The sweaty palms and heavy breathing in the seat next to mine told me that her day was a total success.

Mr. MamaGeph and I had talked for years about when the Princess would be old enough to come with us to the Nutcracker, and this was it. We left the Bear with Grammy and Grandad and headed for the big city.

First up, dinner at the Spaghetti Factory. (She gasped, “This place looks like a palace!” And you’ve got to love a palace where you can get dinner and dessert for three for under forty bucks.) Then we scurried down to Seattle Center and saw the great cracker box that is McCaw hall for the first time. From the outside, you would never guess that there is Art and Beauty going on in there – it looks like a reform school for rowdy accountants. Inside, pictures with the Nutcracker himself, and still an hour and a half till showtime since we are chronically, unfashionably early people. Time enough to wander the area, take in the Christmas village, ride the carousel, and watch the solstice drummers setting up in the fountain and passing out fliers. Got a call from home saying that absolutely nothing was wrong, and have a fun time. Inside again, to wander McCaw and also to introduce my daughter to the time-honored tradition of freshening up. Then to our seats to read our programs and wait for the lights to dim.

I don’t think she breathed for the first two minutes. She may not have swallowed for ten. This was her first ballet, and her first big show. I was a little worried that she might not “get it,” since there are no words, just the sights and music to wash over you and tell the story. But the one time I leaned over to her to explain that the lady and man in the sailing ship was Clara grown up, and the nutcracker prince, she whispered with her eyes never leaving the stage, “Well, of course. Who else could it be?” So I think she got it.

Leave it to my Princess to love the Mouse King most of all. She liked the Chinese tiger, liked the peacock, and definitely did not like the cannons, but she was most impressed with the King, himself. If she was in Clara’s place, she would run off with him, and the prince could just go hang out with the nuts. Who needs a prince, when you can have a king – with whiskers!

The world’s smallest baby is ready to go home. What an awesome thing that babies this premature can be safe. No brain damage, no blindness. She weighed less than a can of coke, but doctors believe she will have normal development.

If the mama had felt differently about this pregnancy, it would have been a ‘choice,’ not a baby. A pro-choice advocate might say that the high blood pressure that necessitated the early cesarean was excuse enough to terminate. At 26 weeks gestation, this is either a life worth using heroic measures to save, or a mass of unfeeling cells to be removed. Interesting.

KUOW’s “The Conversation” did a show on becoming a centenarian. The host was all doom-and-gloom in the set up, asking, “What will your quality of life be at 100? Will your lifestyle or mobility be limited? If you retire at 70, how will you support yourself for the remaining years?” It’s enough to make you want to take a flying leap.

Some listeners called in to comment on how they didn’t want to be a burden on their kids in their old age. (Hey, I thought that was my retirement plan! Manual labor now, hospice care later.) But really, I’d be worried too if I had dumped my kids in daycare 9-5 from birth, then let the schools and afterschool programs raise them. At that rate, you’d better not be a burden on them, or you’re wheelchair’s going to be parked in the dim, grimy hallway of a state run home for discarded parental figures. My golden years aren’t the only reason I want to be involved with my kids’ lives, but it’s a fact that if I am blessed with long years, I will someday be too frail to care for myself. I will be in their hands.

I’d better start fixing the ice cream sundaes now. Looks like I’m going to live to be 100.8!

At age six, my sweet, quiet Princess has started to grow fangs. It’s like living with a sullen, 12-year-old Goth. (The bat-like, crabby, moody teen? Or the Germanic folks who conquered the Roman empire in the 4th century? Either definition kinda fits.) Frowning at my silliness. Heaving sighs at grammar corrections and disgusted noises when told to fold her laundry. General bouts of hollering and crying. When she slammed her bedroom door the other day, she finally got through to me that something needed to change. So now she’s a tomato.

If left to her own devices, she will shut herself in her room all day and read and play. This perfectly matches my personality, since I also am a self-contained unit. But if we continue on this route, I won’t know her at all when she’s due to ride the green dragon roller coaster of adolescence. So for now she is my constant companion.

We read together. We clean together. She can do as she wishes the rest of the time, as long as she’s in the same room as I am. She insists that she can’t play in the same room as the Bear and me, since we will hear all her stories. But she is adjusting, and our relationship is so much better. Enough hang time to get bored and get creative. Sometimes quantity is better than quality.

Craig Westover has some very funny cat-inspired haiku, sent to him by his wife. (Tip o’ the Swiffer: Fraters) My favorite?

There’s no dignity

In being sick which is why

I don’t tell you where.

Our eldest cat, Wayne, must have gotten into the decorations and had a bacchanal, because he has spent the day yacking. Nothing like stumbling around, pre-coffee, trying to clean up before the Bear decides to investigate and fling the stuff around. And does this dear, precious feline ever hit the eject button in the kitchen or bathroom, where there is linoleum? Heavens, no! It’s much better to go for carpet, or even my bed, where his fuzzy toes can be toasty warm while he rehashes the kibble.

I understand the horror about the Groningen Protocol, but not the shock. In a world that denies the existence of God at every turn, why is this a surprise? With no moral compass, with no rules, Peter Singer is the sanest man on the planet.

My good friend, the sunshine Badger, and I have had an ongoing debate about this. She is Jewish, but refuses to condemn the brutal Islamic rituals of Ashoura inflicted on children, because she hasn’t read much of the Koran and who is she to judge. She considers partial birth abortion murder, but better that than letting political opponents get a foot in the door. I know she has a belief system and could readily list what she considers right and wrong, but I have yet to get to the root of it. She is witty, educated, and believes in God. But she thinks I am truly misguided to think that anything could be absolutely black and white, instead of just a personal choice.

Without an absolute standard of where to draw the line, why gasp in horror when it gets pushed a little further back? It’s simply about society’s accepted norm at that point, and woe to the fool who wants to halt our natural evolution with their closed-minded principles.

Murdering babies in the name of mercy is ugly and evil and totally in line with a fallen world. I pray that God will turn the tide in Holland.

I’m a Christmas music nut. Something about Christmas, in general, brings out this bizarre Kathy Lee/Martha Stewart thing in me. I start thinking of fruitcake and biscotti and handmaking everything from base atomic particles. But music more than anything. I’ve got Bob Rivers. I’ve got feline caroling. I even have a few normal discs so that Mr. MamaGeph will come out of hiding.

The other night I put on the first “Very Special Christmas” CD. It’s worth having to skip over Whitney Houston and Bon Jovi for the One Song. But when Bruce Springsteen came on, the Princess looked like I’d served her sauerkraut for supper.

“Mama,” she distained, “This doesn’t sound much like Christmas music…”

Today, when we were out and about gift shopping, she said she really wants to hear “Away in a Manger” on the radio on the way home. She has also insisted that I sing it to the Bear on Christmas Eve as I put him to bed – and she wants to be there as a witness. (I haven’t asked for a script. That child would give me one.) So I asked if it was one of her favorite carols.

“Of course.” she said in her best well, duh voice. “That’s the whole point of Christmas, you know.”