Shifty oatmeal eyes

The Texas part of our trippy trip is complete and we're onto Maine. All is going well and having a good journey so far.

And just couldn't resist a quick yello, m'frands.

Here's my buttercup eating some oatmeal, at my favorite little place in Dallas -- The Dream Cafe. If you happen to find yourself in the Big D (especially if you've got a babe or two), do try mmmkah?

Ni'ni's for us. Somehow always stay up way too late at home...

<3

Later skaterz

BJA and her crew are outta town for the next 3ish weeks. See ya when we're back!

A naptime picnic

Crusty bread + ricotta + heirloom tomato + plenty of salt = MARRY ME, LUNCH.

In our pad, Harps' bedroom is on the same floor as the kitchen. (Which would be the main floor, obvs.) We sleep upstairs, but everything else is down. This makes for tricky situations when she's sleeping. I can't really go crazy cleaning the kitchen after she's down because it's too loud. We have to go upstairs to use the bathroom (or, hey maybe sometimes the backyard) or else the flush will wake her up. Yada yada, you get the point.

The latest issue, since I'm actually trying to eat lunch these days, is how to make said lunch during her nap. I don't want to make her sound like some hothouse flower that can't sleep through us doing normal living. But, she's extremely sensitive to the sounds of crinkling and opening, especially during the lighter sleep of naps, and those are all sounds I need to make to make a delicious repast. Sorry I said repast.

Okay, so very unnecessary long story short, I've taken to taking my lunch ingredients to the patch of floor near the backyard slider. It's not in her tunnel of hearing and I can enjoy a little teevs while I picnic...by myself, on the floor, inside?

Full disclosure, last weekend I also made most of my homemade chicken soup in this nook.

Yes, Future Breeders of the World, this life can too be yours!

Get in shape, girl!

After a workout, I really enjoy a nice piece-a fruit.

Please please, can a fellow grew-up-in-the-eighties-early-nineties reader say they, too, had Get in Shape, Girl?! It was an "exercise program" for little girls, totally cashing in on the Jane Fonda aerobics craze. I was SO INTO IT, especially because my mom taught aerobics and it gave me my own little moves. There was a cassette tape with a manic lady shouting out commands and little weird weighted bangles, I think? I need to find this on ebay and get Harps gettin' in shape stat!

I don't believe in wordless Wednesdays

This question is for everyone, but especially Michaela: Where does one find really cute muumuus? I want to wear a muumuu everyday of my life. Once and for all, I want pants banish-ed (does anyone else ALWAYS pronounce that word Shakespeare style?) from my life. I straight up look and feel bad in them. I think a girl in my situation (buddha tummy, no bum, but yes hips, but skinny legs) shouldn't be trying to figure out the mystery that is pants. As this chick I used to work for once told me: "Well, denim is really just for farmers anyways." Oooo snap! (Hey, I don't agree. Hey, I'm only trying to make my un-denimable bod feel better.)

Moving on.

The following picture cracks me up. It's Harps hanging with one of her boyfriends (girlfriend needs some girlfriends! Lucy F, where are you?!) while I was at an appointment of some sort. She looks pretty angry to be interrupted. And he just looks psyched.

Please don't mind her Blossom, circa 1993 hat. She loves that sucker and I always gets props that my kiddo keeps a hat on. But in reality, she's pretty particular about what she'll keep on. And this one...this dated little denim (for farmers!) number is a major fav. Don't hate!

Moving on again.

Someone tweeted the other day, "Is there anything better than canceled plans?" And I so agree. As much as I'm looking forward to something, I always get a little rush of excitement when it gets canceled. Sad! Yesterday, my cleaning lady (this strikes me as a horrible label, somehow -- Woman Who Cleans My Home?) canceled just as I was rushing around and making things semi-okay for her to enter. I've made a pact with myself that I'm not going to clean for the cleaner, because that's just weird. But I still wanted to do a couple quick things. Then my phone buzz buzzed with a text and she was canceling and the skies opened up and rained Skittles and Peeps.

Think we might head to the Children's Museum today. Oh wait I might have a stalker. Or the Botanic Gardens! Or the Aquarium! Or the moon. NOW YOU'LL NEVA FIND ME.

