I spotted this list on Frances’ blog a few weeks ago, and made a note to share it today, Annabelle’s 11th birthday.

Apparently F. Scott Fitzgerald’s daughter, Scottie, grew up and wrote for The New Yorker and The Washington Post — and avoided her parents’ mental illness. Sounds pretty good to me.

And so here is Fitzgerald’s advice to Scottie on her 11th birthday, in the form of a letter written in 1933, list of things to worry about (and things not to worry about).

Happy birthday, my sweet Annabelle. My advice: Don’t worry about a thing. Stay just as you are — loyal, wise, beautiful and independent. But if you insist on worrying, check out this list from one of my favorite authors.

From F. Scott Fitzgerald:

Things to worry about:

Worry about courage
Worry about cleanliness
Worry about efficiency
Worry about horsemanship

Things not to worry about:

Don’t worry about popular opinion
Don’t worry about dolls
Don’t worry about the past
Don’t worry about the future
Don’t worry about growing up
Don’t worry about anybody getting ahead of you
Don’t worry about triumph
Don’t worry about failure unless it comes through your own fault
Don’t worry about mosquitoes
Don’t worry about flies
Don’t worry about insects in general
Don’t worry about parents
Don’t worry about boys
Don’t worry about disappointments
Don’t worry about pleasures
Don’t worry about satisfactions

Things to think about:

What am I really aiming at?
How good am I really in comparison to my contemporaries in regard to:

(a) Scholarship
(b) Do I really understand about people and am I able to get along with them?
(c) Am I trying to make my body a useful instrument or am I neglecting it?

With dearest love,

Daddy

It’s sharing week here at GIAPH…. Tuesday I showed you Trish’s poem. Today, here’s her lovely daughter Abbie’s English paper — she was asked to write about a “compelling person” in her life. Abbie, who is 17, chose Sophie. Abbie has known both my girls since they were days (hours?) old — and it shows. She asked me to answer a few questions for this paper, but most of it comes straight from her heart.

Smart Enough… to Know

By: Abigail Parker
May 14, 2012

At 10 A.M. on May 21st, 2003, Amy Silverman and Ray Stern brought Sophie Rae into the world. A nurse, who had been inspecting the new baby, told Amy she was measuring how far the girl’s ears were from her head. Ray then chimed in and said a life-changing sentence: “It looks like she has Down syndrome.” No one was positive just yet, but after running a few tests, the doctor confirmed the news.

Down syndrome is a genetic disorder called Trisomy 21. This means there is an extra 21st chromosome, which changes everything about Sophie from literally head to toe.

Starting early, Sophie began therapy. Speech, occupational, and physical therapies have given Sophie the progress she needs. She has been attending a school with therapies in their program.

In the spring of 2012, Sophie competed in the Special Olympics. She enjoyed challenging herself and racing against other children, as well. Her favorite part, though, was standing on the platform to accept her metal.

Sophie is also currently a ballerina at a studio in Phoenix. She was a part of the impeccable performance of Dance Theater West’s Snow Queen. Running around the stage with hectic hair, glitter, and the biggest smile, anyone could tell that she was having the time of her life. There was a clear Sophie Stern fan section that she waved to occasionally.

Annabelle Rose is Sophie’s older sister. The eleven-year-old is enrolled at [edited for content]. She is a successful dancer, pianist, and artist. Annabelle’s influence on Sophie is seen quite clearly. Of course they have differences in their favorite colors, style, and favorite TV shows, but they share a strong bond over many things. Ballet is a common hobby of theirs and Sophie wants to do anything Annabelle does like get her ears pierced.

Annabelle is aware of her sister’s condition and thinks it’s pretty neat have a little sister with Down syndrome. Watching her grow up for the past eleven years and perform as a big sister for the past nine years, I’ve realized that she is the best influence Sophie could have. Annabelle is a hard-worker and knows her role as an American eleven-year-old. Once, she was telling me about a history project she had to do for school and it became clear to me that this little girl is brilliant. Sophie sees this everyday, and although she might not be able to advance as far as Annabelle in her dancing career or in school, Sophie has been greatly impacted by her sister.

Sophie knows she has Down syndrome. Hell, she embraces it. She is a ball of energy that is filled to the brink with love, a lot of that for Olivia the Pig and paintbrushes. She’s the only person I know that will approach a stranger in a coffee shop in La Jolla, California and say, “Hi, I’m Sophie. What’s your name?” Sophie is also brutally honest. Her opinions don’t necessarily hurt anyone, but she says anything that comes to her mind, which can often be strangely insightful for a nine-year-old with a “disability.”

