Nora Evelyn McGowan

I meant to post this over a week ago, sorry. Nora made a mask at the free grad students with kids thing. It had pink antennae, a cool blue nose, and, well, you look at it.

Uncle Brian came over today to help us install (he did most of the work) a new 3-handle shower valve, taps, showerhead, etc. Goodbye leaky faucet and shower powerful enough to tear an unsuspecting guest’s skin off (sorry, Jill); hello, smooth operating taps made of modern, maintainable components (I once repaired the previous (long-since discontinued) handles by wrapping the valve stems tightly with aluminum foil and then banging the porcelain cross handles on with a rubber mallet).

Anyway, Nora was very excited to have Uncle Brian over for breakfast and when he went upstairs and she heard the shower come on she matter-of-factly announced that “uncle brian clothes off. uncle brian clothes off, mommy. uncle brian clothes off!” This, presumably, was a warning.

Amazingly, our one day home renovation project involving plumbing, minor carpentry, and tile modifications took us … one day! Honestly, the hardest part of the entire project was the decision to reuse our vintage, original tub spout.

Nora’s 5′ tall giraffe (Reginald) is now reachable from her bed so today she stole his hat and fell asleep in it. Yes, she is fast asleep in this picture.

Nora’s pronunciation of baby has moved from [didi] (sounds like deedee) to [bebi] (the standard pronunciation of baby). She puts together novel multiword sentences all the time now. Has learned to use generic references to objects (e.g. “I want this one”, “Nora want pink one”, “this one too hot, daddy”). She’s never, ever stops talking (often talking while asleep like her old man). As I type this she’s curled up in my lap singing the alphabet song, hiccuping, and explaining to me that I need to read her her snowman book or her mickey mouse book or the llama llama book. In other words, I need to stop typing and start interacting with her.

Here we see Nora’s pink baby resting in Nora’s new kitchen. In Nora’s defense, it was terribly cold out and our home’s walls do lack insulation. She may have simply been trying to provide her inanimate baby with life-giving warmth.

We took Nora to another free Rackham students with kids event this Saturday: a free morning of bouncing at the Xtreme bounce zone. It’s basically a giant warehouse with a padded floor and 6 or 7 giant bouncy things (bouncy castles, bouncy obstacle courses, bouncy slides) it was bouncy boot camp for a little bouncy army (including a special bouncy castle just for toddlers and babies). Fantastic fun and worth many times the price we paid to get in.

The best part, though, was Nora getting to see nearly every little kid she’s ever expressed an interest in (Harper, Kacie, and Samantha’s absences were duly noted): Salomé, Oda, Pei Pei, Isobel, Anja. It was really wonderful. At one point Nora saw Pei Pei just as Pei Pei saw Nora so they screamed each other’s names, ran at each other, shared a crashing hug, and then squealed and ran off to attack the bouncy obstacle course.

On Tuesday we attended a fantastic event at the University for students who are also parents. There were hordes of happy kids, a corresponding number of nerdy parents, a clown, a station for making masks, a station for making wands, an unbelievably ill-advised baby pool filled with water and ducks, and free food. What’s not to love? It was also Nora’s twenty six monthaversary and her first (known) consumption of celery that hadn’t been stir fried.

Many thanks to the fine folks at Rackham and University Unions (and whomever else was involved) for a great evening of not being in our living room.

This photo was a mistake, but I like it.

Nora wrote a new song yesterday; perhaps it is technically a mash-up?

Twinkle twinkle little star,
Nora poop all day.

If Adam Sandler releases this as a single let this post serve as proof of prior art.

Nora got a brief sewing lesson from her Granny this weekend. Everything went great until Nora noticed the spool of purple thread, lost interest in the sewing, and attacked the machine. I’m confident Granny will eventually get it untangled and working again someday.