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Marriage equality controversy: Think of the children!

October 25, 2012 By 1 Comment

Earlier today, I was reading an article online, when Ash came back into the room from the bathroom.  As is my habit / survival skill / damage control, when he’s in my company I try to give him my attention, regardless of what I was or would otherwise be doing.  Anyway, so he came back over, and I automatically shrunk the browser.  He asked what I was looking at — he will ALWAYS ask — and I told him it was an article meant for grown-ups to read.  Naturally, he followed this up by asking what the article was about.  I gave him an aged-down account of the issue — “marriage equality” — and ramifications.  This is what he had to say:

“Well, the rules are there to keep people safe, right?  So I think if there are more rules about love, they should probably be to make people love more, not to make them love less, of course.  No one is safer if people act like they love each other less.”

There you go, folks.  You know, sometimes it’s a very nice thing that my autistic child doesn’t think like ‘most people’.

We know "gay people" in happy, committed relationships. Can't you tell that our family is crumbling? CRUMBLING, I TELL YOU!!

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A 1st grade graduation present

June 23, 2012 By 3 Comments

Yes, I still have to finish the much-belated-long-awaited post about Ash’s birthday party.  Ditto for my medical update, and the bit about his CSE meeting, and, well, a bunch of other stuff.  The thing is, I’m trying to pack, and those updates take longer than I really aught to spend right now.  Trust me, packing isn’t what I’d rather be doing, context aside.  So, in the meantime, you get another quicky post.  It’s a quicky post about my big boy….seven years old, with his 8th tooth wiggly (he wants it to come out NOW so we can warn the Tooth Fairy about the move), and 2nd grade on the horizon in a whole new school.  My big boy, who mastered buttons (before snaps?!), who has started eating peanut butter sandwiches (and who will consume an entire apple, as long as it is cut into four pieces — they can be any shape, but it has to be four), and who thinks it’s silly that I can’t always remember that the puzzle he won at his school carnival has a shape technically called a stellated rhombic dodecahedron.  My big boy, who in the middle of all this chaotic limbo has grown into wanting to sleep with his knight light on, and wanting me to snuggle him to sleep in his castle bed in the first place, “For comfort.”

Did you catch the bit about how he’s moving on to the 2nd grade?  Good, because that’s the context of this post.  Ash did it!  He graduated from another grade, while in an integrated program, in the first try, for the second time!  I am so proud of him!!  And, because I have friends that are lovable dorks and who notice my inquiries to other friends into the existence of coupons which would help me get him certain things as a graduation present, sometimes those graduation presents actually come from someone else.  Someone else who needs to be tackled by the child they blame their impulse on.  *cough*

Ash opens the box.  Not so long ago, he might have had trouble getting to that point before he had finished examining the box.

Ash checks out his new dragon.  He likes that it’s so soft, as well as that it’s shiny and green with glittery gold parts.

Ash notices the strap-on wings.  Build-a-Bear probably did things that way because most of their animals get dressed in little outfits, but since we’re us, Ash learned the word ‘prosthetic’.  Of course, he immediately thought that we should bring his new dragon to the zoo to show the prosthetic wings to the zookeepers and suggest something similar for the one-winged birds that they take care of.  If they are unconvinced, he will make them watch the How To Train Your Dragon movie with him, where, of course, another dragon flies again with the help of a prosthetic half-tail.

Ash is pretty proud of his idea.

Now Ash wants to know about the pendant-style tag on a gold cord around the dragon’s neck.  The tag notes that this is a limited edition critter in honor of The Year of the Dragon, (and features what Steffan would like to note is a horrible rendition of even the simplified form of the Chinese character for ‘dragon’).  I explain.  Ash points out — oh, I’m so proud! — that this does not look like a Chinese dragon, and wants to know if perhaps the explanation was that it was adopted by a Chinese dragon family.

Ash reassures his new dragon that this is the last time he will have to be adopted, because now he is part of OUR family.

Ash is pleased to get confirmation of this notion from both Mommy and Daddy.

“And you will help the rest of my dragon family guard my castle at night so I can be safe to go on dream dates with Mommy.”

It occurs to Ash to ask whether I have to pack up his dragons for the move yet, or if they can continue guarding his castle.

Oh.  Oh, it’s ok.

Whew!  That’s a relief.

He wasn’t so sure about that.

Now that we’re all feeling secure, Ash decides it’s time to name his new dragon.

“The first part of your name is like your color, and I think the last part is “full” because you are full of shiny green….your name is GREENFUL!”

Ash thinks it’s pretty darn cool that he got Greenful BECAUSE HE GRADUATED FROM 1ST GRADE.

It’s also worth giggling over.  Of course, pretty much everything is worth giggling over.

Ash shortly discovers that Greenful doesn’t just like to cuddle and giggle and prove that he can fly, but that he also likes to fly INTO people and gently bonk their heads with his own, just like he used to as a baby, as a way of introducing himself.  Greenful earns the nickname “Bonk”….not bad for someone who has been hanging out with us for less than an hour.

Attempts are made at two-way flight patterns for Bonk.

But for some reason, Bonk prefers flying at Ash.

Ok, this time he’s ready and waiting for it.

GOTCHA!!!

Welcome to the family, Greenful aka Bonk.  You’ll find lots of love here.  Thank you, Steve, for sending him to us….at Ollie’s insistence or otherwise. ;-)

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Important questions at the end of the school year.

June 11, 2012 By 2 Comments

“Mommy, I read on the class notes that there is no more homework this week….did I get that right?” — Ash

“It’s true, your teachers aren’t sending any more homework home this week.” — Me

“Did the TEACHERS get that right?” — Ash

“Well you know, sweetie, it’s not something to worry about. You can still read, and practice writing to your friends, and I can even give you math problems to learn more tricks for, if you like.” — Me

“Oh. Well that’s ok then.” — Ash

…

“Mommy, where’s the notebook? I think I need to write a note and take a marker and give the teachers an incomplete, because they didn’t finish GIVING us homework, and even if you make mistakes, you’re still supposed to try.” — Ash

He's reading the "How To Train Your Dragon" book series right now. Is anyone surprised? Anyone? Anyone? Bueller?

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Adding to my resume as a professional amateur

May 12, 2012 By 1 Comment

I know you’re waiting for a post about Ash’s birthday party, but since I’m still collecting and editing the photos from you, you’re going to get another tangent in the meantime.  You won’t mind tooooooooooooooo too much, hopefully, since I am kind of proud of it.  Well, the content of it.  You’ll see.

Ok, so remember when I posted a photo of the ‘special interest’ cake that I made for Ash’s 7th (yet first, in a way) birthday party?  It was kind of a birthday post teaser with the excuse of being for my last, actually-got-it-up-amidst-the-chaos Wordless Wednesday.  I was pretty damn proud of that dragon cake.  I AM pretty damn proud of that dragon cake.  He had requested, “A chocolate dragon cake shaped like the real thing, that looks like a purple dragon with blue and green polka-dot scales all over.”  He was also rather intent on the fact that Mommy was going to be the one to make it, so what was a Mommy to do?!

Short Answer: Overachieve!  ;-D

Longer Answer: Spend about 7 hours total, making the cake and its components….which, since I’d never made the like before, and considering the number of scales applied, really isn’t too bad. The body was made from two round cakes (Devil’s Food chocolate), cut, arranged and trimmed to give the dragon its shape. Layers were glued together with strawberry preserves. Then the outside got painted with chocolate frosting, so that the “skin” could stick on — that was homemade marshmallow fondant, colored with Wilton icing pigments. The fondant was used for the skin, scales, the white parts of the eyes, and the nose. The pupils were chocolate chips pushed in point-first, and the nostrils were jelly beans. The claws, tail-tip, spikes, wings, horns and funky dragon eyebrows were made from chocolate. I just got one package of white melting chocolates, used the pigments to color different portions of it, roughly painted the desired shapes, via chopstick, onto some wax/parchment paper, let it re-harden, and there you had it. Unfortunately, I had to patch a horn with fondant and move the wings back so they were partially supported by the hind legs, after things got a little roughed up in transit. The dragon lies on its hoard of “gold” chocolate coins, curled around its clutch of foil-wrapped candy eggs. It’s on a saran-wrapped cutting/draining board, because that’s what I had that was big enough, and already clean, and I was in a hurry to get a ridiculous number of scales stuck on.

