been busy

Today is DD's 7th birthday; I've been running around all week to get ready for it.

Last night DH and I assembled this cute desk and hutch from Target. They'll look perfect in her room, and it will spare me having to do the re-fit of the table that was in there. That project was better in concept than in reality, anyway, and in my current post-op condition, who knows when I would get around to starting it? So now she has her very own desk and more storage, which she desperately needs. She's psyched to have her own space for drawing or other projects.

Yesterday I baked her cakes; today I get to decorate them. Slight variations: the overall cake will be pink, with white borders, and blue flowers. But that illustration (minus the bride & groom, of course) is not too far removed from what she's hoping for. It's kind of scary that that cake feeds 124 people -- but I used the 3 smallest size cake pans, not the three largest, and we all know that a "serving" is some bizarre idea of how a nutritionist thinks we should eat cake (four bites with a demitasse spoon?), so I'm not worried about it. It's all about the effort.

Earlier this week I helped Nana shop for DD's present, too. We scored beautiful bedding for her in a bright pink flower print that goes perfectly with what she already had. Now she can switch between pink flowers and lavender Hello Kitty. Lucky girl.

This morning I let her open one present early, her charm bracelet from Lisa Maynard Designs. (Choose "Collections" and then "Fairy Princess"; it's Flash so I can't link to the page directly.) Lisa did a beautiful job on the bracelet and made a special trip over on Wednesday to drop it off so DD would have it this morning.

Tonight we're off to the Elephant Bar for an early dinner, then home for happy birthday and cake. Now I'm off to make several pounds of decorator icing, and commence coping with the various lopsidedness of each of the layers.

(Recovery continues apace. My physical therapist is pleased with my progress. I still get killer headaches when my Tylenol wears off, like right now, and I'm not sleeping as well or as much as I would like, but other than that, I'm OK. No word on the pathology report from MDA, either, but I'm trying not to think about that.)