Failure

I announced a new model on TikTok today, saying I was starting a livestream on it.  I've been in the stream all day and the model isn't printing correctly.  I've restarted it and it still isn't working, even sliced differently and looked at twenty different ways.  We think we know why, but we can't resolve it with the current model and my printer.  He's so nice about it, but it's still stressful. 

The Big Boy Update:  Two days is apparently not enough to finish folding laundry.  My son is nothing but excuses. 

The Tiny Girl Chronicles:  My daughter folded and put up her laundry in no time flat when she heard she'd been invited over to Ashley's house.  She walked there and back without assistance.   She is so impressive.

It Was An Ice Cream Day

It's midnight or a bit thereafter and I am still full.  I had so much food today in the form of ice cream.   I don't know why, but I had a hankering for ice cream at what should have been lunchtime so I had far more than I should have, because the container just needed finishing.   

For dessert after dinner tonight we all went to a local ice cream place where you walk up, get the ice cream and then get back in the car to eat it with the heat and seat warmers on because it's freezing outside. But it was delicious and since I hadn't had dinner, what with a nice long birthday nap, it was my dinner. 

That makes two ice cream meals for my birthday.  Is it any wonder my pants are feeling tight-fitting tonight?

The Big Boy Update:  My son was very cross tonight.   He wanted to go get ice cream and then when it was time to go was angry we were going to get ice cream.   Then, magically, when he'd had the ice cream, he was in a fine mood again. 

The Tiny Girl Chronicles:  I have to tell about my daughter today.  She planned for my birthday, making a treasure hunt of braille papers that I would read and follow around the house until I got to my present.   She got up when I did and made me breakfast.   She was so sweet.   Then she couldn't bear to wait for her father to wake up to start the clue hunt,   He was needed because he had the main present (a LEGO we'll be doing together) somewhere and she needed him to get it for her.   She would come out and say, "I'm going to do a snore check" to determine if he was still asleep.   She was such a sweet daughter to me today. 

It's That Old Time Again

Tomorrow, well, today given the hour, is my birthday.  I'd say I'm a half-century old, but that happened two years ago.  I don't know if that means everything is downhill from here or uphill.   The older you get the more some things become easier, while other things grow more challenging.   Physically, I am no longer able to do an ariel without putting my hands on the ground.   I remember deciding when I was young that the day I couldn't do an ariel from a standstill, I would be very old indeed.  

That time has long, long passed.  My days of gymnastics are fond memories but much faded at this point.   I loved doing cartwheels and what I learned was the more powerful "round-off" version of the cartwheel.   To do a round-off, you do a cartwheel but the second leg off the ground catches up with the first and both feet land at the same time, giving you more rotational energy to spend with the next move you might want to do.   

When you watch gymnastics competitions, round-off are the first thing the gymnast does before the back handspring and then the power move like a flip with twists or, in Mary Lou Retton's case, a double back layout.  

I never got to that high a level of skill, but I did enjoy doing ariels, a cartwheel where your hands don't touch the ground.  With enough push-off, you can do the cartwheel without even needing to put your hands down.   I would back up and run as fast as I could and launch myself into the cartwheel, trying to go as far over as I could before putting down a hand or two. 

Eventually, I realized it wasn't speed that mattered, it was the launching angle that did.   Along with enough initial push, if you flung your body over in time with the kick over, it was possible to do an ariel from a standing position.  

When I figured that out, I was so pleased with myself.  I didn't need to touch the ground anymore to do a flip.   And boy did I do a lot of them.  As I got older and quit gymnastics, I still kept up the ariel skill for many years, although it grew harder as I got into my late teens and twenties.   

Today, even a cartwheel or round-off is a bit of an accomplishment.   It won't make my back and neck happy, but the sensation is still one that I enjoy.   Tomorrow, when I get up and have had some coffee so I can get my much older body going, maybe I'll try to do a cartwheel and see how it goes.   If there's no blog post tomorrow, you'll know I didn't make it.

The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter and I play games in the car.  Today, my husband picked her up from school and I told him maybe they'd get to play some of her games.  "Oh," he told me, "she already has a game she plays with me, it's called the 'crazy self-driving car' game."   

The Big Boy Update:  My son came downstairs, unable to sleep at almost one in the morning.   I asked him to help me with the filming I was working on.  Could he push the record button for me as I recorded takes.   It worked perfectly, after two one-minute recordings he said he was going to go back upstairs and go to bed. 

The Game of Life

We played The Game of Life tonight as a family.  There was a lot of high energy, excitement when someone got a large amount of money and dejection when they had their money taken from them with the Revenge space.  

My son was hiding his money, changing large bills out for smaller ones to make it look like he had more money and then pretending he was broke.  

We needed to do this, the game playing as a family, for a long time now.  I think I didn't want to do it in part because I thought my daughter wouldn't be able to enjoy it.  But she is having a very good time, even if we have to manage some of the things for her. 

I'm starting to really look forward to Family Game Night.  

The Big Boy Update:  My son saw me changing money and didn't understand that I was trading up, to get fewer bills so I didn't have so much bulk to deal with.   He was trying to get more money in a stack.  We had to cut him off when he started getting all of one of the smaller bills. 

