weeks like this deserve no blog post title.

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This week basically has me like:

What a shitshow these last few days have been. There was barfing and PMSing and lost job opportunities and showing up 2.5 minutes late to Rowan's first Easter egg hunt, which was unfortunate, because you know how long an Easter egg hunt takes? About 2.5 minutes. And then all you've got left is an empty half of a plastic egg that someone else discarded. 

So here. This week left my brain with all the verbal power of a Slushee, so have some pictures of Rowan's Easter adventures instead.

::

Here's my girl on Saturday with Sparky the Fire Dog after the Easter egg "hunt" (AKA thank goodness we ran into friends whose son was preoccupied by the fire trucks long enough for his parents to sneak a few of his eggs into Rowan's basket). Her expression pretty much sums up the freezing, muddy morning:

Her Sunday was much better, considering the Easter Bunny came to both our house and Grandma's house. Plus, outfit on point, awww.

She is STOKED about the toys the Easter Bunny brought her - especially her magnifying glass and binoculars (courtesy of Grandma's UNREAL, amazing Easter basket).

Inspecting the pine cone collection she & Grandma
started in Grandma's backyard

Inspecting the kids' menu at Easter brunch

Keeping an eye out for the hoodlums that egged our
garage last week

She also loved the toys from the Easter basket J.J. and I put together for her. They're pretty random toys, but the Easter Bunny turned in a bunch of loose change at the grocery store recently in exchange for an Amazon voucher, and so the bunny bought some toys from Rowan's ongoing Amazon wish list, and then remembered that Easter was coming up soon so she just saved those toys for the basket. #winning

Pictured:

•  CAT Mini Construction Trucks: I love these little construction trucks, and Rowan does, too. I ended up getting a five-pound bag of aquarium rocks to go with the trucks, and they're just the right size for scooping and dumping with the tiny trucks. (Also, they're accidentally the same color as my kitchen floor, which is great because y'all can't see the rocks scattered everywhere, but terrible because OUCH.)
• 50 Counting Bears with Cups: These are little Montessori-inspired bears that are a great open-ended toy for preschoolers. They're perfect for counting, sorting, and imaginative play.

So, you know. This week was annoying, mostly, but it's almost over...so that has me like:

^^ Now if only this ridiculous child would stop playing around in her crib and go to sleep, because it's 9:20 p.m. and I just can't even with anything anymore.

basically some half-assed pumpkin projects.

I had some pretty sweet project ideas for this month. I mean, come on. I'm home every day with a project-hungry toddler! It's October! Halloween! Pumpkin spice lattes! Pumpkin spice bread! Pumpkin spice leggings!!!

But, you know. Life. (Also I just started watching the Walking Dead series, soooo there goes all my free time.) It's the last week of October, and I've only done about half the projects I thought of, and in an extremely half-assed manner.

Behold, my half-assery:

:: PROJECT IDEA: PUMPKIN PICKING AT LOCAL PUMPKIN PATCH
:: Project reality: The "pumpkin patch" at Kroger, where the pumpkins were already picked over and starting to rot. Buy one, get one free...even if that one to Rowan's left looks straight-up like a pumpkin version of a Walker.

She picked the tiniest one she saw and fell madly in love with it.

:: PROJECT IDEA: PUMPKIN WASHING
:: Project reality: Toddler swipes at a pumpkin with a washcloth, then dumps the water out on the driveway and splashes in it. Whatever; I'm still mostly in shock that it was warm enough in late October for outdoor water play.

A quick scrub of the tiny pumpkin, and then...

..."I goin' to da market, Mama." The market?!

Oh, well.

:: PROJECT IDEA: PUMPKIN DECORATING WITH MARKERS
:: Project reality: Five seconds of scribbling. I used to do this project with my preschoolers, and they would spend huge chunks of time coloring the pumpkins with washable markers, wiping them clean with paper towels, coloring again, washing again, etc. Rowan lasted a few minutes, tops. Maybe we'll try again sometime - and probably inside. Lately, whenever we're outside, all Rowan wants to do is ride her bike.

