Abby's Ninth Birthday

Aside from the fact that I can't believe she's nine, today was a really good day. Leanna got to leave the hospital again (she had gone back in for observation as noted here).We had Abby's idea of the Perfect Breakfast (blueberry waffles cut in strips and served with whipped cream for dipping, plus apple slices, apple cider, and bacon) and ran a couple errands, then attended the party her dad had set up at the Skate Deck. They throw a good party.

Happy Birthday Cake

There were a couple of minor issues at the party - one kid was just way overstimulated between the wobbly feet and the darkness and the black light and the strobes and the pounding music - and the birthday girl has a literal bruise on one buttock (no pictures of that one!) but otherwise a good time was had by all. Part of this is that the Skate Deck has a couple bouncy houses at one end, which is where the kids who get tired or scared of the skating floor go hang out and bounce. Lizzy spent her time in there (after I finally got the skates on her and she announced that she didn't want to skate, of course). Abby and her friends took a few rounds on the skating floor and then went to the bouncy house area. I took some rounds myself, as did Abby's dad and a couple of the other parents, but whew! It's been a long time since I was last up on skates, and I've never been up on them at the weight (or age!) I'm at now. My feet may never be the same!

Ash and Abby eat ice cream

All this skating and bouncing was after the pizza and cake and soda  and ice cream cups and gifts bits, which were also a huge success. Abby's future husband Greg got her a miniature pillow pet on a keychain - it exactly matches her full size one, because he knows her that well. Monster High dolls and Zoobles were much in evidence. Abby is thrilled.

And since one of our guests was Greg, whose mom is Tiffany of Meadowbelle Fudge, we got ours delivered today. Oh Em Gee - this is some Nut-Free Fudgy Goodness, this is.  I approve.

Friday's Frenetic Follies

Poor Leanna. She's been recovering from her tonsillectomy (and adenoidectomy and tooth extraction) and because she's a big girl it's taking her longer to get over it than it does smaller children. So we were not expecting her for this weekend (or for Abby's birthday party) and some of today's Frenetic Follies consisted of phone calls back and forth between me and Leanna's mom, determining whether she could come over this weekend (no) or just for the party (also no), and reassuring Leanna that truly, it's okay; we'll miss you but everybody understands that you are too sick to be rollerskating. Although Lizzy, four, thinks that Leanna isn't coming this weekend because she has "tonsil germs" (we told her Leanna's tonsils were sick and she extrapolated from there based on her own recent experience with cold germs).

Lizzy eats tekka maki! And likes it!

And I went to Abby's classroom to bring her lunch and birthday goodies for her class, then picked Lizzy up and did the grocery shopping, came home and did a load of laundry, finished my homework, and tidied the kitchen. Laston started home from work, we got a call from Leanna's mom saying she had to go back to the doctor because the back of her throat was bleeding, he went to help with that, he got home, Abby got home from school, and we went out to dinner (we love the "Sushi Belt Place"!) with our ringers on "outdoor" settings ready for word about Leanna's throat.

And OW - apparently she coughed some stitches loose where they took her tonsils out, and the poor kid is back at Children's Hospital for observation tonight. Send Good Thoughts, won't you?

Little Girls Grow Up

Abby is almost nine. She'll be nine this coming Saturday, in fact (and how on earth did that happen?) and she's a peculiar mix of almost-teenage and little-girl. Sometimes she does very adult things, like making observations of the world around her far beyond her age, or teaching her Scout Troop to use an epi-pen. And sometimes she's upside-down on the couch just because she can, or begging for just one more episode before bed.

But my favorite times are when she's actually in between - when she does or says something grown-up but with that childlike skew to it that proves she's still a kid. The latest was last night, when she made her four-year-old sister a gift she clearly put thought into; she knew Lizzy would love it. And it turned out to be Ranch dip mix. Or earlier this week when she told me she knew how I felt when I'm having trouble getting that she's almost nine because she feels the same way about Lizzy. She said (sighing in world-weary fashion), "Yeah, mom. I get it. 'Cause it feels like Lizzy should be only one... like she was before she was so annoying".

She does love her little sister, but she's also that that age where Lizzy - nearly five years younger - is the most annoying and irritating person on the planet. Also, unfair grownups are always taking Lizzy's part. Did I get away with all that when I was four? Yeah, probably, except that Leanna was still enough of a novelty (they met what Abby was just three and Leanna was five-and-a-half, and Leanna is not here 24/7) that you wanted to impress her, not annoy her. And you're just a different person than Lizzy is. Don't worry, kiddo, you have the privileges to go with those responsibilities, and given Lizzy's impulsiveness, she probably won't earn those until she's a lot older than the seven or so at which you did.

So as I finish writing this, Abby is doing her math homework ( 'we learned rounding!") pretty much at the top of her lungs. Nine. And normal.

It's the Most Dangerous Time of The Year

I'm not talking about my waistline, although that's true. Nor am I talking about New Years' Day traffic accidents. Here at Chez Gamers' Babes, it's all about the allergens.

I'm mildly allergic to cows' milk. This is not lactose intolerance - although I have that too - but an actual sniffly-sneezy-itchy allergy to whey, the primary protein in milk. Sheep or goat, fine. Cow or buffalo, notsomuch. I can usually manage a serving a day (provided there are no other allergens in my system, such as dog dander, alder pollen, or spider venom) without ill effect. And I'm - y'know - an adult, so I can swallow a Benadryl and take my chances. I have a pretty good handle on it.

