Great weekend

I do love birthday celebrations that start early and last.

I got a box at Christmas from my dad and stepmom that said "Happy Birthday!" that I haven't opened yet. (But I won't be able to resist for long.)

My sister already emailed me about a gift that is coming. Well, she already asked me what I wanted and emailed a link to ask if it would work (3-in-1 networkable printer, woo hoo!).

And a friend with whom I was going to do a Girls' Night Out on Saturday said, "I'm going to take you out for your birthday." Her DH watched G and we went to Kincaid's (you are not surprised) and it was perfect. We talked and laughed and ate and ate. It was SO good. I'm having the leftovers today.

Friday night, G and I went to the Social Skills group at the Berkeley Y. It's free and they bring pizza (for a donation). I am usually the only adult who has any (but I always wait till the kids have theirs) and we always donate about $5. G was totally wiggly at the check-in time (we go around the circle)--didn't want to stay in his chair but sat upside-down in it for a while and then crawled under mine. I think it was a combination of feeling uncomfortable in that group and maybe wanting some attention (which he got from some of the kids). I wavered between feeling annoyed that he just. couldn't. sit. in. his. chair and feeling like, Hey, this is how he is, and if anyone here doesn't understand that, we're in the wrong group. We finished our evening with a swim in the shallow Warm Pool, which was way overchlorinated. I played a keep-away game with G that turned out to be pretty fun, and then he threw the diving toys around the pool as I hid my eyes and had me find them. He dressed and showered in the boys' locker room for the first time and did fine. He had come with me to the girls' locker room last time, but the signs do say boys over 5 should be in the other one, and he noticed them this time. I was glad he did find--found a locker OK and washed his body and hair in the shower afterward just fine.

Saturday morning, we grabbed Oakland Zoo passes and walked around to two houses in Alameda. Wow, Gmap Pedometer says we walked almost 3 miles! It took us an hour (including a stop at a garage sale) and G was "so" tired when we got home. We had 15 mins to pack lunches and get out the door again to get to the Zoo on time. We made it, and instead of the 3 families from our church that I'd expected, we had seven! The zoo was very busy. I asked a Zoo worker, and she pointed out that it was the first warm weekend day in a while. We slowly made our way up to the elephants, down to the Meerkats, and back toward the front. Some folks wanted to buy some food at the cafe, and we all ended up there. I looked at all the deep-fried possibilities and went healthy (for once) and got a fruit/juice bar and a fruit salad.

We went to the rides next:




And then had a while till my dinner out... waiting for the Cable Guy. Literally.

He came at about 5 (in his 4-6PM window, Thanks, Comcast, for a reasonable time window!) and got his stuff done by 6, which meant I couldn't really change until then, but I put out my clothes and got started on my makeup while waiting for him to be done. He had to do some work at my modem with his box-that-tested-speed and then was on the phone with a friend, it sounded like (WTF), and then was finally done. I don't know what they did but it all still works, so good.

Sunday, we just could not get out of bed, so we missed church entirely. I was in my pjs until like 2PM, but getting stuff done at the house: got my hockey gear washed and set out in the sun to dry (finished drying in the dryer, first on low, then on Air Dry) and packed to go to the rink. Cleaned out my hockey bag, fixed my garter belt (I keep losing one of the dangly rubber bits), and sewed up like 7 rips in my pants. Retaped both of my sticks, which felt good: and then set them on the floor and they got all dog-hairy, dangit.

Got a call from Andrea asking me to sub in the game before mine, a nice compliment! And woot, my sitter could, after all, show up 1.5 hrs early! I got all my gear loaded in the car, came back up the back stairs to hear G talking to someone. My sitter was there early--and surprised himself. He said he'd missed the first bus. Well, that works anyway.

The games were way fun; I played D line with Andrea for the first time, I think ever. It felt very smooth; nice to play with someone who's so clear and LOUD about changes. Both teams were faster at changes this time; my team was so. slow. at changes last game that it was making me NUTS. Several gals get on the top of the boards and pause. ARGH!

The first game was 3-0 (or 4-0?) and still a tough game. I got to skate up against my team captain, which was really very fun. She's tricky and fast, and got very annoyed with me when I messed up a play she was setting up. Lots of backtalk and taunting, yay! Then, in our game, I looked at their bench and thought, Wow, they have a lot of speed and strength. And yet, we held them, and we were scoreless at the end. In the sudden death, our wing managed to pop it in the goal in the first 15 seconds, which was nice, as it was my second game and I was getting a little pooped. Fun, fun game with good goalies. Great.

I came home and got G in bed on time, just barely, and worked some more on my pajama top. I'm on step 10 of 17, and it's coming along nicely. It seems a little big, but that's better than the alternative. He's at "art camp" today for the day off, and will spend a few hours at my office after camp is over. Maybe we'll wash the dog tonight. Always fun at our house!