In fact, on the way home from a Special Olympics practice, Sophie asked her mother the mother of all questions: “Why do I have Down syndrome?” Amy answered with the fact that science made it happen, and it seemed to satisfy Sophie.

Sophie’s condition restricts her from doing many things. However, this doesn’t stop her from trying. She’s incredibly lovable, interesting, and smart, yet she’s just smart enough to know she’s not smart enough.

From time to time over the years, the folks at KJZZ — the NPR affiliate here in Phoenix — have been kind enough to allow me to share some of my stories about Sophie. Typically, these pieces end on a high note. Not this one.

You can read it or listen to it here.

(And here’s the (almost) complete archive of my KJZZ commentaries.)

It’s not about flags or fireworks, but I think it’s fitting that they are running it today, Independence Day.

Except for the occasional limerick, which does not count, I do not write poetry. I’m too self-conscious, too aware that this is not a medium for a dabbler. You’ve got to really know what you’re doing to write a good poem. (Or be really lucky.)

But I do know a good poem when I read one. And this one made me understand in a flash why people write poetry — which happens to me sometimes, but not very often.

It landed in my email late last week.

“i wrote a poem about your kid in my writing project, which ended today,” my friend Trish wrote.

I could write 100 blog posts and not come close to the essence of my kid — not in the way Trish does in a few lines.

Remember the name Tricia Parker, folks. Seriously. She’s pretty freaking amazing. And kind enough to let me share her poem with you.

Sophie, who is eight but crawls

Sophie, who is eight but crawls
onto my lap, toddler tiny, all easy,
agile hip flexors, smudgy glasses
transform her almost lilac eyes
into fishes trapped in bowls.

Sophie, who is eight, eats her beans
and rice, and asks why?
every time I suggest
put your napkin here
move your drink away from the edge
try a spoon instead.
Why? Sophie recognizes these suggestions
for the corrections they are.
Why? She wants to know.
So you don’t make a mess.

Why?

And then, tell me a story about
when I was a baby. Tell it now.
Wait until we finish eating.
No! Tell it now,
Sophie insists, her feet in the smallest
pink, sparkly moccasins,
crawling into and out of my lap
insisting fish-bowl wide-eyed.
No. Tell me now.

I need to think about it.
She shakes her head, watching me.
No. You don’t.

Last night I walked into Scottsdale Center for the Arts and smack into two of the coolest women I know. No surprise, it was a Friday night and the place was bustling. This is one of the best places in my town to see a show. Over the years I’ve gone there for Ira Glass, David Sedaris, Lyle Lovett, Spalding Gray — you get the picture.

But to be honest, on this night, I wasn’t expecting to see these two.

“So,” I said, after hellos and hugs. “Are you guys here for, um –”

They both looked slightly embarrassed. No, they explained, they were running an event in the small theater at Scottsdale Center, a discussion about how to save a Frank Lloyd Wright house in the Arcadia neighborhood that’s at risk of being demolished.

They didn’t ask why I was there. They knew.

We all had to get where we were going, so we said our goodbyes and Ray and I made our way into the larger theater. We weren’t there to hear a lecture about modern art or see some tragically hip public radio star. Actually, some people might call the event we’d come for tragic.

My cool friends might. They’d never say it, though I wouldn’t blame them for thinking it. Not so long ago — nine years and three weeks, to be exact — I would have felt exactly the same way.

I was at Scottsdale Center for the Arts last night to see the latest production by a local troop called Detour. Even the closest watchers of the Phoenix theater scene might not recognize the name. All of the actors in this production are developmentally disabled adults. Some very much so. Many can’t be on stage alone — so coaches work closely with them, quietly feeding them lines, masterfully guiding them (literally) through the scenes of a full-scale, full-blown musical production — in this case, South Pacific.

Ray and I were there last night specifically to watch our children perform. Sophie had a role as one of Emile’s children; Annabelle, too, and she served as Sophie’s onstage coach.

I won’t pretend that I didn’t wish in some ways last night that I had come to hear a lecture about architecture. Afterward, we could have gone out for cocktails and talked about the relative merits of Wright’s notoriously low ceilings. But that’s not my life (so much) anymore. Some days I’m better at accepting that than others. I think I did okay last night.