:: PROJECT IDEA: PUMPKIN PAINTING
:: Project reality: Nope. This one just plain didn't happen. She painted a (papier-maché) pumpkin at Grandma's house awhile back and had a blast (as evidenced below). I thought she'd love painting the small, slightly-rotted-but-beloved pumpkin she chose from the Kroger pumpkin patch, and that painting would be a more developmentally appropriate way to decorate her pumpkin than giving her a knife and letting her go nuts. I even planned to tape off patterns on the pumpkin with painter's tape to make it look extra awesome. And it probably would've been awesome...if I'd ever gotten around to getting the paint out. Ah, well. At least she had fun painting with Grandma!

:: PROJECT IDEA: PUMPKIN DECORATING WITH CRAFT SUPPLIES
:: Project reality: Accidentally outsourced this project to my mom group. Some mamas set up a pumpkin-decorating station at one of our recent get-togethers, and I was like, sweet! Decorating a pumpkin with craft supplies: check. Rowan worked very seriously for a long time on hers. 

:: PROJECT IDEA: PUMPKIN DECORATING WITH TISSUE PAPER
:: Project reality: At least we actually did do this...just half-assedly. I found the idea on Young House Love - use Mod Podge and tissue paper circles to decorate a pumpkin; perfect for toddler-sized hands - but I underestimated the importance of picking a white pumpkin (to help the tissue paper circles stand out). Also, I haven't quite gotten around to covering the finished product with a final layer of Mod Podge. Eh. Process, not product, right? This kept Rowan busy for almost an hour, and she seriously loved it.

:: PROJECT IDEA: BAKE AND DECORATE HALLOWEEN-THEMED COOKIES
:: Project reality: Yeah...I forgot that I purchased fifty-cent Halloween cookie cutters awhile ago, and so I never made any cookies. We did make some pumpkin spice oatmeal cups, though, which were pretty damn good. The recipe is here; I recommend adding white chocolate chips, since a friend also made these and said they were too bland. Ours were tasty with the white chocolate chips.

:: PROJECT IDEA: PUMPKIN NAIL & STRING ART
:: Project reality: Heyyy, success! One whole-assed project per month ain't bad. Granted, this wasn't a project that involved Rowan. Maybe that's why I was able to offer up my entire ass, versus half of it. If you want to try it, it's not hard - on a scale of one to ten (one being the pumpkin washing project featured above, ten being owning and tending to your own pumpkin farm), it's, like, a three. I bought a $5 plank of wood and some string from Michaels, printed out a pumpkin template from Google, hammered in some nails, and wove the string around the nails. I'm pretty pleased with the final product, although it's still missing something...maybe some pumpkin patch vines around the base? Oh, and a place to hang it in my house. Oops.

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So, there you have it. The jury's still out on whether we'll actually CARVE any pumpkins this year. Meh. I think I'll be too busy half-assing our Halloween costumes. Yay, October! Ushering in a holiday season of Pinterest fails for all!

(However, I am most certainly whole-assing my Walking Dead marathons. A hearty screw you to everyone who posted spoilers after this week's episode.)

yes, Michigan! (but mostly donuts and cider.)

Truth: The frigid, gray weather that comprises at least five out of twelve Michigan months is the worrrst. Uncalled for. Enough to make you hightail it to a state with a more temperate climate, to a city that isn't overcast for literally more than half the days of the year.

BUT.

Also truth: Spring, summer, and especially fall are glorious here. The weather these past couple weeks has been perfection - cool mornings, hot afternoons, and sunny skies. J.J. and I know better than to waste beautiful autumn weekend days inside, and we plan to take Rowan on an unofficial donut tour of the Ann Arbor area this year. You know. For her sake. For donut research. 

So we trekked out to Three Cedars Farm in Northville today, and we had such a good time. This place is unbelievable - dozens of mini-attractions (a wooden train, silo slides, farm animals, a corn box, toddler-sized tractors) that are all free. FREE. J.J. and I were (cynically) blown away that we could have experienced everything we did today without paying a dime, if we wanted. (We did pay some dimes for donuts and cider, of course, but even those were totally reasonably priced.) Rowan's tiny mind was blown, too, by all the fun stuff to do.