Credit goes to Steffan for helping me get the fondant kneaded in the first place, and to Ash’s “AuntieTora” for helping me knead the pigments in later on, sparing my wrists some strain.  Tora also sat there with me for a few hours and made tiny balls of scale-colored fondant, to speed up my process of making the scales.  Still, the cake was all-me enough that I don’t feel like I cheated on Ash’s request, and yes, I am damn proud enough of that thing, to say so again. Sure, I can pick out things that could look better, that I would’ve done differently or more effectively or more elaborately.  Sure, it pales in comparison to some of the professional dragon cakes you can find if you brace yourself and then do a google image search for “awesome dragon cake” — although to be fair to myself, I think it looks cooler than a lot of the cakes that also appear as results of that search, that were done off the same base model that I spring-boarded off of.  In any event, for an amateur with no special training or tools or practice or anything, I think I made a pretty spiffy dragon.

It certainly made an impression at the party!

Thus far, I’ve at least looked through 3 out of the 4 sets of photos I know were taken at the big event, and am stuck reeeeeeeeeeeeeaaaally hoping that somewhere in that last set is a good photo captured when Ash first saw his completed cake.  ::sigh::  At least I have the memory.  ::laughs::  He was actually stunned enough that what I suppose I’m really hoping for is a photo of the moment AFTER he first saw the cake, because it took him a bit of processing what he was seeing, before he reacted.  Heehee.  And oh, almost all of the boys at the party were oh-so-disappointed that knight-dressed Ash would neither make a big show of slaying the dragon, nor let them be the one to decapitate it!  In fact, Ash, who has no concept of torture, insisted that the cake be eaten tail-first, because it seemed both kinder, and to preserve this new dragon of his longer.  (And yes, I was relieved that he did not backpedal on his acceptance of the fact that a dragon CAKE is meant to be EATEN, not preserved as a keepsake toy or decorative item.)

That actually leads me one step closer to the tangent that prompted this post.  See, Ash’s Auntie L-, my sister-in-law, does fancy baking professionally.  When she’s not indulging nieces or nephews with birthday cupcakes, she’s making things like wedding cakes.  It’s a recent business but it’s been picking up speed, and with good reason.  She’s taken the classes, she’s gotten the books and tools, she’s practiced and improvised and gotten really GOOD.  Good enough that I felt a little bit bad about taking her up on the offer of birthday cupcakes again this year, even if, yeah, she always does do it for her sister’s kids, and for her and my BIL S-’s friends, etc.  There’s a part of me that still felt like it had to lead to commissions from parents of party-attending kids, for it to be worth her while.  Regardless of how it got there, it’s still my baggage, and I’ll own that.  Eniways, I did take her up on her offer, figuring that it might be a good idea to have something in an alternative flavor, for kids (or sticking-around-ing parents) who don’t like chocolate.  It happens.  So, pending her agreement, I requested vanilla-with-strawberry-filling cupcakes (since Ash likes that flavor combination too), decorated with either green dragons or blue castles resting on cupcake-mounds-turned-hills-of-grass.  Lucky me, one of her books had gum paste castles and dragons in it — proving yet again that although Ash’s special interest isn’t the most mainstream obsession for little boys right now, it’s not impossible to find if you look!  Yay!  Well, L- made them (along with a few that had crowns on them, instead), and they were SO CUTE.  I mean, seriously, look at these fabulous cupcakes!  There’s a lot of detail there!

I told her that if she could make them from gum paste she could make them from clay, and should consider doing so!

Here’s where it gets a bit weird for me, though…

Her cupcakes weren’t exactly dismissed, but by all accounts from kids, parents, and other present adults, they were overshadowed by my dragon cake.  I mean, even by people who had no idea that I’d made one and not the other, or either of them, and had any reason to want to make the exhausted Mommy feel that little extra bit better.  I’d be all, “Ash’s Auntie made these cupcakes, aren’t they awesome?!”  The response would inevitably be something like, “Wow, yeah, those are really cute….but OH MY GOD WHO MADE THAT CAKE?!?!!”  Cell phones were snapping pictures.  One mom posted a blurry picture of my cake on FaceBook, and about 60 strangers had left “likes” and comments going ga-ga over it, by the time I was even home from the party and glanced at the computer.  I quite possibly managed to stay awake only because all of the blood was rushing to my head while I blushed through all this.  Most people ate their way through the cake first, and then a number of the boys asked if they could also have a cupcake….it turned out that they wanted the chance to decapitate a dragon!  (::shakes head, laughing::  And hey, while we’re laughing at gender clichés, I should point out that most of the little girls were asking if they could take a piece of the dragon’s gold.)

Let me reiterate: I am grateful for the cupcakes, which I thought were yummy and looked awesome.  Ash, and everyone else, agreed.  Major props to my SIL.  What gets me is that you’d EXPECT her to earn props, as it were.  She’s the professional.  You would not….or at least I would not….expect me, the amateur on my first try here, to earn MORE props from people for my work than she did for hers, let alone without even earning them because my work WAS coming from an amateur.  Yes, I am capable of baking yummy things.  Yes, I’m crafty in general.  That doesn’t mean I know what the hell I’m doing when it comes to specialty, decorative, sculptural, baked goods.  Except….apparently I can fake it really well.

Here’s where it gets even stranger for me…

There was a supportive push for me to think about NOT being an amateur.  Several friends suggested submitting a photo of my work to certain shows (seriously….it’s not THAT good by a long shot!), or at least certain websites, before someone else did it.  Several friends said that if I lived close enough to them, they’d totally have me make special birthday cakes for their kids.  One of the moms at the party kept telling me what kind of price tag she’d expect and accept, on a cake like the one I’d made.  And, of course, I attempted to take this in graciously, but brushed it all off in favor of being relieved that I wouldn’t have to bake anything elaborate again for a good, long while.  I mean, the majority of the time, I can’t even get my body through preparing a simple meal, and if Steffan also happens to be too tired and/or ouchy and/or sick to cook or even assemble some basic edible, we simply don’t eat.  So, in the wake of a 7 hour cake project, I declared a number of times that I was not going to be making any more cakes, any time soon.  I meant it when I said it.  It was not meant to be a challenge.  With a professional fancy-baker in the family, the only family members who would want me to make a cake for them are my immediate family members, and lo and behold, we’d just gotten through the run of OUR birthdays.  I had a year’s reprieve from trying to do (let alone try to out-do!) that again, and I was glad and grateful for it, despite my pride over what I’d managed.

And then, I got a call from the aforementioned mom.  She’d been gushing about my dragon cake to her sister, who was now interested in hiring me to make the cake for the upcoming birthday party of A-‘s cousin.  Would I be willing to talk with her?

I was nearly speechless, though not so much so that I couldn’t laugh at myself.

A-’s cousin is having a 9th birthday party today.  It’s luau-themed.  And yes, I made the cake.  It took me about 10 hours (including some experimentation time, which was part of the deal since she wanted me to make something I’d never made before) and I’m still paying a hefty price, physically, but after needing to buy 3 tires and patch another the same week earlier this month that we paid rent, I was not in a position to turn down the commission.  Oh, if she’d wanted something covered with gum paste hibiscus flowers or something like that, well, I’d have had to pass it on….ideally, to my SIL.  She liked the idea of a “birthday island” type deal, though, when I started giving her ideas about the kinds of cake I thought I’d be able to make.  She liked the idea of sticking a shining, red, number-shaped candle at the top of an exploding volcano — which is why there’s as much lava as there is — and of having palm trees and sand and assorted other things that one might not necessarily expect to be edible decorations.  That, I thought I could pull off.

