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Little man turns 6

As usual, Gavin's birthday was kicked off by the hunt for Thai food, paying our respects to our dinner on the night I went into labor. This year I drove up and down the winding jungle roads, grumbling at both of the closed-up roadside Thai food stands and ending up at the farmer's market picking up basil and cilantro. After popping cake pans in the oven (with batter in them) I made a stir-fry that we called Thai, and Gavin ate canned ravioli. Not quite capturing the original moment, but the kid was pleased, and Leif got a handful of rice.

The advent calendar coughed up a 5 dollar bill on his birthday morning. In the afternoon, I carted up a couple boxes of chocolate pudding and a giant can of whipped cream up to his classroom for distribution. I peeled lids and swirled cream onto 24 cups for eager little kids who has no problem shoveling birthday pudding into their faces while snarking insults at Gavin for being too old for kindergarten. They paused to ask me if I would squirt cream into their mouths. Which I did not. After I had wired them up, they moved on to their favorite pastime; tease the redheaded girl. The little thing sat with her thin ankles crossed and ate her pudding on the sidewalk curb by herself. She got an extra swirl of cream.

The boy had requested an R2D2 cake, and so I channeled my inner Food TV cake decorator and had at it. Now I appreciate why everyone uses fondant; icing is stupid and stupid. I had used photographic reference, but when I finished Gavin said, "He needs lines across that button." I thought he was being artistic, but no, I saw today that R2 does have a grill across that button. I wonder about his use of brain powers sometimes.

My mom joined the party as a floating head on the laptop, and we stuck her on a table with a view of the present chaos. Gavin wastes no time anymore, ripping and flinging paper. Satisfied with his haul, he emptied about a billion Star Wars legos onto the floor while Mike stared at the two-book manual for assembly. I bounced the baby and was glad nobody expected me to do it.

This week gave us a Christmas program and parent/child gingerbread house event, both of which we barely managed to attend as first-time parents of a schoolkid. I sat with Gavin this morning in the school cafeteria, slopping frosting and graham crackers onto a milk carton with a hundred other kids and parents. The little redheaded girl sat alone two seats down, evidently the child of other first-timers who didn't get the memo, so our table pulled together to get her house built and picture taken. It was a nice morning.

In other news, I somehow lost 3 pound this week even though I have been living solely on birthday cake, chocolate biscuits, and mini liquor candies. It's easy; eat enough of candy and you don't have to worry about calories because you get too sick to hold any in. Broke into the 140's, only 10 lbs to go.

The presents have been bought, the liquor stocked, the baking started, the floors cleaned. I'm happy with life, if a bit spotty on the magic still.