I really had to restrain myself from swan-diving into this corn box.

She wanted to take all the tractors home with her. Alllll the tractors.

Taking flight from a giant hay bale.

There were real pigs, too, but this one was more ride-able.

She loved hopping from car to car on the wooden train, driving it, and ringing the conductor's bell.

Here's the cheesy smile she flashed every time I asked her smile for the camera.

The donuts and cider didn't disappoint. There was a long line (no surprise, since it was sunny and 70 degrees on a Sunday afternoon), but it moved quickly. This lucky girl was thrilled.

And the cute rocking chairs outside of the Cider & Donut Hut were perfect for snuggling:

That's a happy yell :)

{Edit: Found the pic below from last year's cold, wet trip to the same place with my new-mom group! Look how leeeetle!}

Since Three Cedars Farm doesn't charge you to enter (although it does have some attractions - a train ride, hay rides, corn maze - that cost a few dollars per person), it was basically like stumbling on a beautiful, fall-themed public playground. I'm pretty sure J.J. plans on bringing Rowie back every weekend until the snow flies. 

I don't think she'll mind.

Happy Sunday, everyone. Hope your weekend was restful, sunny, and providing of donuts and cider. We're gearing up for a week of birthday celebrations around here!

how we spent our summer vacation.

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Summer is my favorite. Always has been. I love the sun, the heat, the freedom to walk outside without the air biting my cheeks. The weather has made a huge impact on my days, both working with other people's kids and as a stay-at-home mom. Everything's so much more manageable when you can just throw your hands up and say, "Everyone outside! Now!"

After a long winter in southeast Michigan where it was often too cold to even go outside to play (negative wind chills, anyone?), I was so, so looking forward to warm breezes and blue skies. And this summer didn't disappoint. The universe may have delivered some of the worst of times this year, but make no mistake, there were some best of times, too. We didn't travel or sleep in or execute any huge house projects. We just summered. Took it easy. Relaxed. Drank each other in.


So...here's how we spent our summer vacation:

:: It was the summer of the backyard. We took full advantage of our backyard - on the new slide mound, in the sandbox, on the swings (usually with a "friend" - a stroller, a dinosaur, etc. - in the adjacent swing), in the little pool, at the music wall, and in the "Daddy garden." She'd eat anything from the garden as long as we called it a "Daddy" vegetable - Daddy tomatoes, Daddy peppers, etc. She learned to swing on the big-kid swing. She, like us, called the pathway to the park "mosquito alley." She explored and dug and fell down and made it hers.

:: It was the summer of language explosions. Rowan learned to speak in full sentences, to use language idioms ("Umm..." when she was pondering), and to play with language to make jokes. For some reason, she started calling me "Momany" (pronounced "mama-nee") and herself "Rowalee." She commands us: "Come see!" "Look at my tower!" She still clarifies with sign language from time to time - most recently, when we were at a restaurant and she was eating salad. She was asking for more dressing and did the sign for "get dressed," which I thought was clever and hilarious. She loves making us laugh and telling us, "Dat funny!"

:: It was the summer of lounging. We had some morning commitments - music class, a Parent & Child class, our regular library story times - but mostly, we could take our time. Rowan loved having picnic breakfasts on the front porch while we waited for the garbage trucks to come by:

:: It was the summer of numbers and letters. They're everywhere, and Rowan notices them everywhere. We started assigning favorite people to letters, and now she yells whenever she sees a familiar one - A for Anna, C for Carrie, D for Daddy, E for Emmett, F for Finny, G for Gramma and Grandpa, M for Momany, O for Obee, R for Rowan, S for Scarlet, and T for Tatum. She also discovered when standing at the edge of the pool that the number 3 turns into an M if it's sideways, a W if you're the other sideways, and an E if you're upside-down. As for numbers, she loves counting, and if you ask her how old she is? "One and a half! Almost two on Rowie's happy birthday!"