Since she came a little too close to running off the road a few times because she couldn’t stop staring at the cake I’d made for her, I guess I DID pull it off.

Welcome to Birthday Island!

The palm trees growing on Birthday Island have pretzel rod trunks, chocolate coconuts, and fondant leaves.

The sand on Birthday Island is a mixture of grushed cinnamon grahm crackers and edible, gold-colored sugar, stuck with a thin frosting wash to colored fondant. It sparkles just a bit, like real sand does.

A thin coating of blue glitter gel icing over irregularly pigmented fondant, gives the river/waterfall flowing down Birthday Island a liquid gloss.

Yes, I’m pretty proud of myself again.  I improvised the concept and the creation, and I think it came out rather well….as well as fairly close to some professional models, apparently.  (In fact, the woman who commissioned the cake reports that similar cakes from a professional bakery, “Start at $500,” so with this one costing her a little less than half that, including the grocery bill, I think we both made out pretty well.)  The island is constructed from three layers of homemade funfetti cake (vanilla cake, with flower-shaped sprinkles of assorted pasted colors, scattered throughout the batter).  Vanilla frosting infused with hazelnut extract and turned pink with Wilton no-taste red icing pigment, glues things together.  The fence is made from wafer cookies filled with chocolate-hazelnut cream, and stuck in place by the aforementioned frosting, sans-pigment.  Ice cream sugar cones give the volcano / mountain peaks their base form — they are covered with fondant and have a chocolate lava flow, although the peak of the volcano is plugged with fondant so that it’s easy to stick in a candle.  Homemade marshmallow fondant also makes the grass, the base for the sand and for the water, the leaves on the palm trees, and the writing.  The palm tree trunks are made from mini pretzel rods, and they have chocolate coconuts.  The sand is made from crushed cinnamon-grahms, and edible, gold-colored sugar.  The water has an overlay of blue glitter gel icing.  The rocks are a combination of chocolate-covered malt balls and just chocolate, partially melted, molded, and then given some extra pigment.  It all aught to satisfy her daughter’s sweet tooth!

This time, though, I’m serious.  Really, really, in a stick-to-it-no-matter-how-enticing-the-payment, sort of way.  No more cakes.  Not for at least a few months, anyway.  We have to move in a few months, Ash has a CSE meeting coming up later this month….I’ve got other things I need to do, right now.  This wasn’t something I was planning on doing, anyway!  I was giving out my SIL’s business info, not expecting to get business for doing the same kind of thing, myself!  In fact, I’ve resisted posting my triumph on FaceBook, because I don’t want to risk it getting weird with my SIL.

…But yeah, I’m kind of proud of myself.

 

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Bedside manner

April 5, 2012 By 1 Comment

I — SOMEHOW!  It’s shocking, I know– never got to posting about it here, but Ash manifested a nasty ear infection on Monday night.  Starting around 9, 10pm (so after 2-3 hours of sleep) he’d started sounding like he wasn’t exactly sleeping well, but the noises coming through the monitor weren’t so obvious that we judged it beneficial to go into Ash’s room to check on things.  At 2am that changed….and the problem not only became obvious, but resulted in my spending the next three hours trying everything I could to do what was needed without having to wake Steffan up to help me out.  He had gone to bed while I stayed up to monitor Ash more closely, because he was going to get a max of 5 hours of sleep before his morning-shift-following-a-night-shift….so I reaaaaalllly didn’t want to have to add to his exhaustion while driving and working and dodging juvenile violence, the next day.  When 5am rolled around I still hadn’t managed to get a complete dose of fever-reducer into Ash, though, so it was time to re-balance the judged risks.  Ash had a high fever — I wasn’t even sure how high, because it only got to 101+°F before I couldn’t keep the thermometer in place any more.  (Hmmmm….maybe I can put one of those ear thermometers on his birthday list…!!)  I’d gotten him from the puddle — Of sweat?  Urine?  I couldn’t even tell — he was writhing in, in bed, and gotten him to the bathroom, where he kept desperately trying to push out what according to him was meant to be pee, but which wasn’t really coming.  He was twiching and trembling and shaking and whimpering and moaning, shivering and sweating, obviously utterly exhausted and miserable, and claiming a headache and a tummy ache.  Most of the time he couldn’t hold himself upright, just wanted to collapse in a hug, even as he sat on the toilet.  In any event, the aforementioned three hours of effort and tricks later, nothing had improved.  After I finally gave up and got Steffan’s help, we managed to force a complete dose of fever reducer into him, but then, of course, he immediately threw it back up.  In fact, that was pretty much the way things went until 11:20, when I’d managed to get him a slot at the doctor’s office.  After a shot of antibiotics in one side of his bum (which burns and aches for the rest of the day, in a scrawny little bum like his) and one shot of anti-nausea medicine in the other side, plus a few rounds of staggered doubling-up of acetomenophen and ibuprofin to bring down the 102+°F fever and the pain levels, plus many, many hours of lying whimpering on Mommy, with an ice pack on his butt and assorted movies attempting to distract him whenever it looked like there were no chances of him dozing off fitfully for even a few minutes, plus all the sips of Pedialyte that I could get into him………………….he finally slept lightly for about 3 hours, starting around 9pm on Tuesday night.  I made it over 40 hours on 10 minutes of rough sleep, but eventually got about 2 of Ash’s three, myself.

“Good times,” as they say, but we’ve had worse.

Ash had to return to the doctor’s office the next morning for another shot of antibiotics, and he still needed both kinds of fever/pain medicine working in tandem, to control his fever.  We kept him home from school all day, just trying to get him to rest whenever possible and as much as possible (this involved, once again, a lot of time lying draped over or snuggled on Mommy, with an ice pack on his butt), monitor how he was doing, keep medicating him and keep trying to re-hydrate him.  As he showed signs of no longer being dehydrated, we mixed the strawberry Pedialyte into his milk the same way we normally mix in the berry-based flavors of generic V8Fusions, so he’d get some more calories into him.  He still had no appetite, and he’d already lost a few pounds….that doesn’t take long, with him.  The day was basically devoted to whatever he needed to feel as good as he could get as far as feeling.  That evening was supposed to be the first performance of his 1st grade show — though that is another post to write, which I’ve barely touched upon yet — and we were really, really, reaaaaaallllllly hoping he’d feel well enough to be in it.  Contagion wasn’t an issue, since his fever, etc., came from an ear infection….so it really all came down to how he felt.  He SO wanted to be in that show, and after everything….well, it would’ve really torn him apart if he had to miss it.

Skipping over the show-related stuff because that is, as noted, really another post… Ash had to have a third (and, hopefully, final) shot of antibiotics this evening.  We’re pretending it still counts at Thursday evening right now, ok?  In any case, the following dialogue took place while on the way home from the doctor’s office…

Ash: “Mommy, it’s time to use the pretend phone.  I need to call the doctor and the nurse.”

Me: “Ok…” <makes the traditional phone shape with my hand>

Ash: “No the other kind of phone, I think.”

Me: <mimes flipping open my cell phone and holding it to my head>

Ash: <does more or less the same, then pretends to push buttons>

Me:  “Brrring brrrring briiiiing!  Hello?  This is the doctor’s office.  Who is speaking?”

Ash:  “It’s me.  Um….it’s me, Ash Fieri.  You gave me a shot of medicine in my butt even though I told you to stop, because you needed to make sure I got better.  Now I need to tell you something.”

Me: “What would you like to tell me, Ash?”

Ash: “YOU COULD HAVE SAID YOU WERE SORRY.”

THEY are the ones that did it, Mom!

