Pixie Turns Three!

Pixie turned 3 on Tuesday, and I'm very pleased to say we all survived the day. Here's a few pictures from the eventful day.

Pixie and her sister, Princess. They don't always get along this well, of course.

The Birthday Girl enjoys her favorite breakfast while watching Handy Manny.

The big present of the day was a doll house. To be specific, my old doll house from when I was a child. My mom provided all new furnishings. Both girls enjoyed it immensely.

Yep, someone's having a happy birthday!

The success of the doll house was a bit of a surprise. I had been planning for a while to give my old doll house to one of the girls. One of the moms on our street told me that during one play date, Pixie had been obsessed with the doll house they had there, so I decided she could have it for her birthday, and then share it with her sister (doll houses are more fun when you have someone to share them with). It is an old doll house. My grandmother gave it to me when I was about 6 or 7, as a Christmas present. She was the only grandparent I ever knew, my maternal grandfather and paternal grandmother and grandfather having died before I was a year old. I still remember the day I got it, and I held onto it for ever, keeping it tucked away in the closet. When I pulled it out to give to Pixie, it still had all the original furniture in it, wrapped in tissue paper. We pulled out each piece to look at before putting the new doll house furniture in. Once I had the girls upstairs happily playing with their new toy, I came downstairs and cried. That I really hadn't expected, but seeing that doll house got me thinking about my grandmother and how thrilled she would have been to see the kids playing with it. She died several years ago, long before Michael and I had kids.

Anyway, I wrapped up the old doll furniture and tucked it away in a box. I suppose I could have given Pixie the old furniture, but the old stuff is wood, and old, and I worry that it's not up to the strain of being played with by an enthusiastic three-year-old. Besides, Pixie's new furniture all matches. Still, my old stuff was pretty nice...

Move It Mama Monday

Well, I'm finally going to declare 2009 officially started because I have no choice in the matter. Yeah, yeah, I know. 2009 started almost two months ago. Well I had so much stuff from 2008 left hanging over my head that I wasn't really ready to start 2009 until today. And I'm starting today because (drumroll please)...

I turned 40 today. That's right, I've hit not-quite-middle-old-age.

I have to say 39 was pretty rough. I had a lot going on - the podcast, promoting my first book, writing and publishing my second book, the webcomic, Princess starting kindergarten, Saint Michael the Magnificent's work schedule (he's telecommuting with a NASA center on the opposite coast). I've been struggling to keep up, and I finally hit the point where I decided to start shoving stuff of my plate and not adding anything else on. This year I've decided to focus on certain basic things that I need to do, that I really want to do, that I enjoy doing, and nothing else needs to be added.

And one of these things is getting back in shape. I know I said back in January that I wanted to lose about 10 pounds. Well I hadn't made much headway in that as of a week ago. Being so busy means lousy sleep and eating habits for me, which means low motivation and a sporadic exercise schedule at best. But on Valentine's Day weekend, while I was away at a sci-fi convention pimping the new book, Michael picked up a Wii for the family, and now everything has changed.

I got to play with a Wii a bit back in December when we went to visit my in-laws. One of my brothers-in-law brought his over for all of us to play, and I thought it was fun. I also thought that maybe playing DDR would be a fun way for me to squeeze in a little exercise every now and then. I hadn't seen the Wii Fit yet. But when Michael showed me the new set up in our living room, he handed me the Wii Fit disk and I thought, "Hmmm... this might be interesting."

I had seen the Wii Fit demo online at Nintendo's website, and wasn't sure I'd be getting much of a workout from the program. Boy was I wrong about that! I've been doing Wii Fit for 8 days now, and I can honestly say it's a butt-kicking workout. I put in between 30-60 minutes a day on that thing and I'm always dripping sweat when I'm done. I haven't seen much change in my weight yet - I've lost one pound since I started 8 days ago - but I did notice a difference tonight when I went to my evening karate class. I've been struggling the last several months in karate. My knees have been nothing but trouble since my first pregnancy, and after Pixie was born, they were pretty much shot to hell. Constant pain in my knees plus extra weight plus being tired all the time has added up to me really not wanting to go to karate... and I'm a second degree black belt! I'm supposed to be good at this stuff, but I've been sucking wind for ages trying to keep up in class. I have to wear these humongous braces on each leg to protect my knees, which really makes it tough to do class. It's a fight to kick or lift my legs, and my balance has been so off that some of the katas and stances have been downright painful.

Well not tonight. This evening I went through two hours of class, and I don't hurt at all! I'm a little tired, but that's nothing compared to how I usually feel after an evening of karate. I was able to do everything with no pain today, and I saw marked improvement in my stances and balance. It's all due to the Wii Fit. That thing measures and tracks my balance and gives me instant feedback throughout the workout so I can correct myself on the spot. It's really been a workout for my legs. I can actually see my hamstrings, and I know from working with a physical therapist that strong hamstrings alleviate a lot of knee problems. This is nothing short of a miracle for me!

So in honor of my new found energy and to mark my 40th birthday, I'm thinking of doing a regular bit on Mondays called "Move It Mama Monday," where I'll blog a bit about what I'm doing to get myself back into shape and stay there. If anyone is interested in contributing ideas for this particular series of posts, don't hesitate to e-mail me at helenmadden (at) cox (dot) net. I'm looking forward to seeing if I can get my thirty-something body back now that I'm forty.