Our little family met up this afternoon with our friends Anna and Salomé for a walk, snack (thanks, Anna) and playtime at the peony garden down at the Nichols Arboretum. When Nora and Salomé saw each other approaching the garden they ran away from their respective parents calling out each other’s names and ultimately meeting in an adorably awkward little series of hugs.

Salomé and her family are, crushingly, done living in Ann Arbor now so this was the last of our little play dates together. Living in a college town means getting to meet and know incredible, amazing, unbelievably smart people who then move on. Life is hard, boo hoo, walk it off.

It was insanely hot but fantastic company and a lovely setting can make up even for small inconveniences like peony bushes bursting into flames as you walk by them and ducks slathering one another with orange sauce as they slowly bake in their feathers. We let the girls escape the blistering nastiness of the day by frolicking in the Huron River. It was lovely and cool and provided the unexpected entertainment of watching, in surprisingly slow, stately succession, a lifejacket, floating cushion, hat, paddle, beer can, water bottle, something unidentifiable, and then 2 sadly soggy looking people floating aimlessly in a paddleless canoe. It’s like a simile (or maybe it’s a metaphor).


Nora was 30 months old today. Happy 2.5th birthday, little one.
p.s. even if you’ve never clicked on a picture before in your life –even if your personal belief system includes an interdiction against picture clicking– click the first image and check out those little faces. *sniff* walk it off.
