Rewind: My Boy Turned 9

Back towards the beginning of May, Hudson up and turned 9 on me.  How can he be this old?  And going into 4th grade next year?  Those of you who have older kids are probably thinking, "Just wait..." and I realize he's going to keep getting older, but still.  It's hard to believe that I have a nine year old and that he's growing up so fast.

 

On his birthday, Hudson saved us money and requested his favorite home-cooked meal: grilled burgers, fresh watermelon, oven fries, and a green salad.  With root beer.  He's really not hard to please.  Dessert was ice cream from Cold Stone where he chose blue cotton candy ice cream with rainbow sprinkles mixed in.  After that came the traditional opening of presents.  Here he is opening one of two favorites that night (the other was a circuit board kit):

He kind of has a thing for Minecraft and Legos.  Putting out a product that entails both of these things is one of the most brilliant ideas in the history of toys.  Ever.

 

A few days later we had a little birthday gathering with extended family (hubby's parents, one of hubby's brothers and his boys, and my two brothers who live locally and their families).  Since smiling nicely for a picture is totally overrated when you're 9 years old, this is what Hudson treated my camera to when he had the chance:

Love my boy so much...  I now have about 11 months to come to terms with the fact that he's going to be 10 next year.

Rewind: Our Little Dancer

Claire wanted to give dancing a shot so back in the fall we put her in a contemporary dance class at a local studio.  Three of her friends were in the class with her and she positively LOVED it.  She had class once a week and finally, after months of preparation, she had her big recital at the end of April.  Her class did a darling little number to the tune of "Touch The Sky" from Disney's Brave.

Love this pic so I just had to work it in...

Claire and a few friends watching some of the older girls at their dress rehearsal.

 

 All dolled up for the big day.

 

Being a finicky almost-6-year-old, Claire thinks she wants to forgo dance this fall and give gymnastics a shot.  We'll see...

Rewind: Disney Princesses on Ice

Yes, you read the title right.  I took my girl to Disney Princesses on Ice.  This was a first for both of us as I had never been to any "on ice" performance in my life (I assume hockey games don't count but the fights are fun so that has to count for something, right?).

 

I bought our tickets several weeks in advance and lucked out when I snagged two seats at the aisle just one row up from the most expensive sections in the arena.  I didn't tell Claire but I wrote on our calendar that it was going to be a night out for the two of us.  She was excited as could be and leading up to the big day, she would refer to the calendar often.

 

Our evening started with dinner in SLC.  Once we arrived at City Creek, I gave Claire a few dinner options and she chose Blue Lemon.  We hadn't eaten there before and we both loved it.  I'm starting to salivate just thinking about the butternut squash soup I had. Mmmmmmm. This post isn't about food, though, so I'll move on...   After dinner we walked to the nearest Trax station and took the train over to The Delta Center (it has been renamed Energy Solutions Arena but it'll always be The Delta Center to me).  On the wait to the train and once we were there, Claire noticed other little girls dressed up as princesses.  She questioned me about it and I was very vague in my responses.

 

When we finally arrived at the arena, I sat her down in front of a tree and told her my evil plan.  She was beyond excited and happily held on tight as we made our way through the crowds inside.  We stopped at Cinderella's carriage which was made entirely out of Lego Duplo blocks and Claire did her best princess wave for a picture.  Then, being a total sucker (and having cash from the hubby), I gave in like any good pushover parent would and got her a light-up sparkly wand (it even makes pretty sounds) and a foam "crown" before we headed in to find our seats.  I also allowed myself to be talked into kettle corn, cotton candy (which she decided she didn't care for - strange child - we saved it for the boys at home), and a bottled water that cost me more than it should have. Oh well...it was a special mommy-daughter date and my girl is worth every penny!

 

 

The show itself was a ton of fun.  Claire was completely enthralled and loved every second of it.  I think her favorite part was the WHOLE thing.  My favorite scenes were when Rapunzel and Flynn held onto long, flowy bands of fabric and rose up into the air and when they lit the lanterns at the end.  Such good stuff!  I honestly enjoyed the entire show and would love to take both of our kids sometime when they put on a more gender-neutral show.

 

Now, I've saved the best for last.  I took a video or two of Claire during the show, just hoping to catch one of "those" moments.  At one point, I could tell based on the storyline and such that a something big was coming up so I quietly turned on my phone's video camera and waited...

This was hands-down my favorite moment of the night!

Ouch Part II: Broken

WARNING for those of you who have issues with even mild injuries/x-rays, bruising (I think bruises are awesome, by the way) and/or feet (I'm thinking of you, HTP): There are pictures of my x-rays and my beautiful bruised toe and foot below.  You may want to shield your eyes.

 

Moving on....

 

My hunch/instinct about my toe was right.  I broke my poor little 5th metatarsal right at the base of the toe.  Lame!!!  After an uncomfortable night and humming and hawing about getting things checked out, I finally went to the doctor late Tuesday morning.  When the tech was reviewing the first two of three films, I heard her say, "Ouch!" quite loudly from the back room.  I asked her if she was okay and she responded that she was fine, she was just looking at the pictures of my toe.  Awesome.

