Christina, Author at A Mommy Story

May 27, 2013

Six: The Years Are Going By Too Quickly

May 27, 2013 By Christina

Today, Mira woke up to greet her first day as a six year old.

I may have cried a little.

It doesn’t seem possible that my youngest daughter is turning six. That six years ago I went through 20-some hours of labor, after being nearly a week past my due date, to meet my fashionably late daughter who would count that as the beginning of a trend of doing things her own way.

She was an adorable baby. I remember how clingy she was – she liked to be touching me at all times, and still does that today when she’s feeling insecure and becomes a “space invader.” We couldn’t persuade her to do anything as a baby – it was all accomplished due to internal motivation. She watched me eating and demanded solid foods for herself. She learned to crawl because she wanted to get to Cordy’s goldfish crackers. (I’m sensing a food theme here…) It took extraordinary effort to get a smile out of her – always so serious, soaking in everything around her as if she was silently judging us all. Except for Cordy – she would always brighten up and smile for her big sister.

Why so serious, baby?

It’s hard to tell that there was once a time when Mira couldn’t speak clearly. Her speech is still a little difficult to understand, but not much worse than the average kindergartener. Gone are the days of speaking mostly in vowel sounds only, and while she still occasionally substitutes some consonants, she gets her point across. Therapy helped her recover from speech apraxia, and she has proven that by encouraging her to talk, we will never again get any peace in this house.

Now she’s six. She’s not my baby anymore. She’s a kid, with her chubby preschooler limbs replaced with long arms and legs, her face thinner, and looking more grown up every day.

I miss those curls, too.

Five was a big year for her: she was off to kindergarten, she lost her first (and her second) tooth, she went to Disney World, she rode her first big roller coaster, and she’s started learning to read. It’s been an exciting year.

She had a birthday party this weekend. Well, three parties actually. Friday night we had an informal dinner with Aaron’s family, where we just happened to have cake and presents for Mira, too. Then Saturday was her “official” party. She requested a party at Chuck E. Cheese and invited all of her friends from school. Ten kids were with her to celebrate, and she effortlessly spent time with all of them, running off to play games with different kids every few minutes, making sure no one was left out. She’s a social butterfly, always needing other people around her at all times.

And then yesterday we went to a family reunion, where again there happened to be presents for her. She didn’t mind that she didn’t know most of the distant cousins in the house. She just assumed they were all there for her birthday, too. Why wouldn’t everyone celebrate her birthday?

Her greatest strength, and greatest flaw, is her sensitivity. She can read people with ease, quickly coming to a friend’s side when needed and trying her very best to be a good person and do what she thinks is right. But that skill has given her tissue-paper skin around her ego, with her emotions bubbling just under the surface and breaking through at the slightest tilt in any direction. When Mira laughs, it’s hard not to join in and she makes everyone around her feel happy. When she feels the smallest slight, the world is ending and nothing I do can console her. Tears can spring from her eyes with no warning at all.

She continues to have that inner drive pushing her forward in life. She wants to see it all, do it all, and when she’s really determined, she’s not afraid at all. If she is focused, she could rule the world. My only fear is that she’ll discover she doesn’t need us long before we can’t live without her. I will forever be asking her to not grow up so quickly, to enjoy this moment and this age, and she will likely be trying to do more, see more, be more before I want her to.

I miss the baby, but I love the girl she’s become and the young woman she’s turning into. She’ll have to tolerate her emotional mother for some time to come, watching her mature and wishing the clock would move just a bit more slowly to give me more time with her as a five year old, a six year old, and more years to come.

Six years. Just…wow.

Filed Under: Mira

May 24, 2013

Cedar Point Never Gets Old

May 24, 2013 By Christina

There are some places we can visit over and over and still feel like it’s new and exciting every single time. Cedar Point is definitely one of those places. We made the trip to Sandusky last weekend (Cedar Point provided tickets for us) to see what’s new for 2013, and to revisit some of our old favorites.

Mira was especially hopeful that she had grown enough since last October to meet the 48″ requirement for many of the roller coasters. Last year she measured 46″ which only let her on one big coaster, the Iron Dragon.

