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A dozen
Twelve years ago I went into labor during the day but carried on with most of my usual activities. It was about 11pm when We went off to the hospital with our little Game Fanatic in tow. Within half an hour of arrival, the Scientist’s mum arrived to whisk him away so he would have to hear his mum howling any longer…I wasn’t nearly so vocal the first time around. I then spent several hours battling a doctor keen on breaking my waters to move things along…except I kept having contractions and didn’t want them broken before the right time. Eventually nature took its course in that area but that little guy was definitely not moving out of his comfortable accomodation. It was several hours later a consultant came along and took charge and the Scientist was able to watch our Lego Lover as he entered the world and joined our family. Happy birthday to my beautiful Lego Lover!
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Has it been that long?
I didn’t realise it had been over a month since my last post….sigh…We are still here and life does carry on, of course.
Last week our Game Fanatic reached his sixteenth birthday. It’s kind of weird to think about how close he is to adulthood. By the reckoning of one government department here called Centrelink, he actually is an adult, and is able to claim certain payments himself. It seems very strange when he isn’t able to vote or drink until he is eighteen. For his birthday, I baked him a lemon madeira cake because he has recently taken a liking to lemony things. Game Fanatic doesn’t care much for cake but he likes this one enough that he asked me yesterday if I could make another one. I also baked a Jamie Oliver Bloomin’ brownie recipe that was somewhat less successful. It was fine for a serious lover of dark chocolate. But it was kind of chocolate overkill for us and was only helped by adding some vanilla ice cream. He asked for my rice pilaf with Spanish chorizo, chickpeas, mushrooms and potato as it’s a favorite dish I cook. The rice often is not cooked properly  no matter which method I use but this time I did it in the pressure cooker and timed it so that it came out beautifully. He was quite happy with his gifts but they were on his list so there shouldn’t have been any problem there.  We gave him a console game that he wanted along with a dvd set of an anime series he liked watching a few years ago. All his other presents were money that he is still working out how to spend.
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Birthday excitement
The birthday went off really well, especially considering Lego Lover slept very little the night before. I thought he would become cranky but he managed to hold himself together through the entire day. I think he was on a birthday high all day.
The day started fairly early when he woke in a pretty good mood. We had to wake his brother so that he could open his present or he might have been waiting quite a while. As soon as he saw the package, he knew exactly what he was getting. He just loves his mega sized Transformer. The only problem is it makes sounds/noises quite easily and there’s no way to turn it off. It only takes the slightest touch. It took quite some time to get the parts out of the packaging and then it was a while before it was all together. So Lego Lover had a great time going through this process and afterwards had much opportunity for play.
We worked on making the Lego brick cake in the afternoon. That didn’t go completely pear-shaped but I think we learned a few lessons to improve the end product next time. We used marshmallows, as I had seen suggested online somewhere, and placed them across an already frosted cake. Then I took the remaining frosting and heated it slightly so I could drizzle it over the marshmallows. They didn’t get as covered as would be ideal but the effect was sort of there. Lego Lover liked it.
Once the Scientist finished work, we went to Whiteman Park, a local state park (about five minutes from us), to meet up with family. The plan was to keep it simple with cake, drinks and a few corn chips. Lego Lover received his presents pretty much as he arrived. He ended up with mostly money and a Bionicle set he wanted. We had cake and then it was play time for a while before we headed home to have “Krabby Patties”.
After dinner we went up to Hillary’s Boat Harbour to get an ice cream and returned home soon afterwards. Lego Lover managed to stay awake until midnight but the tiredness ensured he fell asleep pretty quickly that night with sweet dreams of the Christmas to come.
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Birthday success
I’m too tired to post a proper account but the day went quite nicely for Lego Lover. He woke after a mere 5.5 hours of sleep and lasted the whole day without too much fuss at all. Hopefully tonight’s sleep will be much better and he will be well-rested for Christmas. I’ll post more in a couple days when I’ve more time and my brain is more alert.
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Anticipation
It’s Lego Lover’s birthday tomorrow and the anticipation is trying to do him in. He’s been terribly excited for days and today he had to tell me that his birthday is very close about ten or fifteen times. He was so excited he went to bed early tonight. He fell asleep pretty quickly but then I had to close the sliding glass door off the laundry room and he was suddenly awake. I think it was mostly a matter of him sleeping lightly at the time. He’s been struggling to sleep since then, which is really frustrating for him.
Tonight I’ve had the task of blowing up the balloons that were requested. I waited as late as possible to start on it because Game Fanatic has a fear of balloons popping and, consequently, doesn’t like them. The packet is supposed to have twenty-five but we’re coming up a couple short. Maybe this is to make up for an extra one or two last year?
I made a start on the cake today because Lego Lover wants it to look like a brown Lego brick. So tomorrow I am going to do a second mix in cupcake form…or we might try marshmallows to make the brick effect. I’m a bit worried about trying to spread frosting on it so might see if I can get a mini-cupcake tin since ours makes the larged-size ones. The second cake mix is going to be a dairy free version so that I can keep a few out for my dairy and soy-allergic niece.