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A REAL magic wand

March 24, 2012 By Leave a Comment

To fully appreciate the story I am about to tell, you must first know that on the 13th, Ash made his first specific birthday request, aside from the party he hopes for.

“I’m asking you why I don’t have a real magic wand!”  …That’s actually how he broached the subject.  I’m pretty sure some of the preceding dialogue only took place inside of his head.

He wants Mommy and Daddy to be able to give him a “real” magic wand.  He does not mean a classic magician’s wand — that simple, narrow black rod with a white tip.  No no no, that’s boring, and not the kind of magic he’s interested in, anyway.  He does not mean a fairy godmother type deal with a star on the end.  Those turn up in so many places that they are suspect.  He also does not mean a Harry Potter style wand.  He hasn’t seen the movies yet and so only has the vague impression that they tend to look like sticks, and he knows that kids tend to get in trouble when they pick up sticks and start to point them at each other.

No, those aren’t the kinds of magic wands he has in mind, at all.  On the 19th, he clarified.  What he means when he asks if he can have a real magic wand for his birthday, please, is something with a silvery dragon on one end, and sparkly crystals, and, “If it isn’t the silver or sparkly or black or wood colors, then it’s blue like a night-time sky with stars, of course.”  My input is that it has to be sturdy enough to survive the fact that he’s only going to be seven, and not so hard-core that it’s likely to damage anyone or anything else.   And, yes, I’ve also explained to him that magic wands don’t do magic all by themselves.

We’re….working on it.

In any event, he’s brought up the wand several more times so far, but a particular episode from the 22nd is amusing enough to merit a post (and therefore the preceding explanation).  I think the manner of his story-telling was influenced by having re-read “And To Think That I Saw It On Mulberry Street”, so keep that in mind as you read the following and imagine the style with which he delivered things.  Here’s the break-down of how it went, based on my notes after the fact:

Ash had a strange photo in his wallet.
See, he was walking through the enchanted forest
…when he passed through some transforming magic.
And BECAUSE HE DIDN’T HAVE HIS MAGIC WAND YET….AND WAS HIS BIRTHDAY SOON?!…
…he was magically transformed into…
Could I give him some choices?
…He was transformed into a baby snow leopard…
…with very big paws.
But he could talk, because he wasn’t a REAL snow leopard,
he was just a boy that was turned into one.
As he passed out of the magical woods
…he met a lady.
Wait, the woman had someone else with her.
It was her husband!
So he met the woman and her husband…
…and he explained to them what had happened.
They took his picture
…which is why he has a strange photo in his wallet.
Then he decided that he needed to turn into a boy again…
So he walked BACK through the enchanted forest…
and passed back through the blue sparkly transforming magic…
Yes, it was blue.
…because he had ordered it that way.
And so he turned back into an Ash-boy…
and was telling me this story.
But someone else went into the enchanted forest next,
And he couldn’t help them…
BECAUSE HE STILL DID NOT HAVE HIS MAGIC WAND!
And so they walked through the transforming magic…
But they didn’t turn into the same thing he did.
They turned into…
Could I give him some choices?
They turned into a baby hippo.
But hippos aren’t as smart as snow leopards,
because they aren’t Daddy’s favorite.
So THAT boy didn’t walk backwards when he was done…
…being a hippo…
and turn back into a boy.
So he doesn’t know what happened to him.

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St. Patrick’s Day, 2012

March 17, 2012 By 2 Comments

Ash watches, through the conveniently located bubbles, as his bath water turns green.

Last Thursday, Steffan put out this little, “stone-cast” style statue of St.Patrick that he’d found at a thrift shop a while back.  He asked Ash if he knew who it was.  Nope.  He asked Ash if he could recognize what the man was holding.  Nope.  He told him to think about how it would be green, if it wasn’t a statue.  (It is a shamrock.)  Nope.  It relates to the holiday that’s coming up on Saturday….

“Ohhhhh!” said Ash, “It’s a statue of a LEPRECHAUN!”

Nope. ;-)

Steffan then went on to try some clarification.  He told Ash that it was Saint Patrick, the man that the holiday was named after.  They looked up “saint” in Ash’s dictionary, but he was still a bit confused, so Steffan paraphrased things into a Saint being someone who loves other people, and God, above and beyond the level most people do.  Of course, the history lesson gets a bit more complicated, care of the fact that what St.Patrick is most famous for, directly relates to how he most certainly didn’t love ALL people.  Y’know, like the “snakes”….aka those pesky, Nature-worshiping Druids. *ahem*  Eniways, as he was unsure how to go about the next chapter in that lesson-book, as it were, Steffan left things there for the time being.

Naturally, that backfired in an amusing way.

Just so you know, “Saint Francis was a saint because he loved all the animals and was really nice to them.” (We have a small, St.Francis birdbath in the yard.)  Also….“Saint Patrick was a saint because he loved all the leprechauns.”

Can you tell that Ash is a bit leprechaun-obsessed, this year?

Last night he told me that today we’d need to look for rainbows, because he had to catch a leprechaun so that it could tell him where to find the pot of gold.  What did he plan to do with the gold?  Was he going to use it to buy something?  No, he thought maybe he was going to keep all of it, because it was shiny.  (What?  MY little dragon?!)  I told him that in most of the Lore, leprechauns don’t exactly appreciate being trapped by people who want to take their gold, and tend to use magic tricks to get away and teach the humans a lesson.  Did he think it was a good idea to get in trouble the day before his friend’s birthday party, because he wanted to take something from someone else and keep it all for himself?  “Welllll you’re right,” he conceded, “I guess I’ll give one of the gold to A- for her birthday then, and the leprechaun will see that I am nice.”

Mmmmyeah, we’ll work on it.

Today’s non-stop adventures — which began a bit before 7am and after I’d had only two hours of sleep (possibly because those were the first two hours in which Ash actually slept quietly, himself, or possibly because at that point my body simply didn’t care what I thought my Mommy duties were) — have had several holiday-themed things scattered through them.  A bath in green water….care of one yellow and then one blue color fizz tab (a Christmas present previously featured here)….was the extra incentive for staying still through a hair trim.  Ash got to wear a new shirt I made him last night.  (He asked me to surprise him with a special shirt, the way I had for Valentine’s Day.  Thank goodness for DollarTree t-shirt selections, and iron-on printer paper!)  A couple of hours later, the shirt needed to go into the laundry as the result of Ash’s sudden and overwhelming urge to do a bouncy dance while in the middle of drinking (occasionally, I miss the days when he hadn’t yet graduated from AutoSeal cups, to standard ones)….but he accepted the temporary substitution of a far more boring, green t-shirt, given the fact that the stripy green shirt he’d picked out himself recently was in the laundry since he wore it to school yesterday, and his green sweater (which was another thrift store find and originally grey, but mommy sees 100% cotton and thinks, “Dye!”) was being saved for later.  I also had to promise to wash today’s special t-shirt, tonight, so he could go back to wearing it tomorrow, when he went to his friend’s party.

This is the graphic I put together, for his shirt.

Let’s see….oh, there was also listening to some Celtic music of a few styles, dancing along with (our old VHS of this performance of) Riverdance, innumerable rainbow-checks, multiple confirmations that, yes, he was doing a VERY GOOD JOB today, and was definitely earning his Leprechaun Fizz treat tonight, so far…

There was a holiday-prompted inchstone, too!  For the very first time ever….and not for lack of opportunities….Ash pushed through his sensory issues on behalf of his interest, and had his face painted!  (Really, it was the first time he had his SKIN painted.  He’s had the option of having something done on his hand before, if he didn’t want it on his face.)  He wanted a shamrock on his cheek, and he wanted it to be a four-leaf lucky one, and he wanted it to be green, and he wanted it to sparkle, and he didn’t just want it to be a sticker, either.  Alllllllllrightythen.

Ash shows off his shamrock.

