Our Birthday Girl

 Norah turns 3 tomorrow and I can’t imagine anyone being more excited to be a birthday girl than her. She has been looking forward to this day pretty much since May 27th 2011 and she has been truly pining for it since Bryan’s birthday in February. She would ask me several times a week if it was her birthday and she was actually pretty patient and understanding for the most part when I said no. Sometimes Norah would say “okay Mama, maybe tomorrow?” and in hopes of delaying a repeat of the same conversation I would say “well, it is still cold outside and your birthday comes when it is warm” but after I gave that excuse a few times she just started suggesting we wear jackets. Oh she cracks me up! Poor little Norah has lately been losing hope that her birthday would ever come. Just in the last few weeks she has started to despair when I’ve told her it still wasn’t time for her party. I made her one of those paper link chains so she could have a visual sense of how many days there were till her birthday. At first she relished taking off one link at bedtime but then she finally tore off the rest of the links in one go. Throughout this emotional ordeal, Norah has been genuinely happy for others on their birthday. I’m always a little nervous that she’ll be overcome with jealousy at another kid’s party but she has amazed me with her grace. She acts like they must be the luckiest person in the world to have a birthday and celebrates their good fortune without a hint of envy.  I can’t wait to see her face tomorrow when we sing Happy Birthday when she wakes up – I mean when she comes into our room to wake us up – lets be honest.

These cute pictures were taken by Stacy about a week ago. Stacy is so talented with a camera and clever with kids. She had me get Norah some balloons so she’d cooperate with the photo shoot – genius!
This picture below is my favorite of the few she sent me because it just captures how much personality Norah has.
There is never a dull moment with Norah. She keeps me busy and frankly exhausted but I simply adore her. This little girl was born to be a leader and I’m so proud of her. She is smart, funny and absolutely determined. She makes my job tough because she stubbornly refuses to accommodate my agenda if it conflicts with hers but I’m honing my diplomacy skills and we are finding compromises we can both live with. For example, we’ve come to an understanding that she must wear shoes when walking to the car, but never while in her car seat.

Norah has grown up a lot this past year. She transitioned from a crib to a bed in August, became a big sister in November, and potty trained in April. She also mastered tricycling, visited NYC two more times, went ice skating, had her first dental appointment and finally showed interest in coloring. At two she was speaking in short sentences and making simple requests. Now at three she is telling us imaginative stories and coming up with grand ideas for how she wants to spend the day. She can understand some pretty tricky concepts like the meaning of pretend, far away, tomorrow, and “nursery is only on Sunday” – but she has yet to figure out that her grandparents can’t see her dancing when she is on speaker phone. I’m not sure how much she understands about our approaching move to Texas but I’m certain she’ll be up for the adventure.

Seward and Tubman

We’ve really tried to make the most of our time here in Ithaca but even so there are many places we haven’t managed to visit. Two places at the top of my list to cram in before we left were The William Seward house and Harriet Tubman house. They are both in Auburn just 40 minutes from here. The tour Seward house was absolutely fascinating. We weren’t allowed to take pictures inside unfortunately but it was lavishly decorated and everything was original. Our guide described the family as pack rats – but at least they hoarded some amazing stuff. Seward travelled extensively and had fabulous souvenirs including a bust from Pompeii and a table with a Roman mosaic. There were also many original paintings including an incredible landscape by Thomas Cole.

The man in the green polo was our docent and is a direct descendant of Seward so he felt very comfortable poking fun at some of the family portraits.This is the Harriet Tubman Home for the Aged that has been restored. They are working on restoring her personal home. There was very little left from Tubman’s original estate but it was still really cool just to see where she lived and think about her building the community here.

Big News

We are moving to:

Bryan accepted a job from AT&T and we headed to Dallas. He will be working in product marketing for their cloud services business. The job is a great fit for him and he is very excited to start working on June 6th. With the exception of his mission, Bryan has been in school continuously since he was 4 so this will be the start of a new era for him. We are so grateful to all of our friends and family who helped him network and we hope to return the favor.

Bryan is just about done with finals and we’ve found a house to rent in Dallas and finalized our moving arrangements so all we have left to do is enjoy our last two weeks in Ithaca and pack. I will miss Ithaca so much but I think the washer and dryer I’m going to get as soon as we move will do quite a bit to ease my longing for a picnic by a waterfall.  Speaking of waterfalls

in an effort to make the most of our remaining time here we went to the farmers market today and then spent the afternoon at Treman State Park. We intended to just play at the playground but then the dads got some crazy ideas and we went from thisto thisAudrey and Alice waited in the shade

Cayuga Nature Center

Our branch playgroup took a trip to the Nature Center this past Wednesday to play in the 6 story tree house that overlooks a gorge. I first took Norah to this tree house when she was just barely 1 and I remember thinking how much more fun it would be if she was just a few years older. I think this was our 6th time and it was definitely the most fun yet – probably because Norah is older but also because we went with so many kids. They had a blast chasing each other and ducking in the nooks to hide and surprise each other.

I love this picture of the kids lining up to climb this ladder because you can really see how they clump together in a pack. They always want to be in the same spot at the same time. There is only about a 6 month age span between these 4 particular kiddos.

And here they are emerging

Here they are at the top of the tree house with Natalia who was unanimously elected by the other moms to climb up the ladder and supervise. BTW I just want to publicly thank Natalia for keeping playgroup running. It would have fallen apart without her and it has been such a wonderful experience.

Norah and Callie. We visited the tree house early in the school year with who was then known as  Baby Callie. Incredibly what a difference a school year makes in the life of a child. Oh memories sniff sniff.

The Group Photo (Alice was not pictured due to inability to sit up): Edie, Ellie, Graham, Norah, Callie and Audrey

After the Nature Center we headed a little farther up 89 to the Cayuga Creamery for some lunch, train time and of course ice cream.

Ever since spring break I’ve had a list in my mind of places like these that I want to visit one last time before we leave Ithaca – but a part of me thinks “oh we’ll squeeze in one more trip to the farmers market or the commons or fill in the blank.” But now that we have just two weeks till Bryan graduates the reality that we have to say goodbye to Ithaca and all of our beloved Ithacans is sinking in. Bryan and I took sometime today to calendar the rest of our time here to make sure we maximize what we have left while still getting our packing done. We were left with a sense of urgency that prompted us to finally take a campus tour today. During the tour we ran into one of our favorite undergrads in the branch and then two of our favorite Alpha Phi’s so we kept side stepping to catch up with them. It is going to be hard to say good bye.