Lego Lover is getting just one big present from us this year because it’s so expensive. It’s a very big Transformer model that breaks into about six other models or something like that. It was so highly desired he said it could be a combined birthday/Christmas present. One of the department stores here had it on sale for $99, reduced from $150. The one time I saw them in the store, Lego Lover was with me and there were heaps of them. When I was able to get back to buy one, they were all gone…not really that surprising. I’ve been saying it is just too expensive to buy at retail price and the the store where it was on sale had sold out. So he’s not really expecting to get this but I think he’s going to be very happy with it.
I was talking with him earlier today and told him that the start of his being born actually started the day before. I think he enjoyed hearing about some of the things that happened that day. I started having light contractions by the middle of the day. I had gone to our local bakery and the lady there was aghast that I was out doing normal things while I was in labor. She also announced they had sold the bakery and introduced me to the new owner. I didn’t reach full-on labor until later that night and we finally left of the hospital around 11pm. Lego Lover was finally born at 6:30 the next morning by c-section.
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Fifteen already
Last week, Game Fanatic reached the milestone of completing his fifteenth year. In no time at all he will be an adult. Here in Australia he’s now old enough to watch movies and play games that are rated M or MA. Celebrations were pretty low-key with family visiting on the day before (Sunday). This was planned specifically to get the anxiety and stress he experiences out of the way ahead of time. I think it worked pretty well in the end. He really wanted to wait for his birthday to open presents but some really wanted to see him open presents. So he opened those from the family. That night he was lamenting that he’d not have much to open on his birthday since he was expecting one thing from us. I think he was pleasantly surprised the next day when he had not one, but four presents from us. Game Fanatic creates a birthday and Christmas wish list each year with considerable care and we mostly stick to his list when buying gifts as he’s not terribly fond if being surprised. I managed to find two games from his list secondhand at EB Games on the weekend at a lower price than expected. One was a very rare game that I just lucked out finding. I’d also bought him a copy of Watership Down, one of his favorite books, from Book Depository a while back when purchasing Asterix books for his brother. I decided to keep that as a small surprise gift and I think he was quite pleased to get it. There were a couple of occasions where we were in a book shop recently where he’d gone looking for it so it was a relief that it wasn’t in stock any of those times. The last gift was a copy of Life of Brian by Monty Python, another surprise. He spent most of his birthday playing the game he’d been given the day before while waiting for his dad to get home from work (early). The rest of the day was spent trying out the new games and spending time with the immediate family. He’d be unlikely to express the feeling, but I think he had a really nice day this year.
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Wrong address
Both my parents had birthdays recently and I ordered a gift for my father through Amazon a few days in advance. I tracked the progress of the order over several days and was quite startled to see a note saying the address was incorrect. I contacted Dad to check on this and apparently I’ve been using the wrong address for several years now. I have had several packages sent to the incorrect address in the past two or three years. All have arrived without any problem before now. Anyway, he was able to pick up the package from the UPS office with no problem, which is a relief because I suspect it would have been returned to sender otherwise.
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Starting the forty-fifth year
I passed yet another birthday yesterday so I am now onto the 45th year. It seems as though it won’t be long at all until I’m at my 50th but I think I’ll take it as it comes. The day itself was pleasant enough although I don’t suppose I did much with it in the end, wasting too much time on the everyday things. It was far more interesting during the latter part because the Scientist had finished work and we were all together as a family. The boys made a mud cake for me which was very yummy.
We went out to dinner at an Italian restaurant. I had my first restaurant risotto which was nice, but I made the mistake of eating it all, despite knowing the cheesiness would do me in. I could have had leftovers today if I’d been less of a glutton. Ah well, lesson learned. I was really pleased to see Lego Lover eat and enjoy the pizza there instead of opting for the kid’s meal items. I guess he is really maturing. Game Fanatic chose a paella and didn’t like it. Apparently it was too wet and the texture was wrong. Probably not a good idea to get a Spanish dish at an Italian restaurant. The Scientist thoroughly enjoyed the gnocchi he ordered and said it was just the perfect amount for him.
After dinner we came home and watched My Fair Lady, probably my favorite musical going back many years. This was only the second time to watch it in widescreen and I was able to appreciate it even more this time, not being so awed by the different feel to the movie from the VHS pan and scan version. Lego Lover lost interest fairly early on but Game Fanatic stuck it out and I think did have some appreciation on his first viewing, especially for the fun poked at the upper classes. The Scientist and I both really enjoyed it as always.
Speaking of musicals…my friend K and I made rather late plans to see Phantom of the Opera on Friday night. It’s an Australian production that’s been running for several weeks now and will be closing on the weekend. I’ve never seen a big production musical before so I’m looking forward to it.
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