I didn’t have any face paints anyway because he’s only recently changed his outlook on them, so I took a toothpick (he warned me to be careful and gentle, because it looked sharp, and then accepted that, since he’d called my attention to the issue, there’d be no problem) and used it to draw the shape on him with green glitter nail-polish.  Then I colored it in with DollarTree green eyeshadow, put a little clear nail-polish topcoat over it, used the hair dryer on low to dry things, and….there you had it.  An improvised job, but it made him happy.  He did an excellent job standing still and not touching it.  Actually, it stayed on his cheek until he asked me to remove it, at bedtime!

Later, we'd make corned beef. At this moment, it seemed we had a little ham. ;-)

Of course, once the special shirt I’d made him had to be swapped for a plain green shirt, he had the extra face-painting-incentive of needing to replace the lucky shamrock….after all, he was aiming to catch a leprechaun!  I mean, he’d been talking for a while about how I was going to paint a shamrock on his cheek, but now he really had to go through with it.  Blessedly, he also kept up his enthusiasm for this latest bit of magic, all day, without ending up upset that it came to naught.

I guess next year I need to be one of those parents that rig something for this holiday, too.  Maybe I’ll find a pretty, prismatic suncatcher, and have him help me hang it so that the little rainbows it makes on the wall, will lure a leprechaun over.  Then, when Ash isn’t looking, I can leave little glittery green footprints and an “accidentally dropped” gold coin.  Hmmm….yes, that could work.

Ok, not QUITE Irish. A lot closer than most of the Irish-for-a-day in the USA, though. I thought about putting something more like this on his shirt, but then I had flashbacks to the years when complete strangers, wherever we went, would quite regularly try to grab Ash without permission -- or even warning -- to hug and kiss him. Sometimes one would try to glomp him AS I'd be whipping him away from someone else. Of course, HE didn't mind one bit, but I had several reasons to be a bit concerned by the societal expectation that any child of a certain caliber of cuteness, is now public property.

Any way, that’s the sort of way that the day went.  There were some things we didn’t end up doing, but what we did do, worked out well.  We managed to do all of the things (excepting ACTUALLY catching a real leprechaun) that Ash really, really wanted to do, so that’s the big thing.  This was the first year that he was involved in celebrating St.Paddy’s at all, beyond some school crafts, and holidays are always….a process.

The climax of the planned day was to, after Steffan got home from work, all change into our green sweaters, and take a family photo for the holiday.  Ash apparently agrees that only one decent photo of all three of us together, a year, isn’t really enough.  Plus, he’s been really into the idea of matching, lately.  Well, we got the photo, though unfortunately it kind of sucks.  I mean, it WOULD be a really cute photo of us, I think, except for the fact that, even after using my Photoshop-fu, it’s still a crappy photo.  The lighting just wasn’t good enough by the time Steffan got home….apparently it was just bright enough that the flash didn’t feel a need to go off, but too dim to get anything but a super grainy shot in which you can’t even TELL we’re all wearing green.  Boo.  (So yes, if you’re one of my many friends getting brand new DSLRs and even pocket-variety digital cameras, lately, I am happy and excited for you, but also jealous.)

We're all wearing green sweaters. I have a Celtic-knotwork St.Brighid necklace on. As is holding his new, shamrock-printed, green mug full of frothy "Leprechaun Fizz"....just take my word for it.

Ash was going to be disappointed that you can’t clearly see us all matching in our green sweaters, but there was nothing for it.  Even if I fiddled with the color awkwardly, the fact that all three are SWEATERS would not be clear.  (Note: Yup…. “Mommy, I think the photo was a little messed up or something.  Can you fix it?”)  At least his mug of “Leprechaun Fizz” distracted him, at the time.  Oohhhhhh that Leprechaun Fizz!!  He might not have been talking about it for as long as he talked about wanting the photo, or with as much drama as he talked about catching leprechauns, but he might actually have brought it up the most often of all.  Leprechaun Fizz was made during Speech Therapy, on Thursday.  The kids had to talk about what they did to make it, what happened, what they thought of it, etc., of course.  Ash never STOPPED talking about it.  Ever since coming home from school on Thursday, all of his actions and choices revolved around — or tried to revolve around — earning some Leprechaun Fizz at home, on Saturday.  (Thankfully, I got a reply from his ST on Friday, after asking what flavor of green ice cream was used, and if Ash actually did drink his all up as he claimed….because if all he did was take one sip, it wasn’t really worth us buying the stuff to make it.)  We cracked up when we read the sheet that came home, on which Ash wrote answers to questions related to the activity, and his response to the question of whether or not he liked the drink, was, “O yes!”  Heheh…well, thankfully, Ash did earn his Leprechaun Fizz — which, by the way, is made with lime sherbert and Sprite-type soda.

Fizz and frothy foam are lots of fun, but after finding out that it was hard to drink straight from the mug without getting bubbles all over his face, he opted to go for the tactic they used in Speech, which was drinking through straws. We had to find him a green and white one to keep with the theme, though.

Ash definitely loves the stuff.  He could only handle just so much at once because he has a tiny tummy, but he couldn’t resist continually running back into the kitchen for another slurp.  Oh, and I do mean running….for certain understandings of running which include running, jumping, climbing, flipping, spinning, rolling, somersaulting, ricocheting, twirling, bouncing, randomly breaking out into dance moves, and even stopping to catch his breath in a fashion that suggests you might get a huge static shock if you get within a yard of him.

Granted, that’s not unusual for him, let alone already-excited him, but this was his usual with….added flare.  He doesn’t usually have that much sugar in a go.  I’m just glad the recipe didn’t call for something caffeinated.  Dear lord, if there is something this child doesn’t need, it’s caffeine.

Eniways….that, with the addition of our traditional corned beef and seasoned fries, was pretty much how St.Paddy’s went down.  Steffan and I had Strangely Sobers (using the rare splurge of the happily-discounted-for-the-holiday “Dublin Mudslide” ice cream from Ben & Jerry’s, along with some vanilla cream soda) because we’d rather have that than Leprechaun Fizz — although we did drink ours from green glasses, too.  And, in the end, it was finally time to take off all the green, say an extra prayer for and because of those who think that drunk driving on March 17th is the celebration of a holiday, and not the same dangerous, selfish, arrogant stupidity that it would be on any other day of the year, and get some sleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep.

Of course, that wasn’t that simple, either.

“Mommy, when Saint Patrick’s Day is over, will it be my friend A-’s birthday party?”

“Yes, sweetie….this year, A-’s birthday party is going to be on March 18th, which is the day after Saint Patrick’s Day….and also tomorrow. That’s why we need to let our exciting holiday end, now, and why we need to calm down, so we can get enough rest to make good choices and have a wonderfully exciting day tomorrow with your friends, too.”

“And then after A-’s birthday, it is going to be Daddy’s birthday! And after Daddy’s birthday, it will be YOUR AND MINE BIRTHDAYS!!!!”

“Well, not after only one sleep, but yes, those are the birthdays that come next on our calender. Let’s wait and think about those on another day, though, ok? It’s going to be hard to calm down and sleep if we have too many exciting thoughts at once.”

“But I think maybe I can DREAM about our birthdays!”

Ahhh well.  Tomorrow is indeed another day.  We’ll see how it goes…!

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A strangely productive day

March 2, 2012 By 1 Comment

I know, right?!

Today was strangely productive.  Ok, yes, I know that for most people out there, that would not exactly be blog-worthy news.  Around here, though?  Here, where half the time I run out of time, spoons, or sanity to even finish writing the To-Do List?!  The heralds are blowing their horns, and banners of conquest are waving in the breeze, I tell ya.  Quite possibly, you can hear in the background the triumphant music that plays in Labyrinth when Sarah and her companions finally reach the doors of the castle at the center of the goblin city.

Oh come on.  References like that from me should not surprise you by now.  Did you really think that some of Ash’s earliest words were dwagon, fay-wee, wiz-ud, cas-uw, magg-ick, yoo-corn and foggy pince, because of neither nature nor nurture?