Weekend roundup

I never knew about doughnuts till today. Oh...my.

 Firstly, do you guys watch 30 Rock? I'm picturing you all nodding right now and that makes me happy. I tend to let my DVR pile up with a few eps and then I catch up and I feel like shouting "I LOVE YOU, LIZ LEM!" So I do.

And in other news, it's still rainy/gray around here. Which, gotta be honest -- I don't really mind at all. I sometimes have Insecure About the Weekend syndrome (developed during college), an illness that makes me feel like I should have really awesome plans Friday night through Sunday afternoon. And when I hear about other people, and their busy/crazy/exciting weekends, I look down at my brother's old gray sweatpants falling off my bum and feel a little lame.

But when it rains! I have an excuse for doing what I really want to do. Which is: Eat doughnuts, lounge around, walk up and down the sidewalk and sniff flowers with Harper, cook and make my kitchen messy, watch my DVR, read my PD James, eat more doughnuts. I officially can't have rad plans because it's gloomy out! Or something.

No access to the indoors never looked so cute!

Saturday afternoon, H and I took a little jaunt to the doughnut shop and once we got home (our faces smothered in powder), she wanted to play outside in the sprinkles. (Rain sprinkles, not doughnut sprinkles, although that sounds more fun.) So I darted inside to get our coats and hats. But then I ... left our keys inside. Locked out and it feels so goooood. We had an hour out in the rain before cc heard our phoning/doorbelling/knocking/yelling. But hey, that night we slept like babies! (Babies who aren't nursing.)

And today, Harps helped me weed the backyard (by throwing all the pulled-ups into our inflatable swimming pool) and then do some vacuuming (I've got a vid of this for later -- girlfriend loves to clean) and spent close to an hour lifting my Method cleaning spray (Ginger yuzu! Not as delicious as the lavender, but it was time for a change) up and down off the coffee table with great focus and chatter.

Now to my blue-and-white comforter and some Brit reading and maybe a little om. Happy weekend's end!

Fine, Blogger, fine

Apparently, Blogger didn't approve of my rainy day semi-poem post. And it's...gone forever? Bye!

So back to our regularly scheduled programming.

We've had lots (well, in a relative Denver sense) of rain, which made for fun backyard splashing this morning when the sun returned. Pantsless water play is required around here, at least once a day.

Very concerned. About many things.

Bye bye wa-wa.

And now a completely apropos of nothing picture. Formerly mentioned yellow-flowers-in-glass-milk-jars and my polka dot pillow I finally finished. These caption centering issues are driving my OCD nuts.

Rainy, rainy Wednesday

Fast walking away from the bungalow and through the rain and alongside the lilac bushes, green boots stomping and glasses steamy. Harper under the stroller umbrella, snug in her wool cardy and pink fleece pants and sipping her milk sippy, fogging up the plastic with her sugar breath.

Meeting a girlfriend and her girl for lunch at the cafe a few jogs away. Shaking off the rain (and hail and fallen tree leaves and cold) and pulling off baby's soft purple hat. Room temp water in mason jars and brie/apple sandwich in one hand while shoveling blackberries and raspberries and snozberries into her bird mouth. Anything to keep her peaceful and full in the little chair, away from the angry feet of the big biceped waitresses.

Then both girls escaping to freedom, noses pressed against the glass back door, pointing to the soggy flowers and the white vintage stove, abandoned in the rain.

Things I really like right now

 I have a headache and cc's out on a bi'ness dinner and I'm watching Valley of the Dolls on Netflix (I read that book in one day a few years ago while hanging with cc in Fort Worth and avoiding the wretched heats) and I just feel like typing up some random recs:

Whole Foods sells these candles called Tru Melange (I do not support that name choice) and because I'm a cheapy, I get the travel size. This one is a mix of vanilla and peppermint and it's like a delicious subtle candy (is that a thing?) in your nose. It's a soy/beeswax combo and so it burns clean. (Important for asthma persons such as myself.) I love buying little extras like this, that don't cost much but feel like a treat. Treats get me through!