True, we sat near the last row. A safe distance. After the show, when the actors were milling around in the lobby and I could see them more closely, I was startled to realize how significantly many are affected by their disabilities. For a minute or two, during the performance, I got so caught up I forgot I wasn’t watching a professional theater company perform.

The director, a woman named Sam, does an incredible job of casting and giving each actor the chance to work to his or her potential. In the case of the leads, that meant the audience got to listen to some truly amazing vocal performances. (Really! The woman who plays the lead is freaking unbelievable.) For others, it meant being on stage, going through several costume changes, speaking a line or two, and relishing well-earned applause.

Sam is an old friend of my mom’s, and we talked for a few minutes a couple months ago at Special Olympics. Her own son, Christopher, competes in Special Olympics and she told me that she only comes because he so obviously enjoys it (he won a gold medal for running during the span of our conversation) but that she long ago decided that there needs to be more for adults with disabilities. A lot more. So she created Detour.

I went to my first Detour performance a year and a half ago, when our beloved nanny Courtney was a coach. To be honest, it was hard to watch. You don’t see a lot of parents of young kids like Sophie at events like this — and I totally understand why. Even at a happy time like this, it’s hard to propel yourself headlong into your future. Into your kid’s future.

So when Sam asked if the girls would take part in South Pacific, I hesitated. But they were both so excited about it, we said yes. Courtney graciously took them to several rehearsals, and she’s in charge of the kids while they are back stage.

I have to admit that I worried about how Annabelle would react to spending so much time with Detour. Not my proudest moment: One day I asked her, “How is it, hanging around with, um, people in that situation? Does it make you feel uncomfortable?”

She looked at me like I was crazy. (She does that more and more these days.) I shut my mouth. Last night, watching her take hands with Sophie and another girl to dance in a circle around a woman in a wheelchair, my eyes welled up. I know being Sophie’s sister is hard sometimes, but last night, I only felt how lucky Annabelle is. And what a wonderful young woman she’s becoming. And I know I’m biased, but I have to say that Sophie stole the show.

I had never seen South Pacific (not sure how I got to 45 without it — I did know all the songs) and neither had Ray, so we were a little lost when it came to the story. When Emile made a comment about his children being “different” I thought, “Wow, a reference to special needs?!” but a friend explained later it’s because the kids are supposed to be a different ethnic background. By the end, I got it, and I understood why Sam chose this play — it’s about overcoming prejudice and finding love.

Perfect.

Detour has two more performances this weekend — at 3 today and 3 tomorrow at Scottsdale Center for the Arts. Both are free (donations optional) and open to the public. I’d love it if you come. But trust me, I’ll totally understand if you don’t.

If you do, look for me. I’ll be sitting in the front row.

Really, after a certain age, what does one get one’s mother for her birthday?

After exhausting my sister’s brilliant idea that began several years ago with “40 Things We Love About Aunt Amy,” we’d run through the whole family (our mom included) and desperately needed a new schtick.

Enter the Mamafesto. A while back, my dear friend Jill wrote a brilliant manifesto for a writing workshop. I wrote my own, Jackalope Ranch is now doing a series — the manifesto has arrived.

So why not a Mamafesto? You know, all the good advice (well, the advice that’s fit to print) your mom has given you over the years?

With no further delay, here it is, a birthday present to you, Mom, from Jenny and me. And thank you. We’ve learned a lot — so far.

1. Always announce that you have a big butt (even if you don’t) before anyone else can say it about you first.

2. It’s perfectly acceptable to start the day with a Diet Coke.

3. It’s okay to refuse to get in the pool until the water temperature is 90.

4. Eating Brach’s by-the-pound candy while walking through the grocery store is not stealing, as long as you tell the clerk to lean on the scale a little when you hand her the wrapper-filled bag.

5. Birthday celebrations cannot be too big when it comes to your children.

6. Half birthdays deserve to be celebrated, too.

7. Shoulder pads are always in style.

8. Santa Claus does not discriminate against Jews, but don’t expect anything more than Trident gum from the Easter Bunny.

9. If you are going to fast on Yom Kippur, be sure to eat breakfast first.

10. When you don’t have a coffee filter, toilet paper will do.

11. When buying gifts, purchase one large, lovely thing — instead of a pile of crappy little things.

12. The best Christmas song of all time is and always will be “Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas”

13. They call Scrabble a game, but it’s very serious business.

14. Democrats are better than Republicans.

15. It’s more important to be creative than to be organized.

16. A little green fuzz on the raspberries never hurt anyone.

17. You can’t please everyone, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try.

18. If you feel like your neck is sagging a little, put on a birthday hat. The elastic under your chin will do wonders.

19. You can never tell your kids too often that you love them.

20. The show must go on.

I discovered the number one band in the country by accident.