ENIways…

It started (more or less) with a doctor’s appointment that I had after we got Ash on his morning bus.  This was a follow-up appointment required because of the bloodwork results I got last time.  Steffan dropped me off so that one of us would still be reachable if Ash’s school needed to call us, since it’s a no-no to have cell phones on, in medical centers.  He made use of the time by prepping payments to go out.  In the meantime, after the usual wait — made not-really-any-longer-than-usual by the patient before me needing to be transferred to a hospital, but accompanied by more than the usual apologies anyway — I was seen to.  I actually managed to end up with a good and personable nurse (who did things like appreciate the fact that I was informed enough to give her relevant information, instead of being annoyed by it), a useful and personable doctor (once you realized that he ALWAYS sounded slightly out-of-breath in a hurried way, and it was just the way he talked….nothing personal OR circumstantial), and a good and amusing other-nurse who drew more of my blood (all the while kvetching about the considerable lack of skill some of the others had, in that regard).  Here are the important bits of how it played out:

  • He isn’t convinced that the rash is a drug reaction, because it pretty much sticks to my hands and doesn’t spread over my body.  I’m not convinced that makes a difference, since the allergic reaction I get to my own fevers is hives specifically all over my hands, and if anything is more body-central than ingestion, it’s a fever.  In any event, he’s Rx’ed a topical drug to spread on my hands twice a day, to try controlling the reaction from the outside, since I am allergic to Benadryl — and Allegra, which I seem to be able to take, isn’t as effective for allergies that aren’t centered around your head.  I certainly hope it works, because the rash is itchy and mildly painful.  I’ll try to let you know if it works, once we can pick it up and I try it.  Perhaps the pharmacy will have my topical version of Diclofenac by then, too.  Having drugs on back-order is a pain in the….well in this case, a pain in the joints.
    .
  • This doctor comes from a background as an ENT specialist, so he saved me another appointment’s co-pay and scoped me while I was there.  I did indeed show inflammation and irritation from the reflux, so he Rx’ed me a stronger regimen than the last doc had just Rx’ed me.  I also got accolades for being such a good patient.  It’s not the first tube I’ve had going up, down, and around.  I can’t say that having a tube fed up my nose and down my throat was pleasant….especially since I was already having nasal congestion and sinus issues….but it wasn’t the worst, either.  (Plus,  few things could be as awkward as the giant dildo-cam which is used for intrauterine sonograms.)  And yes, actually, I had already been aware that I had a rather deviated septum, but now I was aware in a whole new way.
    .
  • As for the suspicious bloodwork, this doc set a rare standard in that he actually pulled his wheely-stool right over next to me, put the laptop on my lap, and showed me, point by point, my own lab results.  I didn’t even have to ask him to.I know, right?!It turns out that aside from some predictably (considering I’ve rarely been healthy for more than a week straight, since sometime early last October), slightly “off” white counts, and the glucose levels, everything else about my blood was excellent.  It was especially nice to find that everything seems just as it should be when it comes to my kidney and liver function, since those organs are both moved closer to the front lines, once you lose your gallbladder.  When it comes to those glucose levels….weeeeellll….yeah, they had tested as REALLY low.  Like holy crap, you’d think I’d still be underweight instead of borderline overweight because my body must run screaming at the sight of….things like the brownie next to me….sort of low blood-sugar levels.  Huh.  I reiterated my theories that contributing factors might have been the lack of any food yet the day of the blood draw, and/or the fact that I was still on Cymbalta at the time.  I pointed out that I have noticed, since starting the weaning-off-that-drug process, that I feel more awake, more alert, than I have felt in a long time.  Possibly, about six months.  Six months during which the poorly-chosen drug was quite possibly keeping me borderline-dangerously hypoglycemic, but of course it was never checked or tested because we had lost our bloody medical insurance.  *ahem*  I mean, sure, I’m still tired.  What do you want, when I still deal with my usualchronic pain and fatigue, and by the way, I’m a physically disabled mommy of a neuro-disabled kiddo, and I average 3-4 hours of sleep a night?  But that’s….that’s NORMAL fatigue.  It’s like the difference between drinking fresh orange juice, and drinking orange soda.In any case, they took more blood.  One of the things they are going to check for, specifically, is a condition involving an “otherwise benign” growth on one of the organs, that affects insulin levels.  Joy.  Let’s just hope the levels are more normal this time, eh?

I had Steffan bring me some juice and snacks when he came to pick me up from the doctor’s office, so that I could balance out the blood loss and keep on going with our errands, without having to stop at home.  Onwards we went to the post office (bye-bye, bill payment money) and the bank (hello, Disability check!)  Then, it was onwards to WalMart to pick up some toilet paper and the like.  I lucked out and found on clearance a burgundy version of one of the really nice, warm, blue shirts Ash really liked this year (both of which will fit him this year and next), as well as a pair of black snow-pants that will fit him this year and next….which is good, since the ones he’s been using this year are two sizes too small.  I didn’t snag a new winter coat and boots for next year, but hey, we’re still ahead.  You know that whole, pervasive issue of needing money, to be able to save money?  Yeah.  Too many times, I have been smart enough, but not have-the-spare-cash-y enough, to take advantage of seasonal clearance sales, for shopping a size ahead.

Tangentially — because I ran into these while looking for a clearanced winter coat that WOULD work for next year — would it not be the cutest freaking thing EVER to have Ash wear this suit with this hat?!  I can just imagine spiffing him up in that for the first time, for Easter, and all our middle-aged gay friends from the GLBT & Friends mass would just SWOON for the miniature crooner from Sinatra’s day.  Oh, let’s face it….pretty much anyone out there, would swoon.  My only gripe is that there are no belt-loops on the pants, since he happens to have a black belt because his last pair of dress pants would have been a pair of dress-anklets, otherwise.  Still.  I am trying to get the image out of my head, and I just can’t.  (NOTE: A suit set and hat have since been acquired.  I love friends who go, “Would this work?”)  It doesn’t help that kiddo is FINALLY not only not-against hats, but interested in them.  I do wish that fedora was cheaper.  We haven’t yet found a miniature, black “flat cap” to match the one his Daddy acquired recently, and there are only so many places he can wear:

...Daddy's froggy winter hat, which is too big.

...his froggy rain hat.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

...his faire hat.

...his "Raking Hat" / "Thinking Hat" (search and ye shall find photos) -- here worn to school for Hat Day, even though it doesn't fit.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I aught to do some more online searching when it comes to the winter coat for next year, though.  Ash has already gotten two years out of his current winter coat, and it’s not going to be long enough next year.  This one looks kind of nice, although it’s hardly clearanced yet.  Sorry, this post turned into a partially-for-my-own-reference thing.  But hey, if any of you have a size 7 boy’s winter coat kind of like that, up for grabs, that your kid has outgrown…

Right.  Onwards with the point of this all…

So.  We went back home.  We collected Ash from his afternoon bus, fed and toileted him, congratulated him on making it through both bus rides and the school day without any kind of trouble, injury, or potty accident, and then got re-bundled to head out again.  Ash had decided that we should all go together on the rest of the errands, lest Daddy have to go all by himself.  Besides, it’s not as if M-’s mother had actually followed through this time, on the play-date that Ash and M- were supposed to have today.  Murglefraster.