Green tea (home brewed hot then cooled down for a bit in the fridge -- because bottled/iced has already lost its antioxidants) mixed with Paul Newman's lemonade. I'm awful at getting my daily dose of green tea, but this makes it delicious/doable.

Any and all things California Baby. Sure, it costs an arm and a leg, but there's zero naughty chemicals and everything is delicious smelling and great for sensitive skin. I especially adore their eucalyptus bubble bath and their bedtime lotion -- smells like lavender and mint and chamomile and, well, dreams.

Bon Appetit magazine. The former tenants at our pad forgot to change the addy on all their subscrips. So! We get a lovely array of periodicals, including Nat Geo and The Annals of Internal Medicine (I wish I could say I was strong enough to resist reading it, but I'm too obsessed) and! Bon App. V good.

The table and chair set we bought (from a Montessori supply shop online) for Harps last month. She loves it and these days it's often the only place she'll eat. There's something so delicious about a baby person sitting in her own chair, isn't there?

Resisting the pull and keeping my hair un-highlighted. (Free!)

MY STEAM MOP.

Using glass milk jugs for yellow flowers.

(This list, upon re-read, makes me sound a little bit like a crazy crunchy person? Am I a crazy crunch person? I really like bad TV and cheeseburgers, I swear.)

Mumma day

Hello and hi! Firstly, thanks so much for all the "hey, keep hittin us with Harps bi'ness" words sent my way. You guys are too nice! I shall reward you with enough H tales to be charming, but not enough to send you barfing/regretting your encouragement.

Secondly, happy Mum Day! I hope it was either awesomely crazy or quiet and silly or full of strawberry shortcake ... whatever would make happy my fellow moms or soon-to-be moms or those many people who do motherly things for their friends or family or or or! These days are nice, but I always feel for my friends who have lost their mums or, for other reasons, might not have the day the commercials say it should be. Sometimes these days have crazy expectations, when really ... it's just a day!

As the back of one of H's books says: "Happy things, sad things -- they're all in a baby's day!" Makes me chuckle every time, yet it's also strangely wise?

Moving on.

I got to sleep LATE today, made easy by cc taking Harps out of the house for hours. If you can't hear little squawks and chirps, it's a lot easier to stay oblivious to the world at large. I was up before they were back and even had time to put in my contacts and Neti pot my nose (a daily must must must in my life) without someone clinging to my leg. Then there were flowers (called "owwwwwwers" by bumbum) and gifties and smooches from my lovies.

Elsewhere, spring has sprung, but here...summer has, well, shown up. Hard. It was mid-80's today, sun blazing, crazytalk today and (if this year is like last year), we'll keep that up through September. It's the kind of sun that's so intense, you get major color even with 30 SPF on. I see lots of indoor time from the hours of...sunrise to sunset for the next few months. Or at least noon to four? Must not get wrinkly, friendlies.

Didn't get any snaps today -- not even of H's brand new purple sandals she's so proud of -- but here's a little video the two of us made a couple days ago, right after waking up. Pretty much sums up why being a fulltimemom is my thing. I get to sidekick it up with this ham everyday all day.


Untitled from amy cowan on Vimeo.

A few Friday foughts uh thoughts

- We didn't have the Internets ('cept for on my phone) for a bunch of days. Because...the bill wasn't paid? When we moved there was a hiccup in the auto-pay, I guess, and therefore my Netflix streaming was forcefully ripped from my puny hands. When you rely on Simon and Simon episodes for that eighties screwball fix, things get dire without it. Also, I'm really behind on my blahg reading. Probably not a bad thing to distance myself from stranger's pregnancies I'm way too invested in?

- Went to Jane Eyre with Manj last night. I really enjoyed, though yet again we found ourselves hiding behind our hands, afraid of the screen. We have issues. This time, the screen was delivering up -- a crow I believe? Oooo sca-wee.

- I've been on a strange memoir kick. First, the New York Regional Mormon Halloween Singles Dance something or other, then Tina Fey's new book, and now Ice-T's. (Yes. I love him, deeply, zero irony, I'm not kidding.) I've been doing pretty good with my reading goal this year (think I've exceeded it already, not that the number was very lofty), though I'd like to try and read fewer things all at once. Currently, it's a crazyperson mix of hiphop gangster tales, Buddhism, and a mystery novel set in a post office.