:: It was the summer of growing. Her pigtails are long. Her clothes are too small. (Except her shoes...her feet are a full two to three sizes smaller than her same-age friends' feet.) She now loves to pee in the potty when I change her diaper, although I wouldn't guess that she's anywhere near being potty-trained. (That's fine, I'm not ready for that quite yet, either.) And, telltale sign of toddlerhood, she adores pretending to be a baby...like, all the time. She actually distinguishes between real and pretend, and did NOT enjoy when I pretended to be her, sitting on Daddy's lap in the big chair and drinking her milk: "Rowie saaad. Mama just pretend. Rowie all better, drink milk."


:: It was the summer of swimming swimming swimming, and then swimming some more. We spent a ridiculous number of afternoons between naptime and dinnertime at my mother-in-law's neighborhood pool, and I'd say it was Rowan's favorite thing about summertime. Whenever I'd go into her room to get her from her nap, she'd sit straight up and say, "Gramma's biiiig pool?!" I loved being able to say yes. I thought she'd be nervous in the water, given her shyness in new situations, but she took to it like a natural. It didn't take long before she was going all the way under the water ("Jumping under," she called it) and splashing around like a fish.

:: It was the summer of evolving tastes and preferences. Her current favorite things in the world: Elsa, Anna, Elmo, Cookie Monster, jumping, swimming, letters, pickles, baby dolls, birthdays, Elmo oatmeal, and books (especially Pete the Cat, Chicka Chicka Boom Boom, Curious George, The Paper Bag Princess, Frozen, Big Pumpkin, Pickle Things - any book that she gets to recite parts of). She'll tell us when she likes something, too - "I like dat song!" "I love dat pizza!"


:: It was the summer of singing. I remember wondering, in the spring, how and when kids start singing. It seemed like such a weird, far-off milestone. But now? Rowan loves singing full songs: Itsy-Bitsy Spider, It's Raining It's Pouring, The Wheels on the Bus, Happy Birthday, Twinkle Twinkle, songs from music class, Sesame Street record songs, etc. I might be the only person who can distinguish which song she's singing 95% of the time, but hey. The effort counts.

:: It was the summer of being messy. For sure. Pretty much every day. But, true to her Gorga heritage, my girl loved the clean-up just as much as the mess-making. Here she is trying to wipe up her driveway paintings with a wet paper towel:

:: It was the summer I learned that Rowan has a secret talent: pole dancing. She found poles everywhere we went and executed some fancy moves. Hey, someone's got to make the money around here. 

:: It was the summer of exploring our city. We made sure to hit up some of the best summertime (and just general) destinations that Ann Arbor has to offer: Nichols Arboretum, the Farmers Market, the U of M Matthei Botanical Gardens, the splash pad at Buhr Pool, the U of M Museum of Natural History, the Hands-On Museum, a million parks and playgrounds, the Huron River, Washtenaw Dairy, neighborhood ice cream trucks...

The Arb

Washtenaw Dairy

Botanical Gardens

The Arb, again

A Marilyn moment at one of the U of M Hospital courtyards
(with a dinosaur in hand, natch)

Ran through the woods to hunt down the ice cream truck

:: It was the summer of identifying emotions. And, for me, letting her feel them, even though sometimes I want to tamp down on the negative ones. Since Rowan processes so much through language, it helped give her names for her big feelings. Now she can tell me when she feels sad, angry, happy, scared, and (my favorite) frustrated (by stomping her feet and yelling, "I'm frustrated!"). 

Adult Swim sucks. I agree, Rowan.

All in all? It was a good summer. We flourished outside. We thrived in the water. We danced in the rain and laughed in the sunshine. Rowan's pigtails grew long. All these wonderful things happened, and my daughter grew and learned and love. And. And we also said good-bye to my mom. 

And now it's September. Rowan turns two in two weeks. There are some things I'm fine with taking a break from - sunscreen, loads of swimming laundry, and bedrooms that are sunny for hours past toddler bedtime - and it feels like a relief to let go of the season in which I lost my mom. 

So. Moving forward, welcoming autumn, and - as always - enjoying my sweet girl.