 

The nice doctor came in and saw me once he'd seen my films and we chatted for a few minutes.  He really was a nice, good, honest guy and whispered that he could buddy-tape the toe for me but that the clinic would charge something like $120 for it and suggested that if I was comfortable doing it myself, that I should do so.  No question there!!  Before I left, a medical assistant came in and gave me a lovely black shoe with a sturdy sole and Velcro straps...just like the one that has been collecting dust on the top shelf of my closet for a few years.  Compared to the flip-flops I had on when I walked in (even my loosest, comfiest shoes hurt like crazy), it actually felt quite nice to cruise around in.

X-rays of the toe along with bruising that night.  The bruising got way worse but I didn't get a good pic before it started to go down again. Also - I have since painted my toenails so my foot looks a tiny bit normal.

 

On the wise advice of my hubby, I went to see my podiatrist on Wednesday.  I asked all kinds of questions about activity level/usage of the foot, when I can try normal shoes, etc.  I wasn't too happy to hear that the first two weeks are the most crucial for healing and that I need to take it easy.  Ha, ha, ha!!  I know it's logical but it still bugs).  I have to go back in about a month to have new x-rays taken and hopefully at that point, I can stop wearing my crazy wicked-awesome strappy shoe...if it doesn't hurt.

 

Since my doctor's appointment, I've tried to take it easy and since the doc okayed it, I've kind of let pain be my guide.  I've definitely overdone it a couple of times in the past few days (like when I cleaned bathrooms, did laundry, and went out to a movie and dinner yesterday) but I've really tried to make sure that I sit back and put the foot up for longer than 10 minutes at least a few times a day.  And I'm counting sitting here at the computer and not moving it as rest time as well.  I have to because otherwise I'd go nuts.  I can't just sit around, read, and eat chocolate all day.  Well, I'm sure I could manage somehow - especially if it was dark chocolate marzipan from Mrs. Cavanaugh's - but I'm not wired that way.

 

In the meantime, my mom was apparently insanely jealous of all the attention that I've gotten with my broken toe so on Friday morning, she up and rolled her ankle and broke her 5th metatarsal.  Her break is on one of the longer bones up closer to the ankle so it's considered a broken foot.  Lucky lady gets to wear a back Velcro boot that goes up to her knee.  And she has a cane.  I am not envious.  We're going to see each other later this week and you can bet we'll be taking some pictures of our darling footwear and spending lots of time sitting around.  At least we both did this to our left feet so we can still drive.  I think between the two of us, we might be able to function as 1, maybe 1 1/2 adults.

More posts coming throughout this week.  And I'm not bluffing (for once)...I've already knocked out 3 posts and scheduled them!

Ouch

This afternoon Hudson and I worked on rearranging his room.  We sorted, cleaned, put away, threw-out, moved, and generally took care of business with everything in there.  When the bulk of the work was done, I sent him off to play and started to take care of a few bigger tasks that I decided to do on my own (i.e. making up his bunk bed which happens to be my all-time least favorite household chore. I'd rather scrub the toilets or mop the kitchen...I curse whoever invented bunk beds with railings).

 

I can't recall exactly what I was doing, but after running something to the kitchen, I walked back into the room and while apparently not paying attention to where I was stepping, I jammed my left pinky toe into Hudson's big, sturdy book basket.  I heard a crack but I don't know if it was the basket or my toe.  Either way, it felt less than marvelous and I quickly grabbed the railing on the bunk bed and stood there trying to decide whether I felt like swearing or crying.  I did neither and instead took my sweet time soaking up the pain and rather un-fondly remembering when I broke that same toe about 3 1/2 years ago...  Just before Christmas.  Spiral fracture. Huge black boot. 10 weeks before normal shoes didn't hurt.  Ugh.

 

Dinner had just arrived when this happened (pizza night...too hot to turn on the ovens or stove and too hot to make hubby grill out back) so I took it easy with my foot resting on a pillow while we ate and watched MIB 3 with the kiddies downstairs. Will Smith, by the way, is positively hilarious...I can't stop laughing when he's doing his thing. Anywho - hubby did his best to keep me from being on my foot too much and was kind enough to bring me pain killers and get me another slice of pizza.  I have a hard time being waited on but it sure felt better to be off it than hobbling around like a total gimp.

 

Tonight the toe has definitely swelled up a bit and it's starting to turn a lovely shade of light purple at the base and around the side.  The pain isn't nearly as bad as it was when I first love-tapped the book basket but I don't know if that is because I've stayed off it much of the night, if the painkillers are doing their job, or if it's because it's not broken and is already getting better.  I'm hoping and crossing my fingers that this is nothing more than a bad jam or sprain.  We'll see how the pain is tomorrow.  I really don't want a broken toe and I really don't want to wear that super stylish boot for several weeks again.  It'd make everyone jealous and I hate making others feel less beautiful just because I look so incredibly awesome with my bulky Velcro-strapped footwear.

 

Please don't be broken.