The changes at Cedar Point start right when you get to the gate. They’ve completely remodeled the entrance now, partially to work in the newest coaster, the GateKeeper. It’s an impressive winged coaster – meaning the cars are attached to the track in the middle, but riders sit on either side on the “wings” of the coaster. There are two keyholes built into the towers around the new gate, and the GateKeeper coaster glides through each of those narrow keyholes, twisting at the last possible second to fit the arms and legs of it’s passengers safely through, and wowing visitors as they come up to the gate. It holds records for being the longest, fastest and tallest wing coaster. I can already tell you I love this coaster, and I haven’t even had a chance to ride it yet.

Yes, they have to turn sideways quickly to fit through that narrow tower over the main entrance to the park. It’s amazing to watch.

Our first stop was to get both kids measured for rides. You can do this right at the entrance and get a colored wrist band, avoiding any further waits in line to be measured again. Cordy was 54″ this time, allowing her to ride nearly everything in the park (allowing is different than wanting, though, and her anxiety kept her away from all coasters), and Mira let out a cheer when she was told she met the 48″ height requirement. She was the happiest kid ever to get her 48″ rider wristband.

Proudly showing off her red 48″ wristband.

The first ride for us has practically become a tradition now. Cedar Downs is always our first stop – it’s essentially a carousel, but it goes faster than most, and the horses “race” each other, with one in each row coming out ahead by the end of the ride. (The winner varies each time.) Cordy loves this ride, and Mira was thrilled to have her first experience with it.

Cordy on Cedar Downs: 2011, 2012, 2013 (with Aaron this time)

After that we had a quick lunch (full disclosure: lunch was provided by Cedar Point) and Aaron was so happy that Cedar Point is considerate of those with food allergies. He was able to eat a gluten-free pizza for lunch, with other gluten-free options available as well. If you need a gluten-free meal, try Joe Cool Cafe – they even have separate fryers for those who can’t have gluten but still want some french fries or gluten-free chicken tenders.

Mira then wanted to continue exploiting her new height to ride another 48″ or higher ride. Off to the Cedar Creek Mine Ride we went! Cordy used to love this ride, but her anxiety was too high, so she stayed back. Thankfully, Cedar Point offers a Parent Swap pass for this kind of situation. You can pick up a Parent Swap pass in the Guest Services office, good for one use on most of the larger rides.

Here’s how it works: one parent gets in line for the ride with their child, while the other parent does something else with the kid who doesn’t want to ride. Once the first parent and child get off the ride, they hand the Parent Swap pass to an attendant and go out the exit. The other parent can trade off and go up the exit ramp to get on the ride with no wait. Each parent gets to ride, and the child who wants to ride gets to do it twice. It’s a win-win.

Mira loved the Mine Ride! We tried the Gemini next, which was a little more scary for her. I’m glad she decided not to try Millennium Force quite yet. At this point we decided to dial back the adventure level a little and spend some time in Camp Snoopy, which is filled with rides for the younger set. (Although many allow adults to ride with their kids, too.) Cordy was a big fan of the Tilt-a-Whirl, and we rode that ride at least five times. Yes, I’m still dizzy.

Cordy and Mira took a few rides on the swings, too.

You can also meet Snoopy and his Peanuts friends in Camp Snoopy. Cordy couldn’t miss out on a hug.

We like playing the carnival games at Cedar Point, too, always coming home with some new stuffed animals to add to the family of plush creatures. Both kids like that Pokemon can often be found as prizes with some of the games, but Cordy set her sights higher this year:

Say it with me, folks: IT’S SO FLUFFY!

Near the end of the day, Mira got her courage back and asked to go on the Corkscrew. This roller coaster has three loops in it – I thought there was no way she’d want to go on a looping coaster. But she did, and she waited with Aaron patiently (although nervously) in line for the ride. Despite the wristband, they still checked her height again – she just barely clears 48″ and I think they were surprised a five year old wanted on the Corkscrew.

She did it, though – and she loved it! I know Mira is going to be a Cedar Point Ride Warrior as she gets older. She’s already asking how long it will take for her to be 52″ tall so she can ride Top Thrill Dragster, a ride that goes from zero to 120 miles-per-hour in four seconds. Maybe she can ride that one with her dad.

