Shopping and Nutrition in Texas

This morning, I took X to her school, where the choir members are having a Saturday morning pajama party to watch 'Annie,' the musical they will be doing this year. I called the teacher to verify the time and she mentioned she would be picking up snacks at the HEB (local grocery store). I had the same thing in mind, so I told her I'd get her stuff too. X and I walked out of HEB with 5 cases of Capri Sun "juice" drink, 6 packs of popcorn, and 3 tubs of assorted flavored sugary dough. This was added to a collection of soda and cookies, once we arrived at the school.

Baby, we are not in San Francisco anymore! I wanted to say that, but I avoid mentioning the subject around X. But the food police would have been on us in a flash, at even a whiff of half as much sugar. The police-approved breakfast for such an event would have included a fruit tray, perhaps some low sugar granola, cheese sticks and....well, not juice, it doesn't have enough nutritional value. Water to drink, that's a  safe one. Except I wonder if they are onto the wastefulness and damage  of individual plastic water bottles yet.

I think I'd actually have been happiest with a blend of these meals. A fruit tray would have been good, and most children (unlike mine) will spontaneously eat fruit  I could have gotten that.  But Brownie Bites called.

Have I mentioned lately how much I love HEB? Well I do. They--the urban location nearest us-- have the friendliest personnel, even for Texas. They have fresh made tortillas every day.  They have a lady cutting up nopales fresh in the store, almost every day. They have plenty of stuff for a healthy breakfast, had I chosen to buy one. They have weird deals where if you buy some chicken, you get a free fajita maker. (I have yet to use mine.)

AND They sponsored X's school choir to come and sing Christmas songs at their store last week. (promotional event) AND gave each kid a gift certificate AND the choir  got a $500 contribution.

Oh Frabjous Day!

It is X's birthday. She is 12.

 I just stuck birthday notes all over the living room/dining room/kitchen, including the quote from Jabberwocky, above. She quotes that poem all the time, without even meaning too. I will make her the usual heart-shaped pancakes for breakfast. (Usual on her birthday, that is.) She will go off to school with her book report in backpack. She will go sing with the choir at a local supermarket this evening, so no birthday dinner until tomorrow.

Now, the book report is a big deal. She has to do a couple, maybe three, reports per "marking period." Last year, this was torture. Every time she had to write one, I sat with the way overly complex rubric, prompting her to write some sentences about "a conflict, external or internal, and how it was resolved." What saved her last year were her creative book jackets or other artistic expression of the book. She had to write two reports over the summer and it just about killed us both. But for this one, X noted: "And I didn't even break down."

This, of course, after I went to the teacher to make my plea for informal accommodations based on X's difficulties with writing--which I suspected were brain based, although I had not had her tested for any of the vague categorizations such as dysgraphia. The whole incident follows one of those parenting rules: Just when you think you can't stand some condition your child has/is in, just as soon as you are poised to do something about it, the whole thing changes. At least that is the usual case for me. Maybe all we are facing is X's immaturity compared to her classmates. Anyway, the teacher said to call if X was crying over her book report. But....oh frabjous day!...she wasn't!