sLOVEnka: birthday lily party slovakia presents

Lily asked for an apple party for her sixth birthday. I was giddy with excitement at the thought of crab apple garland and hollowed-out apple tea lights and homemade apple cider and gorgeous apple tarts. None of which ended up materializing. In fact, the party ended up kind of summing up my life in no uncertain terms. Plenty of good intentions, very little follow-through. I even went out and gathered a bag full of wild apples, made sure we had tea lights and all the mulling spices. Had a tart pan and everything. Still, somehow, like every other party I've ever thrown in my entire life, it was a rush to the end just to make the place presentable and pretend like yeah, we always have our bookshelf dusted, are you kidding me? And no, I didn't just clean the gunk off the bottom of the windowsill, it's always like that.

The next day at church a friend asked how the party went and I told her my cake turned out poorly and Lily heard me. ''Mama, bola to vyborna,'' (Mama, it was excellent) she said, looking almost a little hurt. And just like that my world refocused. I had had a breakdown after the party due to feelings of failure and inadequacy, and Tomáš chastised me a little bit, ''Why-y-y-y do you try to please [people]? It's like trying to stay dry in the rain. It is impossible. You come in from the rain and you're upset that your shoes are wet.'' And of course he was right. Again. And the truth is, it was actually a really nice party. The girls had a ball. Lily ate enough cheese to keep her bound up for a week, but she was happy. Really happy. And this, this is going to be my focus. I have another chance in three weeks to get it right. Rosy's fourth birthday party. There is a phrase in slovak, kašli na to, which means literally ''cough on it.'' It means something like don't worry about it, or more closely don't care about it. And this is going to be my goal. Not to not care, but to care about the right things. Because the price of caring about the wrong things is far too high. I recall again the great words of my friend Ad'a who once said of her mom, ''I would rather have a roll and a glass of wine in peace on Christmas than 100 kinds of cookies and a stressed-out mom.'' And it's so true. For as the balloon says (below) You are the apple of my eye. My love bug.

Gotta love the two photographer shots.

Sometimes I delay blogging because I have so much I want to share that I feel overwhelmed to try and capture all of it or do it justice. Sometimes I delay life for the same reason. What I mean is I always find myself wanting to do something better or bigger than time or energy or resources allows for, so instead I do nothing at all. So here you have a quick-ish post; better than nothing.
Last week was my birthday and earlier in the week a package arrived from my mom. It was a combo package for my birthday, gifts for Lily and some thank yous for friends and family from when my mom was here. I read the birthday card first, which set the tone for the whole box. I cried the entire way through. It was one of those mother/daughter cards about fleeting moments and dancing through life and I just bawled. Mother/daughter has new meaning for me this birthday. And my mom has a knack for finding the perfect card anyway. Not to mention the perfect gift(s). Growing up, my family set the gift-giving bar pretty high. My whole entire family, both immediate and extended has this knack. (Ok, I'll say that with the proviso of family with whom I regularly exchanged gifts; read my mom's side of the family). Trudging to the point. They were all so good, in fact, I unbelievably didn't know bad gift givers existed until one friend told me the story of his getting a Ken doll on his 16th birthday from his mom and one Christmas (of many) of receiving such gems as a giant M&Ms mug and some book about the bloody Nez Perce trail. But back to the box. First off, my mom sent me an Audrey Hepburn movie I'd never seen before, then she sent me a shirt and a sundress that I adore. Couldn't have picked out better ones myself. Then for Lily, aka Monkey, she sent the cutest monkey bibs you've ever seen, two board books, which I was thrilled about because it's very important to me that Lily have lots of books and even if I could find board books in English over here they would cost one million dollars. Yes, one million (688,777 Euros). On top of that she sent some oh-so-soft cotton pants (which she needed) and a onesie and two hats that will knock you over with cuteness. But the icing on the cake, the thing that actually made me cry, was the stuffed animal she sent her. It's just so my mom.
So, that was that. And then on the actual day of my birthday I was feeling pretty blue, just missing family and the birthdays I used to have. I always had amazing birthdays because they were in late June and always involved parks or picnics or water of some sort and frisbees or greenball and people I love. Everything I love about summer. So I was feeling pretty sorry for myself, if I'm perfectly honest with you, and Tomáš came home with a pretty bouquet of orange Gerberas and a card. I smiled and thanked him and waited to open the card. Then when I did, it read ''I hope you like the bike you pick,'' or something like that and again I just burst into tears. I have wanted a bike ever since I had to leave mine back in Missoula. No, wanted doesn't really cover it. I have dreamed of having a bike. First I dreamed of having my bike here. It is a fantastic bike, but even more than that is the sentimental value it holds because it was bought with money donated by all my friends, collected by her after my previous bike had been stolen during the Western Montana Fair. He and she even looked into UPS-ing it to me, only to discover that that would cost more than its own plane ticket. So here I sat. And sat. And sat. I love bikeriding. It was my only form of transportation for much of my adult life, and to me it just screams summer and freedom, and I have missed it. There are villages all over the stinkin' place here, perfect distances for a nice little ride and I can't wait to discover them. My boy also has the knack. Then I made waffles with fresh raspberries and real whipped cream with Viennese coffee as well as fresh ginger gingerale with lime. Happy birthday to me.
And lastly, last Saturday we celebrated with Tomáš' family. It was a pretty typical little get-together, except for one thing, my cupcakes turned out. For whatever reason I just cannot seem to ever get it together on party day when it comes to baking. And I'm a decent baker. I guess it's the pressure. But I turned out these tasty little beauties and forgot to take a picture when there were two plates of them, so here are three. Lemon with cream cheese frosting and raspberries. Oh! Speaking of raspberries, have I mentioned they are my favorite thing on this earth? This year I've been in absolute heaven because it was a good raspberry year and Tomáš' mom has brought me not one, not two, not three, but four BIG cartons of them. So, I think it's safe to say it's been a pretty good birthday.
*Since I wrote this post Tomáš' mom brought me another flat of raspberries and I got my bike! I found a used one online that I just had a good feeling about, so Tomáš went and got it today and it turns out the owner also owns the bike shop in our town. He had put new brakes and spokes and some other things on it and it has had a fresh tune-up. We took it out for a test run this afternoon and I felt amazing. I am so happy to once again be a velocipedestrian. Also, this ''quick-ish post'' turned into a many-hours-in-the-making post. Oh well.