Thankfully, Ash handled the change in plans rather well.  We dropped off our rent check, and then headed to DollarTree.  I found a blue pencil box for Ash, so he can keep track of the various, seasonally-themed pencils he’s been collecting — because, of course, it drives him nuts when there’s a particular pencil he wants to use, but he can’t find it because it rolled behind the desk or something.  I found eraser tips for the pencils that have outlived their erasers.  I found a couple of other useful, but somewhat boring items we’d been hoping to find, for the household at large.  I also found a couple of things for Ash’s Easter Basket, some 6-count plastic wine goblet boxes in preparation for the hoped-for birthday party, a nicely shamrock-green t-shirt to make into something special for St. Patty’s day (and after) for him because I’m cool like that, and a purple t-shirt for my birthday-present-plan for his classmate and casual friend A-, who has invited him to her birthday party for the second year in a row.  Her favorite color is purple, and she’s a girly girl who loves princesses….just not very demure princesses….so I figure I can bling up a purple t-shirt with one of those pink rhinestone princess crown appliques, and, depending on the cost, maybe also glittery iron-on letters spelling out “Princess A-”….in any event, if it turns out we won’t be able to get him to A-’s party, I can easily enough find some other use for a purple t-shirt.  Ash picked out a book on “Great Americans” because he recognized some of the presidents on the cover — and it’s an educational book at a good reading level for him, so we’re pretty happy about that.  It gives him more information on some figures that he’s already learned about, as well as some he will learn about in later grades.  There are also a few people like Elvis Presley in there, but that lead to my catching a short video clip of him strumming his toy guitar white trying to do wiggly-impressions of Elvis’ dancing, while a YouTube clip of “The King” in action played in the background….so, y’know, I guess I can deal with that.  ;-)   Overall, we got a lot of useful stuff that wasn’t overwhelmingly frivolous, for very little money.  It was also for a heck of a lot less than we would have spent if it didn’t occur to us to look for these kinds of things we needed or were going to, at a place like DollarTree.  Score.

There’s a volunteer-run, profits-go-directly-to-feeding-the-local-homeless thrift store close by to the DollarTree, so we stopped in there.  Steffan scored a shirt he can use both in and out of work, and a scarf that goes with his coats and non-silly hats, so he can stop borrowing mine.  I scored a flattering spring/summer top that’ll go with some of the only skirts I still have that fit me, and another shirt that manages to actually be both really soft and warm, AND flattering.  Yep, now I’ll get rid of another of the sweatshirts that are almost 20 years old.  I also found one pair of camo cargo pants and two pairs of blue jeans that’ll fit Ash next year, and he picked a shirt out for himself.  He got it into his head that he wanted to find a green shirt (possibly because that’s what his Daddy found), but he kept finding ones that were either way too big, or way too small.  We had our own little thrift store version of the Goldilocks story, going on there for a while.  Finally he found one he liked — a forest green thermal shirt, with a little bit of thin, black striping — that will be a bit big on him this year, but will fit him for the next two years.  Thermals are a staple of his fall/winter/spring wardrobe, so I can deal with that.  It’s nice when we don’t have to be desperate for hand-me-downs shipped from long-distance friends, when new sizes and seasons come and we haven’t been able to prepare as well as we’d wanted to.  Don’t get me wrong….I LOVE that method of at least partially wardrobing, but it doesn’t always work out, either.  Regardless, we walked out with probably $60-80 worth of clothes in good condition, that were needed, for around $20.  Win!

Overall, it was an exceedingly successful Thrifty Day!  We didn’t end up with time to get our oil changed, but hey, I had a coupon for that, too, thanks to a “perk” one of the times that Steffan donated blood.  We also didn’t get as far as arranging some of my other sorts of medical appointments — although Steffan made one for himself when he picked me up from the Dr’s — but it was pretty darn productive overall, too.  After a smooth dinner-time (in which all three of us ate breaded fish sticks….that’s right, WE ALL ATE THE SAME THING!) and bedtime, I even managed to arrange a short play-date with some of our only local family friends, for Sunday.  We’ll be more closely eyeballing their place at the same time, since we happen to be looking into whether transferring Ash to an integrated school program local to their house is a viable and responsible option, because renting their house from THEM when we have to move this coming July would be an all-kinds-of-awesome option for us in other ways.

Whew!  It’s not often I have enough productivity in one day, to fill this long a post!  Sorry?  Heheh.

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Distinguishing between dragons

February 29, 2012 By 4 Comments

One of the many crazy-awesome pieces by M. Peña -- the image is linked to source.

Ash decided that for his birthday, he wants me to make him a chocolate cake shaped like a purple dragon with green and blue polka-dot scales all over.  He’s not talking about a flat cake with a dragon design drawn on it either, but a 3D cake similar to the coiled, green dragon one I made Steffan a few years ago.  Very well.  I have a plan.  With luck, I’ll ALSO have more than the 1½ hours from start to finish, and incomplete planned-ingredient list that I unexpectedly had to work with (gotta love when certain people show up 3 hours earlier than you told them the party would begin), when I made that first 3D dragon cake.  Ash doesn’t know yet that I haven’t given up on making his personal party possible, so he thinks there will just be the usual family party.  In line with that thought, if the with-his-friends party can happen, and his auntie wants to make some of her snazzy cupcakes for it to get the attention of his classmates’ parents, I can plot and scheme those with her as a surprise for him, since the dragon cake I would quite possibly have made some version of anyway, has now gone from surprise to request.  The cupcakes can involve different flavors and/or possibly take some egg-free form, if one of Ash’s two classmates with egg allergies, end up coming.  They could be decorated….well, in whatever thematic way we brainstorm that his auntie feels up to, if it comes to that.  I still haven’t asked her about it, because it seems silly to do so before any plan — even the family-based one — is even vaguely in place.

In the meantime, at one point today during a tickle-fight, Ash started to Raaar at me.  I went into silly antics, going on about how the dragon was going to breathe fire at me and turn me into tickle monster toast to eat.  “But of course I’m a dragon!” he said, “But I don’t think I need toast, because my tummy isn’t sick.”  Oh, that was very good to hear, I told him.  By the way, was he a purple dragon with green and blue polka-dot scales all over, like the one he wanted me to make his birthday cake into?  “You’re so silly, Mommy!  Nooooo, of COURSE not.  I’m not a purple dragon with blue and green polka-dot scales.  I’m a REAL dragon that’s green.”

Mommy is indeed pretty darn silly.  That must be why she giggles so much.

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Valentine’s Day 2012

February 17, 2012 By 2 Comments

I hope that on the 14th, whether or not you celebrated Valentine’s Day, whoever you did or didn’t celebrate with, you knew, and truly felt, that you are loved.

Ash had school on Tuesday, and while he was there, Steffan had work.  The few hours of family togetherness that remained between homework and bedtime were to be dedicated to celebrating the holiday with Ash.  After all that, Steffan and I were — fairly predictably — too zonked to celebrate more privately….but that’s ok.  Steffan and I are a little more able to take it in stride when things aren’t best-manifested on their pre-designated dates, than Ash is!  Steffan had presented me with a chocolate rose (in, “Festive red foil,” Ash would like to be sure you know) at 4am when he woke up and realized that putting the finishing touches on the shirt I was making for Ash had not yet released me to bed with him.  We’d get to our own more extended celebration on Thursday night, after he’d had the day off and before he’d have another day off.  At random times during the week, I’d find myself surprised by some little token — such as when Steffan sidled up to me with adorable dramatized meekness, then with a huge, proud grin, whipped something from behind his back and said, “Happy whatever we feel like celebrating about us today, day!”  Yeah, Ash gets a whole lotta CUTE from his Daddy.  Hee!  Eniways, it was all good.

I'm pretty sure that all Mommies still working on something for their kid 3 hours before their kid is going to need it, aught to get one of these from their counterpart Daddy (or whoever).

This was the design I put together, and then put onto a shirt for Ash, for Valentine's Day. The frog is not my artwork. I'm afraid I didn't have the kind of time needed for my own artwork, this year!

On Tuesday it-was-morning-for-all-of-us-at-that-point, I went to wake Ash up, and was greeted by, “Happy Valentine’s Day, Mommy!” as soon as his eyes focused.  After some extra hugs and kisses, we set about the morning routine — a routine which was made considerably more exciting by the fact that I had set out a special outfit for Valentine’s Day, including the shirt I’d made for him as a gift.  Oh yes, my little froggy prince charming quite loved it!