The Tiny Girl Chronicles:  My daughter is really starting to stand up for herself about being blind.   I wasn't avoiding her question, I was just in the middle of banker things, finding child pegs to put in cars, handling her and my money, doing payday minus fine math and when she complained that it wasn't fair to her because we could see, I started dialoguing everything I was doing.   I'm glad she's speaking up for herself.  She will have to do so her entire life. 

This Great Idea! (That Isn't)

I've been introduced to someone who has connections with some people that it would be good to get connected with in the blind blind services corporate world.   This person is exceedingly nice and was already planning on doing something with this company and it's very generous to be invited to be a part of it. 

He's tasked me with doing something though that is not a good idea.   He knows 3D printing, and he is knowledgeable about blind people, but not from a direct contact, day-to-day perspective.   The idea is a good one, only it's not practical.   And I think he'll see that, but I'm going to have to have a conversation with him about it and let him come to that conclusion. 

The last time we talked about it on our first introduction call, he mentioned it right at the end (we were meeting for other purposes).  He threw out the collaboration and his idea, I said that sounded great, and then we had to go.   I didn't. have a chance to think through the idea.   

Since then, he's pitched the idea to corporate people, who know all about the visually impaired, but don't know about 3D printing.  It sounded good to them.   And it is a good idea, it's just not a practical idea.  

For instance, let me know what ten flavors of pop corn you think would be most successful at the movie theater.  Let me know when we talk again.   You can come up with ten flavors of pop corn, but the reality is, people are going to get the traditional flavor and candy far more than they're going to get your bacon and broccoli popcorn, even if they are fantastic.  There are just better options.   

It will all be fine, but I hate telling someone their great idea is good, but the context it's in isn't.   Or maybe I'm wrong.  I'm going to ask around and see if there's something I'm missing.  3D printing is great in that you can print all sorts of things.   Some of those things are just more practical to get via more traditional methods.    Like a 3D printed newspaper: Possible? Yes.  Practical? No.

The Big Boy Update:  My son wanted to ask if he could get on the computer tonight.  I was on a call.  I asked him to tell me quickly.   He launched into a very long, well, I could tell it was going to be long, I interrupted and said, "are you asking if you can get on the computer?"  He said, "you don't understand". I said, "if you want to get on the computer, just ask, I'm on a call". He said with an odd look, "can I get on the computer???"  I said yes and he looked confused, like how did he just get away with that?

The Tiny Girl Chronicles:  My daughter took a walk with Lisa and Charlotte the dog today.   Lisa said she would be glad to spend some time with my daughter and my daughter loved it and loved seeing Charlotte again.   Oh, and she got paid for helping out this past weekend with Charlotte.   She was not expecting money, and was really excited about that part. 

Feed The Woozle

We played the game Feed the Woozle tonight for family game night.   It's a game for children from three to six years of age (suggested) but when you have a blind child, sometimes games have a lifespan of much longer.  

The game is a lot about manual dexterity as you have to carry chips to the Woozle across the room in a spoon.   You have to cross the space doing something silly, like bunny hopping, walking backwards, doing a hula dance, spinning or just going crazy.  

My son was interested in playing too, but to him, he wanted to do everything to an extreme.   We successfully finished and won the game as a team the first time around with my daughter and me dropping some of the food to the woozle.   We decided to increase the difficulty by having to do two and then three moves at once as the game went on. 

The second time around we played with everyone having their eyes closed.   It wasn't that hard, but it gave us an insight into how my daughter did what she does and how she makes it look easy.   Everyone laughed at me because I was so careful I was trying to feed the woozle's head and wouldn't stop to feel with my second hand until I finally got the chips into his mouth. 

The way we knew where the woozle was from across the room (something you needed help with if you had your eyes closed and were spinning around or walking backwards) we tapped on the woozle's cardboard head so we could locate via sound. 

A lot of laughing was had and we got a chance to spend time together.   It didn't matter that the game was for little children at all. 

The Big Boy Update:  My son came home with sticks he's been working on turning into tools and weapons at school during recess.   Weapons at a Montessori school?   "Tools, Mom, and we don't use them," I was informed.  He spent a lot of the night writing up and then printing out some team names and guidelines for the team members for the rest of their work with these "tools" that he put back in his backpack to take to school in the morning. 

The Tiny Girl Chronicles:  I got an, "I hate you, Mom" tonight when I took my daughter's Alexa after she was very rude to me because I walked into her room to say goodnight.   She was reading and I think she's had a lot of homework lately.   Still, she can be polite, or at least apologize when she realized the situation.  

In The Dark

We have a therapeutic massage person that comes to the house from time to time.  The children like her and seem to get some benefit from it.  When she arrived today, I had laid down and was asleep, my husband in unusual form, was asleep in the chair in the basement.  My son was in the bonus room and my daughter was in her room, listening to an audio book.   And it was completely black inside the house. 

My daughter came to the door, go the dog to calm down, asked who it was and then let Shelia in, and then fled up the stairs to her room because a good spot was currently happening in her audiobook.  

I groggily got up and found Shelia, who had located some light switches by then.   My daughter didn't need the light to answer the door.  

The Big Boy Update:  I found my son on screens when I woke up tonight.   He said he had permission.  He did, but only for a fraction of the time he took since his parents had both fallen asleep.  Tomorrow there will be a conversation. 

The Tiny Girl Chronicles:  After answering the door tonight, my daughter went up to her room.  I found her sitting on her bed in the dark.  I thought she had been listening to an audiobook but she wasn't.  She was reading, something she doesn't need light to do.