O.P.E. Center Resources and the South Seattle Youth Care location. If you haven’t made it out to Communion yet, this event will be a joyous and very memorable introduction to Chef Kristi’s incredible food—and it’s all for a great cause to boot.
(The 101, Pioneer Square, $50-$250)
Dance Like a Mother
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OmCulture Wallingford will provide a “sacred healing space” for mothers and a denomination-neutral service that involves dance, yoga, live music, a portion for attendees to tell their stories, and an extended savasana pose finale and the option for massage. Bring your mask, vax card, ID, and yoga mat. The event’s tagline is “Like church, for your body,” which begs the question: what is church for if it’s not for your body? What if you went to church without your body? And it were just a bunch of heads on skateboards? That would be crazy.
(OmCulture, Wallingford, $50)
Mother's Day Floral Design Workshop
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At this “guided DIY” floral design workshop at Wanderlush Boutique on Lake Union, you and your mom will learn how to arrange flowers and also about their natural healing powers, either real or imagined, all while sipping wine and/or mimosas. That last part is probably not required. The event will be led by a master florist and is hosted by Serenity Valley Healing—there’s not much info available on this organization, but we're pretty sure Serenity Valley isn’t a real place (wouldn't that be nice though?).
(Wanderlush Seattle, Westlake, $45)
Runway Drag Brunch with Ladie Chablis
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Ladie Chablis is a goddamn legend in this town. After emceeing Lashes, the weekly drag cabaret at R Place (RIP), for 17 years!!, she’s now holding down the Sunday brunch slot at Taqueria Cantina in Belltown every weekend, always with a dazzling lineup of guests, and you gotta go. Not throwing any shade at Le Faux at Julia’s—also a local institution—but if your mom likes drag brunch, this is the one. The cocktails look great at this spot as well. They will put an entire paleta—that’s a frooty Mexican popsicle—IN your margarita like it’s a freaking swizzle stick. No idea if the tacos are any good, but with queens and frozen margs, does it matter?
(Taqueria Cantina, Downtown, $7)
MORE MOTHER'S DAY EVENTS
Mamma Mia!
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May 6–11, Central Cinema, Central District, $12
Seattle Rock Orchestra Performs The Beatles: Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band
Past Event
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May 7–8, Moore Theatre, Belltown, $32.50–$42.50
Dirty Jokes with Cheri Hardman: Mom's Night Out Edition
Past Event
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Sun May 8, Super Funny Comedy Club, Tacoma, $15
Mother's Day Improv Comedy Show
Past Event
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Sun May 8, Unexpected Productions' Market Theater, Pike Place Market, $20
Mother's Day Intro to Pole
Past Event
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Sun May 8, Positive Spin Pole Dance Fitness, Greenwood, $50 per pair
Down the Rabbit Hole: a Wonderland Cabaret
Past Event
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Sun May 8 and other dates through Jun 19, Cafe Nordo, Pioneer Square, $95–$105