- I've entered into the food battlezone with Harps. One day, she'll love something to pieces (banana and peanut butter), the next it's like I'm poisoning her. And she is not enjoying her high chair. And even if she's hungry, she's more interested in playing with her edemame than eating it. If I use her little table and chairs for eating, she's happy for a bit, but then she starts roaming around with her food and smearing it in my Uggs. These are the most cliched toddler complaints, I realize, but oh-so-frustrating! She'll actually wake up hungry (and finally chow down on dinner at 9 pm) because she won't eat dinner.  I know the solution is something along the lines of make her get hungry/don't hand her string cheese while she wanders around/food is for the table only or whatever, but she's a lady on the go! Doh. *head in hands*

- Thank the heavens for therapists and house cleaners.

- I find myself conflicted on this blog sometimes. Because it's read largely by faraway family members, I want to do some Harps bragging since that'll make 'em proud. But then, ew to people who find that ew. Am I right? Maybe I should create a little tab up top exclusively for that. But for now - girlfriend can say lots of words! I won't go into details or numbers because then that's ew, but she's a little chatty butt.

- Any ideas for a cool hat I can wear around to protect my delicate facial skins? Without looking like a dweebtoast? 

- All I want for Mother's Day is doughnuts and sleep.

A good nap

Interwebs down, but Harps isn't losing sleep over it.

Mini me

Starting forever ago, I fell in love with the mirror. Or a window-at-night. A large window-at-night is a really effective lip synching mirror, too. Did you know?

I spent much of my youth belting out show tunes in front of my living room window and/or my bedroom mirror. I'm sure we all did this, but I promise you I did it more. I've also been known to watch myself cry in the bathroom mirror because it's a morbidly fascinating project. Or talk to myself and watch how my mouth moves while I pluck my eyebrows real up close and personal.

It was a real surprise when I chose theater school.

Anyways, this is all to say my little apple has not fallen far from her tree.

Macs have a program called Photo Booth, that allows you to take self-portraits or self-videos. Harps figured it out and now she's obsessed. It's a good way to kill 5-10 minutes when I just need to sip my tea while it's still relatively hot or I want to pee by myself. This vid below was one of the first times she got ahold of it. I can't even deal, really. I love it all, but especially the coy one-shoulder shrug she keeps doing while she shamelessly flirts with...herself.

(Oh, also -- she whips her socks off at bedtime faster than I can put them on. Girl needs bare feet to sleep, just like me. Aw, genes.)

Table for dos

Sometimes cc sneaks home from work real fast to catch a bite to eat with his lovely lady.

She loves it.

(And did you know naan tastes best on a fork?)

Happy Eeeeeeaster!

She'll always want to hold my hand, right? RIGHT?

You can't see really, but those are star-covered, rouched leggings. Yessum.

Easter! No, we don't do the Jesus thing around here (hey, but I'm coming closer and closer to getting all hardcore Buddhist on your a*$ ... quick scene last night around the television: Clay looking at used Porsches on his comp, me blurting out: "Oh hey! This place has a THREE MONTH SILENT MEDITATION RETREAT!" Yet, somehow, we work...), but I'm into the metaphorical meanings of it all. How can't you be?

It was just us 3bees, but we got lil peep dressed up, hid plastic eggs (filled with Kashi cereal?) around the backyard, and handed her a basket (hand delivered last night by our previously mentioned hoarder neighbors...which came two minutes after we realized she didn't have one...I shall never speak evil of them agayn!). The whole getup (dress + uggs + wet grass + huge basket) was a little unwieldy, but she totally got the concept and twirled around the yard gathering neon plastic lovies with a big ol' grin.

Video ev:



But my favorite moment came when cc started airplaning her around and around the prayer flag tree and I flew after them then reverse...squeals and fresh air and suddenly we're all kiddos again, together. Easter!