This is our third year in a row to go to Cedar Point, and we really appreciate how much there is to do in this amusement park. We love how many thrill rides are in this park, as well as plenty of family rides and in-between rides that are thrilling but not too scary. Our energy level ran out before we ran out of rides and attractions to visit – you can’t do it all in a day!

We’re a Cedar Point family!

Yes, we love Disney World and will always love Disney World, but Disney’s roller coasters can’t compare to the roller coasters at Cedar Point. And unlike Disney, Cedar Point is an Ohio theme park that’s easy to daytrip or take a short Ohio staycation at Lake Erie.

If you have the chance, get to Cedar Point to try the new GateKeeper this year, and then let me know how you liked it! I’m hoping we’ll visit again later this summer, perhaps with more adults in our group, so Aaron and I can take a ride on GateKeeper together!

Full disclosure: I was invited by Cedar Point to bring my family to the park for the day and received complimentary admission into the park and lunch. Mira’s blossoming Ride Warrior personality comes to her naturally – both of her parents love roller coasters!

Filed Under: local fun, travel Tagged With: cedar point, Ohio, staycation

May 21, 2013

I’m Kicking My Soda Habit!

May 21, 2013 By Christina

You may remember at the start of April that I made a decision to begin eating healthier. Less processed junk, more whole foods, etc. One of the goals I had was to stop drinking soda. I can’t even begin to tell you how frightening a prospect that was at the time.

It’s not that I wanted to give up caffeine. Oh sure, I know it’s also not good for me and I could probably stand to have a little less of it in my life. But soda was not the optimal caffeine-delivery-system, especially the diet soda I was drinking every day. Yes, every day, often several a day. After all, it was diet soda, so there were no calories to worry about, right?

I couldn’t continue ignoring all of the studies linking diet soda to increased obesity, metabolic disorders, and all of the other ways it wrecks havoc on the body. It’s acidic, it’s full of difficult to pronounce chemicals, and the artificial sweeteners are not exactly the best ingredients to line the inside of my digestive tract.

Photo credit: Caro’s Lines

So I said goodbye to soda. And it’s been hard. REALLY hard. I’ve been tempted to reach for that bubbly sweetness on more than one occasion and had to force myself to step away from the can and reach for water instead.

I’ve been drinking more coffee and tea now, brewed fresh without the artificial ingredients. I use a splash of real cream with my coffee, and a little bit of cane sugar, honey or stevia with my tea.

This past weekend I found myself in a situation where my only choices for drinks were soda or water for a meal. I was exhausted after barely sleeping the night before, so I broke down and asked for a small Diet Coke. I had gone 48 days in a row with no soda, and the temptation was too strong, along with my desire for caffeine. I knew I was putting my goal at risk, and that reminding my taste buds of the soda that I used to drink daily might start me down that path again.

As we were eating, I took my first sip of soda, and I was immediately not impressed with the taste. It was…off. A little bitter on my tongue with a chemical-y sweetness layered on top. At first I thought there had to be something wrong with this soda, but with each additional sip I realized that this is the way it’s always tasted.

I’m not used to the taste now, and it no longer tastes good. (Skye, you were right!)

This is huge for me. I’ve been a soda addict since I was a teen, and a diet soda fiend since college. Nothing until now has managed to completely tear me away from my fizzy mistress. Until now.

It seems going cold turkey for a month and a half might have finally helped re-wire my sense of taste back towards natural flavors and away from soda. Well, that and eating a lot less processed food. It’s amazing how good real food can taste once you forget how processed food tastes!

There have been other benefits, too. Since many non-soda drinks I like often have some calories in them, I’m more conscious of how much I’m drinking and I limit myself to only one or two a day.

This has resulted in drinking a lot more water again, too, which of course is better than many other drinks out there. And I think my skin looks better from all of the extra water, too.

I’m gonna brag for a moment and say I’m proud of myself for giving up this bad habit!