I’m only a little ashamed to admit to you that I’ve been known to skulk around Anthropologie long after I’m done shopping so I can Shazam the store’s entire playlist. Hey, I’m in my mid-forties. I’m busy and I’m not particularly hip. I’ve got to find my music where I can.

Like in the hairdresser’s chair. I ran back to the office one day a few weeks ago to ask our music editor at New Times about this song I’d just heard.

“Oh yeah,” Jason said when I blurted out some lyrics. “That’s Fun.”

(Technically it’s “fun.” but that’s hard to make work in writing.)

Turns out, the frontman for Fun is a local guy, Nate Ruess, who’s made it on a scale no one from Arizona — not the Gin Blossoms or Jimmy Eat World or The Refreshments — has ever made it before. Fun’s big song, “We Are Young,” hit number one on the charts after it was in a Super Bowl ad and on an episode of Glee. The band has been everywhere all year.  

Who knew? Apparently everyone but me. Luckily Jason had an extra copy of the album “Some Nights,” which I stuck in my car’s CD player. That was early April; I haven’t taken it out since, although sometimes we listen to Fun’s first album, “Aim and Ignite,” to mix things up.

Fun is catchy and poppy and, well, fun. Ray really hates it (not surprising, for a guy who listens to Lamb of God) but both my girls adore it. Particularly Annabelle, who was immediately taken by the fact that Ruess writes a lot about his parents.

“That guy’s from Phoenix,” I told her. That’s all she needed to hear. She was fascinated, obsessed, hanging on every word. (Including the word fuck, which we decided she’ll just ignore.) And so when I heard Fun was coming to town, I knew that I had to get tickets. It had to be Annabelle’s first concert.

My first concert was Rick Springfield at the Arizona State Fair. He was pretty huge at the time, it was the Working Class Dog tour and all, but still. “Jessie’s Girl”? Nothing compared to Fun. I hope this is a night she remembers, for a lot of reasons.  

Like Annabelle, I’m totally in love with this band — and this guy. Their music — particularly the second album, which feels like a seamless anthem — is wonderful. You just don’t hear a young indie rock star sing so passionately about missing his mom, or about how he’s lived his whole life under the shadows of his father’s (specifics are never mentioned) illness.

We both love the song The Gambler, from Fun’s first album. An example of the lyrics:

It was the winter of ’86, and all the fields had frozen over.
So we moved to Arizona to save our only son
and now he’s turning to a man, although he thinks just like his mother,
he believes we’re all just lovers he sees hope in everyone.

And even though she moved away,
we always get calls from our daughter.
She has eyes just like her father’s
they are blue when skies are grey
And just like him, she never stops,
Never takes the day for granted,
works for everything that’s handed to her,
Never once complains.

It’s just lovely, but I didn’t realize til I was in the audience at Mesa Center for the Arts late last month that it’s more than that. After years of working really hard (he was half of the Phoenix-based band The Format before moving to New York City to start Fun) Ruess has finally made it – made it huge, Fun’s big hit will be played at every wedding and bar mitzvah for the next 20 years — and this was the first time he’d come home to play a big show.

Home.  He stood on the stage and the teenage girls (and Annabelle) screamed, but more than that, you could feel that this guy was home. He was clearly singing to his parents (somewhere in the balcony, it appeared), to his longtime fans, and to his hometown.

I’m not used to that. Several times during the show, Ruess addressed Phoenix — and I waited to be chastized. For SB1070, a crazy governor, a disgusting sheriff. Goodness knows we deserve it. But that’s apparently not what this guy’s about. He’s about love and family.

And he happens to be from Phoenix. 

How lucky, I thought, that I brought Annabelle. Don’t get me wrong, I want my kid to be cynical and to challenge her world, but I also want her to be happy in a way I never was, growing up in Phoenix. Maybe Nate Ruess wasn’t particularly happy at the time, either, but at least he has fond memories of growing up here.

I don’t. I spent my childhood dreaming about moving away. That didn’t happen, and in a lot of ways I’m glad — like Ruess, I’m convinced it’s all about family — but still, I have regrets. Two days after the Fun concert, I went on a rare solo trip to New York City. I saw friends, did cool work-related things, shopped, saw art, and mostly walked all over the city. It was magic, the New York I always figured I’d experience full-time as a grown up.