And then we piled in the car and ate Med food (gotta honor my peeps occasionally) and then bought new bikes. Because, as we realized, bikes don't just come readysetgo in your garage. Turns out they must be procured, and procured they were. As the raindrops started to fall, we each took a few runs around the block on our new sweet rides. (Bike riding on Denver sidewalks is iiiiiinfinitely more doable than doing so on SF sidewalks...)

Oh and! While H and dada were on a trip together, I f-i-n-a-l-l-y busted out my sewing machine and started working on a pillow I'd pinned together months (literally) ago. Is there a chance I might actually figure it out and make cute things for people on earth? TBD, TBD...But I'm having fun.

And with that! I bid you adieu. Next time you see me, I'll have Peeps sugar all over my face, as first thing tomorrow I'll be hitting up the candy sales. (Can you believe I haven't had ONE Peep yet?! The restraint!)

Couple bonus pics:

Weirdo angle.  Lo siento, my besties!

Awaiting some grass seeds from our landlord...

Sad day except for cute baby

This pic really doesn't capture the correct scale of this eNORmous/awesome Richard Scarry book.

 

 

Saw my mom/H's gram off on a Jetblue jet today. I'm always sad when our visits end, but this time felt especially hard. I spent the rest of the day pretty mopey/maudlin/Cadbury egg eating.

I've had a turbulent and challenging past few months, and so her week here was really welcomed and needed and loved. Sometimes you don't even realize how much help you're missing until you're suddenly getting it. And as awesome as it was to have company and a major Harps helper and an insane laundry doer and a fellow thrift store shopper and high chair wiper downer and career advice giver etc etc -- it makes it sting that much more once it's gone.

Her visit also comes at a time I'm feeling especially homesick. So to send her back East, back where all my peeps are -- Ben and Amanda's new baby, my brother graduating from grad school (go T!!!), all the pretty lady babies dressed up in Easter dresses -- makes me feel way left out and lonely. Just the truth. Cuz as my city college professor used to tell us (about nothing, in particular): "You got to keep it real." God, I'm glad I went there.

But! Enough sad talk. Our visit really was awesome and not sad in the least! We visited Red Rocks and let Harps walk up and down the streets and little bridges of Morrison, we shared chocolate milkshakes, we shopped for fabric, we took many many walks, ate cupcakes, danced a tad too enthusiastically to Cats, taught Harper how to sniff flowers...

Speaking of Harpsychordy. Girlfriend is really having a learning spurt! Is that a thing? A learning binge? No? She's picking up words like mad and doing all these insane little tricks (must get this one on film STAT: she looks at a picture of someone doing downward dog and will get on the floor and do it! perfect form!!) and just being a total ham. She was also insanely crabby and needy the past couple days, so the tricks were a welcome distraction inbetween the wails.

For the peeps who do vids, here's H tonight, saying hi to "baby" -- aka her new cousin, Annabelle. Hearts!

Sorry for the quiet

Harps and I are busy playing with my momz -- in the dirt/flowers/springtimeness. Back soon!

I just found this picture on cc's phone and oh my what

Perhaps the greatest Harps candid eva taken. LOOK AT HER CHUBBY LEGS HELP ME JEEBZ!

And the cloth dipes (sob sob sob) and the dada cuddle and the toe! touch!

Man, I'm loving it hard.

What else what else?

Oh, I cooked cc meat tonight (and by "meat" I mean chicken), which thrilled him and made me feel like a nice-ish person. I also made an ENORMOUS amount of roasted asparagus. Harps and I eat it like candy, while he frowns and sniffs in confusion. I'm letting it all digest a bit before I attempt my third cupcake of the day. Dude brought me home a box of them last night, which is just unsafe.

Tomorrow night my momz lands! I'm trying to get at least half of my huge stack of laundry done, so she doesn't think I've fully regressed since she last left. (I have.) But then, of course, I'll leave the other half undone so she has something to do. Wouldn't want her getting bored!

Hope to get those last few lingering boxes unpacked while she's here, as well as my eyebrows unbushy, some bread and vegan ginger cookies baked, and maybe sleep past 8 am? TBD, TBD.