Filed Under: healthy living

May 16, 2013

Being Rich And Entitled Is Not A Disability At Disney

May 16, 2013 By Christina

When we visited Disney World in February, I worried how Cordy would react to the crowds and the lines. She doesn’t like crowds, and she likes waiting in lines even less, especially when those lines are enclosed by barriers in tight spaces. She’ll get fidgety, anxious, and sometimes start to panic. She’ll repeatedly bump into others around her, and if the sensory overload lasts too long, she’ll be a wreck and unable to enjoy the ride when we finally get to the front of the line.

We were told about the Guest Assistance Card (GAC) before our trip and were encouraged to talk to Guest Services when we got to Disney. It’s fairly easy – you tell someone at Guest Services what the nature of the disability is in regards to what accommodations are needed. Based on what you tell them, they provide one of three different GAC passes. The pass is good for your entire stay at all parks, and allows the disabled guest and their family to stay together for any rides.

Cordy’s GAC

I was nervous about asking for the card – while Cordy’s autism can make situations difficult, I worried that she wasn’t “disabled enough” to deserve a GAC. (The Guest Services folks were amazingly kind about the whole thing, though.) I was also a little embarrassed about using it at first, feeling like I was cheating by getting to use the Fast Pass entrance instead of the standard lines. I worried we were being judged.

But then I tried to remind myself that it took a lot more energy for us to go from attraction to attraction, and we often needed more downtime for Cordy, so we really weren’t getting to more rides and attractions than any other family in the park. And OH did it make the experience SO much better for our little ball of anxiety! Without that pass, we wouldn’t have been able to get through more than one or two rides at most before she would have felt overwhelmed and been done. Or worse – annoyed everyone else around her and ruined their day. And even with the pass it still wasn’t all roses and butterflies, but it was a huge improvement.

So I was horrified when I read a New York Post story stating that a new trend in visiting Disney for an elite group of rich NYC moms is to hire a disabled person to pose as a “family member” for the day, allowing the family to use that person’s Guest Assistance Card to “skip the lines” and enter through the alternate entrance.

Yes, you read that right. Moms and their families, all perfectly healthy, free of disabilities, cutting their wait times for rides to nearly nothing all because of their newly hired “distant cousin” who is handicapped and has the ability to bypass the general line.

Before you say, “But we all know that the rich can buy their way to the front of the line with anything, so what’s the big deal?” consider this: Disney already has a VIP Tour Guide service the wealthy can pay for that will provide a Fast Pass for rides. The VIP Fast Pass will get them to the front of the line nearly as fast as a GAC access. It costs a little more, but what’s a few more dollars to those with this kind of privilege?

(It’s also possible to reduce your wait time to practically nothing through using the free Fast Pass system and doing a little planning. But I suppose that’s too much work for them.)

No, I don’t think it’s about the money. Rather, it’s about the smug satisfaction of telling your fellow rich moms at the next playdate how you gamed the system and had your own pet “cripple” (ugh, I hate that word, but it gets the sentiment across) to grant you your privilege and make you feel even more special.

Because an official Disney VIP tour guide? That’s something anyone can get! Having your own disabled fake family member, on the other hand, is only for the 1% insiders who know the secret of how to hire them.

What kind of self-absorbed idiot would willingly and knowingly take advantage of an accommodation for the disabled for their own selfish reasons? I can’t wrap my mind around what would assure someone that this was a great idea, other than they’ve lost all shame and humanity in their black hearts. The Evil Queen would be proud.

Beyond that, I’m appalled at the message this sends to their children. They’re being taught that the rules of the world don’t apply to them, and that the struggles of others can be exploited for their own gain. That any obstacle in their way, or any special exception allowed to someone else but not them, can be bypassed by throwing money at it. Good luck when those entitled kids become teenagers and will do anything to get their way.

I worry that behavior like this will force Disney World to tighten its restrictions on the GAC pass, making it harder to obtain and possibly denying some people who really do need it. Few places offer accommodations with such generosity as Disney, but any increase in the abuse of these accommodations might cause them to rethink their policy.

I’d hope that the actions of a few despicable people wouldn’t affect those who legitimately qualify for it, and I also hope Disney can find a way to weed these folks out and shut them down.