PSA: Special Little Prince Valentine shirts might make little princes twirl like princesses singing, "I Feel Pretty"...

So dang cute, it's hard to keep your feet.

Of course, giggles knock you over regularly, around here, also.

We have our own version of the old, "I've fallen, and I can't get up!" commercials, in our house.

Supposedly the shirt was a hit at school, too.  I don’t really know how the other kids reacted, beyond not-badly (or I would’ve heard about it), but I had notes from the staff about how adorable it was, and about how everyone was surprised when Ash told them I had made it for him.  Ash told me that one of his teachers told him that it was going to be hard not to kiss him, but that that was ok, because he was already a prince charming to them — to which he claims the reply, “Why yes, I AM, I know!”

The holiday-based changes in the school day made for a fun — and exhausting — time, for Ash.  He came home with a sack of valentines from his classmates, the half-Halloween‘s-haul equivalent of another sack of candy taped to those valentines (apparently the agreement to prepare goody bags of sweets to go along with the typical array of sticker-folded cards, did not reach my planet), a few warm-n-fuzzy stories about thank-you’s and hugs from kids after getting valentines from him, some holiday projects for us (which decreased in number relative to last year, predictably), and a tightrope-routine along the fine line between holding it together, and mark-your-calenders-for-meltdown.

This flower, which Ash made in one of his therapies, actually came home on Monday. It was supposed to come home on Friday, but had gotten pushed back and overlooked in the shadows of Ash's mailbox, and didn't make it into his backpack like he'd thought it had. He was SOOO proud and excited to give me, "The beautiful flower (he) made for (me)" -- it was the first thing he mentioned when I got him off the bus on Friday -- and he had been crestfallen when it appeared to have gotten lost. I was so, so relieved, for a few reasons, when it was found and secured in his bag for him, on the next school day!"

This is the valentine that Ash made for both of us. :-)

This is the valentine that Ash made just for me. :-D

And this....made me cry. Sentence one reads, "My hero is mommy." Sentence two reads, "I have just one daddy." Sentence three reads, "I said hello to a friend."

Thankfully, both Ash and I managed to hold it together, and worth through his “3 Steps” after getting home from school.  After eating his snack, Ash asked me if I would share my chocolate rose with him.  I told him that I’d be happy to, but that I wasn’t ready to open it yet.  He accepted this without struggle, and decided that, instead, he’d share one of the miniature chocolate bars he’d ended up with, with me!  A miniature Hershey bar — something I am normally loathe to refer to as chocolate — has never before tasted so sweet.  We finished off the whole thing, taking turns bite-by-bite.  I’d say we did so at his direction, but that doesn’t even cover it, since he fed me my bites of chocolate.  Once we were done, he asked for my help cleaning off his fingers and his mouth, “So [he] could hug and kiss [me] without making [me] dirty.”  Then, after another love-you, he went off to the bathroom with, “Ok, ok, I’ll catch ya when I’m done with step two.”

Glass crayons used on medicine cabinet mirrors make trips to the bathroom more exciting, too.

Homework -- "Step 3" -- was done with a new, Valentine's Day pencil. Much as both Steffan and I dislike pink, Ash hasn't been raised to object to a pink-and-white, heart-adorned pencil as too girly. By the way, it's still odd to see a mature pincher grip, a supported writing arm, and the other hand holding the paper. So odd, and so wonderful.

Part of Ash's homework was a sheet of math problems you solved to end up with a Valentine's Day coded message. Oh, in the background you can see the board game we're currently playing as a family again. Ash gets the blue piece, Daddy gets the green piece, and Mommy gets the red piece.

We always take a lot of "hug breaks" ....and sometimes, kissy breaks, too! On this day, there were at least a few hugs, kisses, cuddles, and verbal proclamations of love, along with Valentine's Day wishes, every hour. You can bet I soaked in every moment of it, and gave as good as I got! In fact, at one point I kind of had to remind myself that if I didn't want Ash to have a potty accident, I really needed to stop squishing him, even if he DID tell me that he loved me about five times while on the way to the bathroom.

Daddy got home from work around the time homework was being finished up, so then he went out to get the pizza we’d promised Ash for dinner.  (And so, the last of the Christmas gift cards went *poof*, into a big, tomato-sauce-covered grin.)  While he was out, Ash kind of randomly turned to me and asked, “Mommy, am I a man yet?”  After I replied that he had  more growing-up to do first, he told me, “Well, I will be a man when I get married.”  I asked him who he thought he was going to marry, some-day.  “I think I will marry Daddy,” he said, “Or maybe, no, I was wrong.  I will marry you.”   Yep, we’re pretty equal-opportunity, around here.  I guess it shows.  ;-)

After enjoying dinner, we gave Ash his valentines from us and from his great-grandma, and his other gifts.  He had asked for a shiny frog balloon like the one we’d gotten him two years before.  (A mylar balloon filled with helium is only $1 at DollarTree, you know, instead of $2-6 elsewhere.)  Thankfully, he didn’t get upset that they’ve changed the model slightly since then.

He might be high-maintenance (for example, as you can see starting here from one photo to the next, he chaps horribly around his lips in the winter, even when he DOESN'T have a cold, if he goes more than a few minutes without medicated chap stick freshly applied -- because he's so often licking and sucking on his lips, as he mouth-stims), but he sure isn't "high maintenance"....he could've been set with that smile, all day, with only the $1 balloon.

One of the things you can do with balloons, is have "bopping battles"....and it is nearly as funny, to just bop yourself!

You can run back and forth with them, or spin around while trailing them...

...until you get dizzy! (That is, of course, assuming you're CAPABLE of getting dizzy, at that time -- which Ash isn't always.)

You can listen to the noise they make while you yank them back and forth, or let them go and watch them float up, over and over.

You can pretend the balloon is your head...

We could easily have left things at balloon-play, but there was one more present for Ash.  A friend had sent him this adorable Valentine Dragon, that she found at Target:

The Valentine dragon doesn't have a name yet.

Actually, she claimed that the toy thought it was a dinosaur….that happened to have wings.  Yeah, whatever — it’s totally a dragon.  Once he had checked to confirm that it was not going to surprise him with any noises, Ash was all over it.

Apparently, if this dragon kisses you, your hair is set on fire. The photo above is of Ash watching me react to the information. It’s all right for him to be amused, because in this game of pretend, when a love-dragon sets your hair on fire, it doesn’t hurt, it just turns red…..until Ash blows it out, at which point, “Whew! It’s black again. Ok, Mommy, it’s your turn to set my hair on fire.”  Hmm….perhaps not the version of being set on fire with kisses that one would expect from a happily-married couple, on Valentine’s Day, but I didn’t mind the additional version. ;-)

After a little more family play-time and some shared cocoa, it was time for bed.  Ash didn’t want to take off his special shirt, and when he finally did, said, “But Mommy….I can wear it again even if it isn’t Valentine’s Day, right?!”  As if he needed to prove that he wasn’t done being my little prince charming yet, he decided to break his own routine — YES, YOU READ THAT RIGHT — and switch up the order that we took our turns wishing on his star-lamp during the bedtime routing, telling me that I could go first, and his Daddy could go second.  (Normally, he goes first, I go second, and if Daddy is home for that bedtime, he goes third.)  Naturally, extra wishes included variations on the theme of always being each others’ valentines, having had a happy Valentine’s Day, etc.  Also naturally, the traditional last wish of each of us, remained the same.  To help avoid wish-interrupting, the cue is always saying, “And also…” or, “And for my last wish…” — if Steffan or I is wishing, Ash completes the sentence for us with a triumphant, “….for lots of hugs and kisses!!!”  If he is making his wish, we say it all together.

It was a good day, filled with lots of love.  The best part is that it didn’t end there.

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