“If I lived here, it’s not like I’d be seeing a Broadway show and walking from the Lower East Side to the West Village and drinking at The Carlyle all in one week, right?” I asked my best friend, who moved to Manhattan after college and (pretty much) stayed.

She and her boyfriend looked at each other and shrugged. New York is their playground. That’s how they live. But they are in finance and I am in journalism and anyhow, as I wrote in a Facebook status update as I waited to board the plane at JFK, “Goodbye New York. I love you madly, but my heart is in Phoenix.”

It’s true, even though I started to cry after I wrote it. I don’t want Annabelle to live her life like that. I don’t think she will. Already she’s surpassed me in so many ways, maturity-wise.

Plus, she’s got Fun. Thank you, Nate Ruess, for loving Phoenix and not being afraid to say so. Thank you for making it big even though you’re from this podunk place and thank you to your parents, who must be pretty fucking amazing people to have raised a son with such a voice. A line from one of your songs is stuck in my head, and I hope it stays there, a reminder that geography doesn’t matter so much as what’s inside:

May your path be the sound of your feet upon the ground. Carry on.

“Hey Sophie,” I asked a few days before her birthday party last month. “How many layers do you want your cake to be?”

Then I held my breath.

Prior to that, the tallest cake I’d ever made in my life was two layers — and it was lopsided. But I was feeling ambitious (thanks a lot, Pinterest) so I was thinking three or maybe four layers, in different shades of purple. (Sophie’s favorite — I’ll post pictures of her purple party — thanks again, Pinterest — later.)

She didn’t look up from her dinner. “Nine,” she said, around a mouthful of sticky rice.

I looked at Annabelle, panicked. She shrugged. “She said nine, Mom.” DUH. Ninth birthday, nine layers.

“At least she’s not turning 13,” I muttered to myself as I left the kitchen, shaking my head.

So nine it was. Two days, four boxes of cake mix (well, six, if you want to get technical, though the last two didn’t made it far) and almost seven pounds (!) of butter cream frosting later, I had nine layers stacked. Nine too-thick, falling apart, why-not-just-give-up disasters.  I managed to swipe some frosting across the top, but the sides were out of the question, and even at that (and with skewers — lots of skewers) the whole thing started to tilt.

Like a scientist, I took a picture every few minutes to confirm the impending avalanche and decided to take action.

So the girls watched as I salvaged what I could, peeling,  scooping and grabbing at layers (four entire layers wound up in the trash after a wise decision was made to forgo cake pops) til I had a structure I was confident would make it to the party. I iced the whole cake with the little bit of frosting left and stepped back to admire it.

By just about anyone else’s standards, the thing was a mess. But to me, it was beautiful. The truth is that I never expected to get more than three layers — and here I was with five. Not bad.

As I raced around the house, getting ready for the party, it occurred to me that making that cake was a little like raising Sophie has been. If I’d never expected to get past two or three layers, I never would have. By going for it, I wound up doing far better than I’d imagined.

And you might think it a trite comparison (if you’ve never to make a nine-layer cake) but the truth is that as with that cake, it’s been Sophie herself who has pushed do things we never thought she could. (And pushed me to do the same, though that’s a separate post.)

That’s what it’s been like with Sophie, her whole life. It never occurred to her that she shouldn’t read, talk, run, dance or make a best friend — even though I worried hard about each. And yes, she’s still hard to understand at times, runs like a wind-up toy and lavishes her BFF with the kind of love most kids never give (or get — Sophie was smart enough to pick a little girl who can handle that). It’s all done Sophie-style. And it’s all awesome.

Nine won’t look the same on Sophie as it does on other kids. (No two kids are alike anytime, in any case.) But she’ll wear it well — even if a couple layers have to come down here and there to make math easier or keep her in basic swimming lessons a little longer. And I need to remember that that’s okay.

That silly cake wasn’t perfect, even at five measly layers. But as I lit the candles and watched Sophie make a wish, it was the most beautiful cake I’d ever seen.

Dear Sophie:

Happy birthday! I cannot believe that you are 9 today (even though we have been talking about your birthday for months) and some days, I cannot believe that I am your mom. Or that I am a mom at all. I am so lucky. Also tired and exasperated — and sometimes not as nice as I should be. But more than anything, I am happy. I love you, my beautiful girl. I hope you know that. Just in case, in honor of your birthday here are nine things I love about you (a twist on our family tradition):

1. I love your butt. I cannot believe that I created a person with such an awesome butt. (Daddy and your physical therapist do get some credit there.)