And now it's raining out. Always at night, Colorado, always at night! I have my super cute green Hunters I got to wear in SF, but never here. Unless I take out the garbage and wave hello to our crazy neighbors ("DON'T KNOCK ON OUR DOOR, WE WON'T ANSWER."), who in addition to their piles and piles of inside junk might want to steal them off my feet.

Ni'ni! (*slaps hand to face in imitation of H's almost-but-not-quite ni'ni signing*)

Toe-ahst

Everybody should be this awesome:

Vailz

Guys. I'm cool. Shut up.
Made cc take this pic because look at the sign!
Top of Vail Mountain, 11,250 feet. Ow ow!

Friday afternoon, we packed up the truck and headed to the mountains. Biscuit in the backseat, snacks in a paper bag, skis on the roof. Quick lil ride up (bout 2 hours) and we were in high up in the sky. Cute little condo for the Cowans, paid up with points. (Thanks for traveling 4 days a week for 4 years, cc!)

Walked to a pizza parlor dinner (H absolutely crushed some cheese pizza AND gnocchi with meat sauce -- is this really my baby?) finished up with delicioso chocolate cake. (Harper liked that, too.) Yes please every night?

Morning brought crazy sunny skies and warm temps and a nervous mama -- was about to go skiing for the first time since I was 12 AND leave Harps at a bottom-of-the-mountain daycare for the first time ever. She cried as we left, but I had to step away step awaaaaaaay. Ugh, no likey.

Skiing! Skiing was...skiing was fun! The first half. I learned to plow down and did little turns and didn't fall off the ski lift huzzah! cc's a great teacher and after a few runs on the bunny hill, we headed up (up up UP UP UP) to the top of Vail. Holy HIGH ah! And then we cruised down the triple black diamond the end!

Dorkiest picture of us ever? Yes.
I have to keep it small.

Okay, well, green. We did green. And got down half the mountain in good spirits. Then lunch (bbq outside on picnic tables -- checking up on H via cell and then relaxing/appreciating eating a sammich without a fiending toddler by my side...) and then hey, "just the second half of the mountain" and we could pick up my baby!

I'll keep it short: Had a total meltdown that last chunk. It was a looooooong last chunk and my legs were dying dead and dying. And my boots hurt and I was shaky and got re-scared and bratty and beyond crabby. I kept yelling "I MISS HARPER!" (which, hey, I did) and then I'd realize I had to MOVE to get to see her, but then my legs were shaking with fatigue and right...over...that...little...edge was a crazy black diamond drop and people were zooming! Anywho. I hate how I get like that, but lesson learned. Happy times are early/untired times. Getting to knowwww meeeee...

Cue some H and mama shots:

Snuggling in our jammies.

Nutjobs unite!

Saturday night we left the kiddos (Manj and bean and fam were there, too) alone, I mean with a sitter, and hit the town! It was DUMPING snow. Dumping snow. Which terrified me and made me another whiny boo for awhile, but then we got to the restaurant and were cozied back in a corner, overlooking Narnia trees and a creek and snowflakes and okay okay -- I can do this. Lovely night out for the homebodies! (For my own records, I ate duck and bok choy and brussel sprouts and mushrooms and, very strangely, a mojito? And, not very strangely, sticky toffee pudding. Which we got for free because they were out of donuts. Happy but also sad.)

Why is this picture so hilarious to me.

This morning cc hit the slopes solo (whew) while H and I drank cappuccinos and watched Frasier reruns as the snow fell. (She napped actually.)

Thanks for bearing with my total recap. I have fun looking back on these things down the road, so sometimes I just gotta jot it down. Oh and! Can I say, also for my records, that I just LOVE 14 months? Love. The happiness, the new words, the walking, the I'm-still-kind-of-a-baby cuddles and goopy kisses, the loving to read, the strangely easygoing and good sleepingness? It's just yes! (I need to write this, so that in one or two or whatever months, when things are annoying, I'll remember the yesness.)

So in summation: Weekends away = fun! Vail = insanely beautiful and a little altitude sicky! Harper = world champion! Home = my love!

(And for family members afar and/or people who care, here's Harps movin OUT tonight at the park nextdoor. Eep!!)