Because as much as they’d like to claim it is if it would get them to the front of the line, being an entitled, elitist cheat is NOT a disability.

Filed Under: big issues, rant Tagged With: accommodations, disabilities, disney, Disney World

May 14, 2013

Green-like Thumb

May 14, 2013 By Christina

When we bought our house, I was so excited about having our own yard. There were fantastic ideas in my head of beautiful landscaping and a garden in the backyard full of fresh herbs and veggies and a lush, green lawn for our children to play and walk barefoot on.

I don’t know who I thought would take care of all of these things – perhaps I thought we’d be wealthy enough to afford a landscaper? Because certainly I wasn’t going to be the one to nurture all of these plants.

My mom is the green-thumb in the family. She can keep nearly anything alive, even if it’s on the brink of withering away. I, on the other hand, am usually the one who can get a plant to the nearly-withered-away state. My ability to kill plants is nearly a superpower – if I were an evil villain, I’d probably be called the Wilter.

It’s not intentional, though. I try to do my best with our yard. I had a garden for a few years, and even managed to produce some broccoli from that garden. Cosmo has reduced my ability to have a garden now, thanks to his evil sidekick taste for young plants, but I did do some container gardening last year that was a semi-success. And (with help) we planted our little arborvitae evergreen trees out back last year, which have so far survived my care.

With my new mission to make this house a little more home-like, I’ve had to take a tough look at the outside as well. I don’t want to be that house in our neighborhood. (To be honest, it would be really hard to be that house with the number of rentals and foreclosures in our area, but I’m also aiming to not be in the bottom 50% either.) My project this past weekend was the tree in our front yard.

We placed a little ring of landscaping bricks around this tree years ago. Originally there was mulch inside the ring, but over the years it’s all disappeared and the ring has contained a mess of dead leaves and weeds. Our soil is also extremely hard clay soil, making it impossible for things to grow well, and that’s resulted in our tree’s roots staying close to the surface as well.

The first thing I did was scoop out all of the leaves into a yard waste bag, along with pulling most of the weeds within the ring. Some of those weeds were stronger than expected and tried to pull back. Then I carefully adjusted the woefully uneven bricks, trying to make them lie even again. I wasn’t able to get them to lie perfectly even because the tree roots have pushed some areas up, but most of the ring looks pretty good now.

Tree roots made the back part of the ring bumpier than I’d prefer.

Next, it was time to fill in that ring. I emptied three bags of topsoil, combined with half a bag of peat moss, inside the ring around the tree and mixed it all up. At the very least, I hope covering the tree’s roots will help protect our red maple from the fate of so many other trees in the neighborhood. (Tree death is high when you live in a new subdivision that stripped all the topsoil off to sell before building houses on clay.)

Mira went with me on Saturday to pick out flowers to plant in the ring. A five year old doesn’t necessarily know the best flowers to pick, so I enlisted the help of a store associate. After describing to her my lack of skill with anything green, and my requirement that anything we buy needs to be easy to care for, able to handle some neglect, and preferably could handle itself like a weed, she pointed me to the right flowers. She didn’t even laugh at me, though, which I appreciated.

This was the final result:

Not a bad transformation compared to the naked tree above, right?

The light purple flowers are creeping phlox, and the bright pink ones (Mira’s choice, no surprise) are dianthus. And yes, I still had to look at the little cards that came with them to remember what they were and how to spell them.

There was nothing complicated to planting the flowers – I dug a hole with my hands, took the flower out of it’s plastic pot, and plopped it in the hole, filling the area back in with dirt. I’m not sure if I spread them out well enough, so we’ll see how they grow. I finished this project by covering everything with a good layer of mulch and a silent wish that they don’t die.

No really, please don’t die, little flowers. You cost too much.

And just like that, our front yard has a little bit of color now, hinting that someone actually lives in this house and cares about it’s appearance. The next step, of course, will be keeping these little plants from wilting away. Who knows – maybe if I can keep this little contained flower bed alive, I’ll add more flowers to other parts of the yard?

Filed Under: domestic zero, home Tagged With: flowers, gardening, green thumb, landscape