Special moms

• Sunday night, Donny and Marie Osmond will host a contest-based special recognizing outstanding mothers.

Cathy Higgins

NEW YORK – After all of the flowers have been delivered and the gifts have been given to let Mom know how special she is, Southwest Georgians can wind up their Mother's Day celebration with "Teleflora Presents America's Favorite Mom" on NBC at 7 p.m. Sunday.

Hosted by celebrity siblings Donny and Marie Osmond, the hour-long special will feature 15 outstanding mothers from across the nation.

"The 15 semifinalists were selected from more than 1,5000 online nominations, collected at AmericasFavoriteMom.com," an NBC news release states.

A panel that consisted of heads of several parenting publications narrowed the pool to its current 15.

"Semifinalists were notified when Teleflora personally delivered a specially designed 'America's Favorite Mom bouquet to each of their homes," the release states.

This week the "Today" show went on to feature those finalists in five categories: military moms, working moms, single moms and nonmom moms. Today's final category, chairman of everything moms, concludes the weeklong presentation in which viewers vote for their favorite in each category.

The winner of each category, one of which is single mom Lena Ledford of Atlanta, will then take part in Sunday's special.

"And I think it's going to be a very, very exciting show," Donny Osmond said in a recent telephone interview.

That's because on of those five finalists will be named "America's Favorite Mom."

"The winner is going to receive $250,000 and a Caribbean vacation and makeovers," Marie Osmond said, "and all these kind of fun things that they're going to get, like a GE kitchen."

The winner will also take home a diamond-encrusted pendant and a year's worth of flower arrangements and an all expense-paid trip to the Big Apple.

But the other finalists won't have much to cry about.

"Teleflora will present the four runners-up with $25,000, a gold pendant, a year's worth of Teleflora flower arrangements and a General Electric washer and dryer," the release states.

But Sunday's special will feature more than just a contest to find the nation's top mom.

"The one-hour show will feature an exclusive duet by the celebrity siblings (Donny and Marie Osmond) and a special performance by Sony/Epic artists the D.E.Y. singing 'She Said,' a heartfelt ode to mothers," the release states.

Sunday's special will also include a tribute to 100-year-old Opal Trundle, who was born on May 11, 1908, the nation's first Mother's Day.

"Opal raised six children during the Great Depression and has 96 grandchildren," the release states.

A number of celebrities, including Christina Aguilera, Alicia Keys and Tony Hawk, will also make cameo appearances throughout the show.

According to Marie Osmond, Sunday' special is an ideal way to mark the nation's centennial tribute to mothers.

"They're the nucleus of life," she said. "And I believe that this kind of an honor is something that we really do need to honor these women."

Plus, it enable the Osmond siblings to put their own spin on reality television.

"We love reality television," Marie said. "You can't get more reality than this."

The Osmond siblings, both of whom have children of their own, look forward to Sunday's special and Mother's Day, itself.

"This is such a special day for us because we love our mother so much," Donny said. "And it's a pretty significant day for us because she passed away on Mother's Day four years ago."

Besides, they both pointed out, it's the one day that lauds an otherwise thankless job.

"The most underpaid, overworked profession in the world is to be a mother," Donny said.