Now, where is that wrapping paper?

Our daughter (7) is furious. She has just told us, yelling from her bedroom, that she no longer wanted to live with us. She has had a bad day.

It is her brother's birthday.

And it is not fair.

(To put it in some context, she is mad that we threw her a surprise birthday party in June and didn't tell her about it. Even if she did have fun at the time, she says it doesn't count for a birthday party.)

What she and her brother don't know is that I was so focused on Cucalorus (and their joy at going to Simply Play) last week that I had not bought his birthday presents until Monday night. What they don't know is that I had three deadlines—with countless interviews I hadn't done—and some papers to grade that were shifted all over the place so that I could go to the store and buy his presents. (But, yeah! I got there.)

Fortunately, my mother sent him a Peter Rabbit stuffed animal and a collection of Toad and Frog books to open on his birthday morning. Because the kids don't even know that we haven't yet wrapped his presents. They don't know that I quickly baked muffins this morning (during the quiet darkness of my writing time, when I should have been finishing another story for another deadline), just so he wouldn't appear at school empty-handed on his birthday. (And, yes, they were pretty yummy.)

They don't know that we haven't finished making the phone calls about his birthday party or that we haven't quite found a birthday cake recipe that we can serve his ingredient-challenged sister.

They don't know that on the fly I e-mailed a friend who once said she would get him something with a few bees on it. She delivered today and arranged for him to sit in a police car with some folks who wear a beehive on their police uniforms.

(Score! A memorable day for a newly minted 5-year old!)

They have no idea that while, of course, the universe…my universe…revolves around them and sometimes it may wobble.

I'm hoping though that they feel the embrace of my arms wrapped around them in a snug hug and won't notice the wobbles so much. (Nor will they notice the sleight of hand while I'm trying to tie a ribbon on a present behind their backs…even two or three days later than promised.)

Now, off to wrap some presents and try to stay warm....