2. I love that you love Chinese food as much as I do.

3. I love that when you are dancing on the big stage, you always make sure to give a little wave.

4. I love to watch you run.

5. I love that you seem to know instinctively when somebody needs you to crawl on their lap.

6. I love listening to you sing Adele songs.

7. I love that you tell me, “Mommy, I love you too much.”

8. I love falling asleep with you — and waking up with you, too, even though you are a morning person and I am not.  

9. I love that even though you were disappointed this morning that you didn’t get McKenna, the American Girl doll of the year, and even though we didn’t have time before school to go out for bagels or play a board game, and even though I couldn’t find the purple dress you wanted to wear and we were out of Carnation Instant Breakfast and I wouldn’t let you call your best friend at 6 a.m., you still told me it was “the best birthday I ever had” after I let you get extra whipped cream on your Starbucks drink.

And I love the fact that even though you aren’t on Facebook, everybody seems to know that it’s your birthday. 

I cheated — that’s 10. One to grow on.

P.S. Happy Birthday to Girl in a Party Hat. She’s 4 today.

We were both juggling hectic workdays, so the phone conversation was quick. And as it often is with my best-friend-from-second-grade, it was totally over-the-top.

“OK,” Amy said, “so I’m thinking about going to Mood and buying fabric and hiring a seamstress to make Sophie and me matching purple pajamas for our birthday sleepover.”

“Are you insane?!” I replied. At least, that’s what went through my head. Amy lives in New York City, so she has access to things like Mood (the fabric store made famous by Project Runway) and seamstresses, but still. Hand sewn pajamas and a trip across the country to wear them seemed a bit much for a 9th birthday present.

But Amy is perfectly capable of such an act. Actually, this would be nothing for a woman who once threw an East Indian-themed Thanksgiving dinner on the floor of her tiny apartment, and who’s been known to take off for all parts of the world at a moment’s notice. The day she left for college she called and sang, “I’m Leaving on a Jet Plane” with such gusto that to this day — decades later — I can’t hear that song without thinking of her.

I don’t remember the purple pajama conversation — after all, it took place an entire nine months ago, but Amy swears that back in September, the last time she was home for a visit, she’d promised Sophie a sleepover party for her birthday. (She knew she’d be home around Sophie’s birthday — which is next week – for her niece’s college graduation.)

And damned if she wasn’t going to find matching purple pajamas for the two of them.

“Hold on,” I said, pulling up target.com to look for a more reasonable option. Amy got on, too, and it was just like high school — only instead of picking through the underwear rack at Marshall’s, we were scrolling through pajama options from the comfort of our respective desks.

I found some cute Nick and Nora pajamas in Sophie’s size — purple and with cherries. Voila. And there was even a (sort of) matching nightshirt in the adult section.

I sent Amy the links, then held the phone a foot from my ear as she yelled that this simply would not do. “That nightshirt is white! This is a purple pajama sleepover party! We have to match!” 

Sufficiently chastized, I gave up. Only Amy Segal would honor a 9-month-old promise of this sort. Sure enough, last night she showed up on our doorstep with gift-wrapped, matching purple pajamas (“I Heart New York” tee shirts, perfect!) in hand. She’d even found an Olivia the Pig stuffed animal wearing a bathrobe. And matching pink, furry purses for both Sophie and Annabelle.

“FAO Swartz to the rescue!” she announced, grabbing a peach and plopping down at the kitchen table.  

Sophie was enchanted. I might have forgotten their plan, but she remembered every detail. She sat on Amy’s lap and made her tell the story over and over again, of how many months ago, Sophie invited Amy to her purple pajama sleepover birthday party and how Amy said, “Well, Sophie, I’m not sure I can be there on that day, but no matter what, I’ll come to Arizona and the two of us will have a special purple pajama sleepover party together.”

And then Amy (again) took her finger and traced the path she’d drawn on Sophie’s birthday card, of a plane flying allllll the way across the country from New York City to Phoenix.

The two of them took over the living room. Sophie thought it would be a good idea if they shared one couch, but Amy (and I) drew the line at that, so after a quick cuddle Sophie stretched out nearby and slept all the way til 6 before climbing back in with Amy, which is how I found them this morning.

There was no cake or ice cream or candles, no pinata or games (except a few rounds of Go Fish) and the celebration ended abruptly when it was time for school.

But I have a feeling it was the best birthday party Sophie’s ever had.