saturday circus

RING ONE: WAKE UP CALL

we had a FULL day today. we got up and had a good breakfast of eggs and toast with oranges. pooka didn't eat much, though. she was still excited about sleeping in her new room for the first time. i was not so excited. i was stiff. without my own mattress, my stock of pillows and particularly my body pillow, i did not sleep well. add in the obligatory 3 mid-night trips to the bathroom and i was still very tired.
she begged me to sleep there for another night but i adamantly refused.

while kisu and i were getting ready for the day ahead, she was buzzing around, wanting to do something for her room. we told her to go ahead and move in her socks and underwear. we aren't going to transfer her pants and shirts until we get a chance to sort through them, because i know there are a lot of things that are too small for her still in the old closet. she was very gung-ho, and ended up clearing out the changing table/dresser. she tried to move all the baby blankets, too, but we had to remind her that those were being handed down to the baby. we did let her keep the couple blankets that are personalized or have special meanings: like the ones she received from providence at her birth and children's at her diagnosis. these we put in an underbed storage case and slid, well, under her bed.

pooka tried to get us to stay home by pleading fatigue and saying she just wanted to sleep in her new bed all day long. yeah, as if that would happen. we finally left the house for adrian, with pooka in the back seat watching a dvd. when we got to uncle k's house, the boys left pretty quickly for the movies and the girls went to lunch.

RING TWO: EVERYBODY WAS KUNG-FU FIGHTING

after lunch, pooka and i went to the college to check out the black dragon's den tournament. it has been ages since i attended one. master rodriguez was very surprised to see me and pooka. we grabbed some seats and watched little kids' breaking. pooka was pretty interested and asked lots of questions. i was glad she quit protesting about being there. i introduced her to several people that i used to train with and she was her polite self. i was surprised that she didn't really pull the shy act. although most people there don't know about the leukemia, no one commented on the shortness of her hair. i guess they just figured "like mommy, like daughter".

the breaking did kind of drag on and we both got a little antsy. i was trying to keep her entertained long enough to see some sparring. finally, the fighting began, and fortunately, they start with the youngest kids first, so she could relate to it a little better. meanwhile, we had talked about the different uniforms and why they were barefoot, etc. she watched some of the sparring, but didn't really get into it. i don't know if she related it to the fighting that she and kisu do.

at one point, master rodriguez came over to us and asked, "so what does she play with? does she have any weapons?" i said, "well, she has a plastic sword, but it's more gladiator-style." he responds, "oh, she needs some nunchucks!" uh, yeah, exactly what i was thinking. he walks and away and comes back with a set of foam handled 'chucks. oh, okay, that's not so bad. i said, "my husband's gonna love this." she looked at them and we talked about what they were. then she said, "no thanks, mommy, you can have them." but then she saw some of the slightly older kids working them and playing with them, and she got interested. she pulled them out of the sleeve and got down off my lap to start swinging. i told her to stay in the open area behind me so she didn't hit anybody. the next thing i know, i hear these crazy qi-ups and i get whacked in the butt. i turned around and she's got a huge grin on her face. she didn't let the chucks out of her sight for the rest of the day, and even started to panic when she thought we left them at uncle k's. we then headed home for the next event...

RING THREE: JUMP AROUND, JUMP AROUND, JUMP UP, JUMP UP, AND GET DOWN

not knowing if there would be food at an 8pm birthday party, we stopped home for a quick snack. by the time we hit the road, it was obvious that we were going to be late because of the time required to drive to the place. oh, well. i was not very enthusiastic about the whole thing, considering what we had already done today. things were in full swing when we arrived, it was an inflatable play structure paradise. a jump/joust room; a jump/basketball room; a giant slide; and an obstacle course. pooka was in heaven, although i'm pretty sure heaven doesn't smell like sweaty kids' feet. i hope.

we were glad to see noel and nancy there. noel kept kisu company and nancy jumped around with pooka, since i obviously was in no condition to do so. except everyone kept encouraging me to get in the bounce houses, saying, "maybe it will bring the baby sooner". excuse me, what makes you think i want the baby to come any sooner than God has planned? i'm perfectly content with the baby where it is, thankyouverymuch.

anyway, pooka had a BLAST, and burned off tons of energy that i didn't know she still had. adios to more chemo-calories, baby! i did end up riding the slide a couple times, and paid for it: the first time i got an abrasion on my elbow and the e last time i whacked my face and shoulder against the side of the slide, plus pooka crashed her face into my other shoulder. ouch.

after much revelry, we headed to the party room for pizza and cake. pooka surprisingly didn't want any pizza and by the time she was ready for cake, the only kind left was vanilla. (vanilla anything is anathema to her.) we weren't too disappointed, though, that she couldn't get a dose of sugar at 945pm. she crashed by the time we were on the road for 5 minutes and when we got home, kisu and i hit the sack immediately, too.