Nora Evelyn

Last night Jen had to work so Nora and I headed over to Washtenaw Dairy for ice cream. She had a tiny, little bowl of banana pudding ice cream (with bananas and vanilla cookies mixed in), I had the chocolate chip and we sat on a faux wrought iron bench outside so Nora could swing her little feet while we ate.

It was a gorgeous late summer/early fall evening of the sort that could convince anyone to live in Michigan. Nora pointed out all of the dogs, birds, cars, babies, trucks, busses, airplanes, glasses of water, trash cans and shoes she could see while gripping her bowl in the left hand and very, very neatly using the spoon with her right. Occasionally she’d give me a scoop of hers and wait for a scoop of mine in exchange.

When we were done she needed her face cleaned up a little bit and her hands wiped off but who doesn’t?

Life is good.

It took 13 days, but Nora has figured out that she can get out of bed and wander around. No photo as that would only encourage her.

Nora and her cousin Kacie celebrated the end of summer by donning their inadvertently identical swimsuits (really, complete accident) and playing in Kacie’s fancy Finding Nemo lawn sprinkler.

Nora has learned to pretend; this happens far earlier than I’d have imagined during a child’s cognitive development. Or she’s been pretending for a long time and she’s just become sufficiently verbal to convey irreality? I don’t know.

She’ll lay her doll down on a pillow and tell us “shhhhhhh! baby sleeping”. This morning she spent several minutes pretending she was crashing into her bedroom wall and falling over while yelling “nora boom!”. Here’s a photo from this past weekend when she climbed into a milk crate and began pretending to drive: steering gestures, yelling *beep* *beep*, bobbing from side to side, etc. She learned to pretend drive from her Baba (sometimes the jokes practically write themselves and the true sign of wit is to leave them unsaid –formless but inescapable).

Nora also acted as general contractor for our pantry installation this weekend. Here’s a shot of my feet preparing to hang new cabinets and Nora explaining how to proceed. When I finished she ran around the kitchen yelling “yay, dada! yay, dada!” which is pretty good for employee morale.

On Sunday, Granny McGowan took us out for lunch at Buddy’s Pizza (don’t let the abysmal, amateur web site fool you; the pizza’s fantastic). Afterwards we all headed back once again to Bicentennial Park in Livonia for another run at play structure city (playopolis?).

Wednesday morning Nora and I missed the 9:07 bus. It had taken two solid hours to build and maintain the momentum required to get our clean, fed, dressed and happy selves out the door in time for Nora to meet up with Salomé’s mom so I could go to a meeting (thanks, Anna!) and I failed at 9:07:30. We were on the front porch, in the stroller, eating cheerios and trying to lock the front door when the bus rolled by. Naturally, Nora happily called out, “bus! *beep* *beep* *beep*” and I yelled too — I didn’t yell “beep” exactly, but what I yelled would require beeping. I also slammed the storm door. Nora eyed me nervously and I behaved like the toddler.

Everything worked out great, of course. We walked to campus (the weather was phenomenal, Nora sang to me most of the way) and arrived just in time for our scheduled rendezvous with Anna. The two of them went off and, by all accounts, had a great time; my meeting was uneventful. I regretted my stupid outburst but no harm done, yeah?

Thursday morning (the next day) Nora and Jen were waking me up and, as it’s wont to do, the 7:07 bus drove by. Nora stopped cheerfully explaining to me that I needed my glasses and shoes (“dada glasses! glasses! dada socks. dada shoes!”), looked grave, darted back and forth, fidgeted her hands nervously and exclaimed “uh oh! dada! uh oh, dada! [pause] bus!” She seemed frightened.

I’m new at this and I make mistakes. I’m glad I don’t have a photo of the scared little face pointing toward the sound of the bus going by.

Nora’s current favorite toy is the small, stuffed monkey given to her by our friend Tami. Monkey (pronounced ‘ahkey’ with a nasalized vowel but no ‘m’ or ‘n’) comes to breakfast, comes along on car rides, gets carried around quite a lot and is apparently essential for bedtime.

Nora, don’t look now but I think you got some yogurt on your nose.

Jen caught a picture of Nora clapping with giant oven mitt arms.

Today is day one in our little “can Nora sleep in a big girl bed” experiment and the preliminary results are incredibly promising. I converted the bed (took the front off the crib) right after she got up this morning. Here she’s sitting in it for the first time (wearing a towel because she was gearing up for a run at the potty chair which, you understand, requires one to be properly attired). Her afternoon nap went as smoothly as ever (actually, she dropped her monkey and cried until I came in and retrieved him for her. Despite putting herself *into* bed she seems unaware that she can put herself back out again. We’re not complaining).

Bedtime went even more smoothly than usual. We finished teeth & bath, put her in her footy pajamas (“shoes! mama! shoes!”) and she climbed into bed herself, snuggled monkey, told us “bye bye” and went straight to sleep. Amazing. Can it last?