Saskatoon Mother’s Day staple returns at Saskatoon Inn

Mother’s Day in Saskatoon was looking a lot like it used to Sunday.

After a couple of subdued years of celebration due to COVID-19, crowds returned to the Saskatoon Inn for its 30th annual Mother’s Day brunch.

Director of operations Kelly McGinn said it was a special occasion after two years without the brunch.

“It's absolutely wonderful to see all the happy faces coming through, all the moms stopping in to tell us how great the brunch was and how much they enjoyed it, and I think it's just really nice to get together with your family and friends again,” McGinn said.

The hotel limited reservations to roughly 1,100 people as opposed to the usual 3,000 people. McGinn said roughly three months of planning goes into the day to make it as perfect as possible for everyone involved.

Being such a well-established tradition in Saskatoon, staff are used to fielding calls looking for a reservation for the Mother’s Day brunch weeks in advance.

At Quinn and Kim’s Flowers, more than a dozen staff were busy trimming flowers and preparing arrangements to be either shipped out the door for deliveries or be picked up for the last-minute walk-in shoppers.

“Flowers became more of a conduit or an avenue to try and connect with Mom,” Brown said of the past two Mother’s Days with pandemic-related restrictions.

“So we kind of know what we're in for with Mother's Day. And it's busy and we don't sleep a lot the days leading up to (it).”

With Mother’s Day being the busiest holiday on the calendar for Brown, he was happy to see a frantic week of work slowly wind down Sunday afternoon.

“It’s heavy. It comes in spurts, so we might have a little quiet spell and all of a sudden five or six people will show up at once,” Brown said.

Both McGinn and Brown are ready to chip away at some of the sleep debt they've built up since the start of the month.

“Things really quiet down after Mother's Day. So we'll find some time here and there to grab some shut-eye,” Brown said with a laugh.