And then there's Abby and the Nut Allergy of Doom. She is anaphylactic to cashews and pistachios (we discovered the allergy with a can of mixed nuts; she ate the cashew and bang! Hospital time). She gets sniffles and itchy skin to the point of scratching it all off with all other "true tree nuts" and with mangoes. That's almonds, hazelnuts/filberts, walnuts, pecans, brazil nuts, macadamia, and pine nuts. Coconut and other palm-based nuts are not truly nuts, (nor are peanuts), but we tend to avoid them for her because they're often cross-contaminated. She did manage a fun-size butterfinger (peanut) this halloween with no ill effects, but she didn't like it well enough to take the cross-contamination risk again. We thought she was having a reaction to the "may contain traces of tree nuts..." in candy corn, but it turned out to be traces of almonds in her chocolate soy milk (safeway.com no longer carries the Silk light, and the regular "may contain...". I have an email in to Silk). So we're very careful. And vigilant; things like a knife used to cut pumpkin pie after it's used on pecan can invite disaster, and unless one is aware of it, one has no way to know. Abby herself is pretty good about it (she even taught her Brownie troop when and how to use an epi-pen), but she is only not-quite-nine after all.

Enter Tiffany, mother of Abby's future husband Greg (if Abby and Greg have their way; they are only nine), and allergen-aware Fudge Confectionery Chef. She makes fudge every year (assorted flavors, all gluten-free (even the Cookies-n-Cream!) and all but Peanut Butter nut-free as well) and this year she's selling some (click this link!). And she is so conscious of the cross-contamination potential that she makes the Peanut Butter last of all, after the rest are packaged safely out of the way. This is huge - even the professionals aren't usually that careful.

We're ordering three pounds. Which gets back to the waistline issue. But that's a separate post.

ETA: I just got off the phone with the White Wave people - who make the Silk products.They test the equipment and the products before, during, and after production, and they destroy any product that is contaminated.

But of course there's always human error.

And they saw that if she ever has any reaction - no matter how mild - to any of their products again, to please call them and they will take down numbers and have their quality control people check that batch.

So they take it very seriously.

I heart them.

What Was I Saying?

I have not posted here since Thursday evening, and it's now Sunday. This is Very Unusual. Nothing calamitous has occurred (in the Real World, anyway) to prevent me; I just haven't been writing for other than school this weekend. As we're finishing up Week Seven of Nine (ha!), the papers are getting longer and more involved, so more time goes into researching and writing them. After Week Nine I have a break until the first of the year, when I'll be taking Environmental Science and Research Writing - yes, it's a real Associate of Arts, so science classes are required. I've also been spending the evenings after the kids go to bed watching Torchwood - and some of that is fairly intense stuff I needed to process before I could switch into other writing modes.

And really, this weekend has been a lot of short little things - no big topics. Abby had a meltdown because she said I'm "no fun anymore" but really, it turned out she just wanted some mommy-time when we were just chatting and at nine PM could not express it. Lizzy feels that Pixie Dust is the best way for "not-a-astwonaut" girls to fly in outer space. Leanna's at home recuperating from her tonsillectomy. We had four kids here watching Pink Panther shorts from the sixties and adding their own dialogue, which was hilarious. I discovered that Abby's favorite brand of chocolate soy milk "may contain almonds" - and does. On that note, she can now swallow "grown up pills" (at least those the size of a Benadryl). I got some good news as regards my moving to the next interview level with a couple of jobs. I made arrangements to meet a friend who has more episodes of Doctor Who than are available on Netflix Instant Play and I'm gonna bring him some soup. Abby had a sleepover at her friend's house last night and her own (ninth!) birthday party next Saturday. We're going to have tree-decorating at my mom's today.

Nothing big. Just a normal weekend.

OH Yeah... I ROCK!

Apparently I am the Coolest Parent Ever... at least to the younger-sibling set at Abby's gymnastics class. There's a  balcony above the gym for people waiting on their kids, and it's full of younger siblings (I wouldn't dare bring Lizzy - she's too wild and she'd end up taking a header down the stairs). It's a big gym and I can't watch Abby herself the whole time; often she's nowhere near me. Because I don't use a phone for games or email or texting while waiting for my kid; I bring my Nintendo DSLite along. So I pulled out the DS, popped in the Final Fantasy IV DS game, turned it on, and adjusted the volume so as not to bother other people. I became quickly aware of a presence behind me and to the left, so I glanced up.

It was a little boy - looking to be about five years old, hovering near my left shoulder. When he saw me looking at him, he asked, "Can I play next?" I smiled at him and shook my head. "Why not?"

"Well, I don't know you."

"Oh. Hi! I'm Grayson and I'm almost five. Now you know me. Can I play next?"

I looked around for an adult attached to this kid. A man I took to be his father was watching us, laughing silently, but obviously ready to jump in if I needed help. So I said, "Nope. This is my toy - even my own kids don't get to play with this." The father laughed harder. Grayson leaned - hard - on my shoulder and stage-whispered into my ear.

"But I'm really nice."

By this point three or four other little boys came to investigate, and Grayson's father was almost doubled over with laughter. None of the other boys were quite as close as Grayson, but still, I'm not used to kids who are complete strangers to me hanging off me; usually it's only my own and those of my closest friends. Grayson's dad recovered himself and collected his child, half laughing and half apologizing, at which point the other boys all wandered off to their interrupted game.

Me? I got to the summit of Mt Hobs. And I got a blog topic out of the deal.