October 2012

Annika is five! 

She’s been planning it for a year, and it’s finally here -- her fifth birthday! For the actual day, she and I had a full schedule, to which Lukas got dragged around as usual: We went to “the tea party restaurant” in the Pruneyard for lunch, where she got a special ice cream treat with a candle after the meal, and a gift of a little demitasse spoon from the owner. Then we went to the bookstore, where she got a few more new books, and picked up some food to take home. At home, we had a family dinner followed by a homemade cake with purple icing and a big “5” made with pink sugar, plus of course the 5 candle she picked out months ago from the party store. She got a bunch of presents, including a Cinderella costume, a rake and hoe (for helping R. in the yard), and more books. 

The following Sunday was her birthday party at Airborne Gymnastics. We invited some kids from her old school, and the four- and five-year-olds from her new class, plus the cousins, and it was pretty much a riot -- she loved it! (Now she wants to go to real gymnastics class, which is a whole other thing ... yoicks.) It was a little bit of a weird day, though, because that morning I decided to try some real food out on Lukas -- a little yogurt, some scrambled egg -- and not only did he hate them, but he started having trouble breathing (for reasons we did not at this point connect). It was scary, and eventually we decided it merited an ER visit. I took him, while R. got Annika ready for her party, picked up the cake we’d ordered, etc. Several hours, many texts, and a skipped chest x-ray later (because Lukas seemed completely back to normal), I made it home in time to go with them to the party -- a little discombobulated, but at least I didn’t miss it! 

Anyway ... happy fifth birthday to the most precious little girl in the wide wide world! The baby years are great, but these times are even better. 

Another trip to Texas

Because I am getting up in years, we have come upon my 20-year high school reunion, and I dragged the whole fam onto an airplane to go to it with me. We took Annika to the homecoming football game with us on Friday night; I’d bought her a mum, and though we planned on leaving after the halftime show, the friends I wanted to see showed up late and we ended up staying till it was over. So then Saturday was a trip to an alleged pumpkin patch, with a hayride, a bouncy house, some dubious farm animals, etc., the highlight of which, for Annika, was dashing around the place with her new friend Audrey (my good friends’ daughter, who’s only a few months younger). It was great to see everyone with their families, and I was proud to show off my bunch, of course. Saturday night was the adults-only thing, where we all mostly talked about our kids. Heh. We also got to spend some time with the folks, and then headed on home to Cali. 

Halloween: The Second Most Important Day of the Kid Year

Annika had been throwing out Halloween costume ideas since Nov. 1 last year, ranging from “a butterfly” to “a nice witch, not a mean witch -- a NICE one,” to various book/comic book characters, but had at last declared her intention to be a “made-up superhero” -- Super Sister -- with silver leggings, pink briefs, silver top, pink headband, black wig, and brown stompy boots. She drew a helpful illustration, even, and I had bought all of the required pieces here and there. And but then she got a Wonder Woman costume from Mamalah for her birthday, and THAT. WAS. IT. She was going to be Wonder Woman! She got so much mileage out of that costume -- wore it pretty much every day to play in, plus to dance class on the day they said to dress up, to school for the Halloween parade the Friday before, to a little festival at the community center that weekend, and then finally on actual Halloween night. Her commitment to the full outfit was mature beyond her years -- she even wore the wig without complaint. And oh man, the reactions she got everywhere we went! People would shout, “Hey! Wonder Woman!” from across the room, point her out to their kids, ask if she had her lasso, etc. The most enthusiastic cheers were generally from women about my age (obviously!), and the funny thing was that in a sea of princesses and superheroes (which together accounted for at least 75% of all the costumes), she was the only Wonder Woman we saw in all of our travels. Way to think different, little girl! Meanwhile: Lukas, who of course doesn’t know what Halloween is, went as a tiger, because Target had a tiger footie pajama in his size. He pulled the hat off instantly and repeatedly, so we only ended up with like one photo of it, but it was cute as heck anyway. We all went to the cousins’ to go trick-or-treating, feeling that it might be Cousin A.’s last year for this rodeo, and the candy haul was much much better than the year before -- success!