this week:
found my first grey hair.
got some work done in a playful environment.
had the best apple cider ever.
great evening out to see richard buckner.
discovered a new playground. darla swung. i did calesthenics. win. win.
and took advantage of outdoor time in this glorious weather.
and now we’re heading off to my cousin’s wedding. family! i love my family! so excited. looking forward to sharing upon our return.
have a great weekend. huggie wuggies.
i’m sure everyone remembers that we love to hit up pumpkin patches with these folks. we got to spend yesterday celebrating the birthday of our very best buddy and my favorite little guy at schacht’s family farm. can you believe how big these kids have grown?
these last two are my favorites. they were hissing like snakes and then laughing at how they amused themselves. these kiddos have their own inside jokes now. we’re slowly approaching the age when parents will be outsiders. i’m ok with that. especially if it means their bond will grow stronger. they’ve acted a bit more like twins in the past, but lately there’s been a whole lot of love.
happy 4th birthday burkeybuns! we love you.
this girl
is pretty rad.
at least in my opinion.
just a bit of our fantastic fall weekend:
the best part, by far, was meeting our nephew. welcome to the party, little man!
aaaand fairfield county fair. just wouldn’t be (w)right for us to miss a fair.
family effort pancake breakfast for friends
that was well received
and finished it up with a walk to admire our neighborhood in more ways than one ;-)
i hope you all had a refreshing, fulfilling weekend as well.
good vibes to you for a great start to your week.
i’d first like to take a moment to thank everyone whose wedding i’ve attended this year for choosing such beautiful settings. i mean, look at this
and this
and now i’d like to take a moment to thank pinterest for spreading and spurring every one of those weddings to be so thoughtfully put together, detailed and aesthetically wonderous to behold. i mean, look at this
and this
and this!
we had an amazing time this past weekend taking part in the communion of a very special couple. their one-of-a-kind weekend was perfectly tailored and i’m just very grateful to have been a part of it and to have seen our friends bc well they’re fun and cool and good looking. i mean, look at this
and this
sigh.
a bit more reminiscing…
1. bonfire! 2. there’s some handsome dudes down there getting pics 3 & 4 fashion choices – farm b&b calls for ruched floral and vintage cowgirl boots, fall wedding calls for faux fur stole & animal print clutch 5. boutineer boy 6. mother nature showing of the beautimous veil 7. officialness 8. another columbus day wedding couple 7. more twinkly 8 & 9. gettin’ this party started! and james on disco ball duty.
and by the way, the dance party was epic. EPIC. at least i thought so…
i much prefer a nice stroll in the woods over any other activity with my girl. after a picnic lunch at their pondside wildlife observation deck we took our apples and went for a walk in sodalis nature park.
i love the way her imagination has the freedom to expand when there are few parameters. we walked along the trail, singing various songs, clearing sticks off the trail and using the sticks to build various projects darla dreamed up. i loved watching her excitement as she found red leaves and exclaimed “i found the first leaf of autumn!” or when she found large rocks to climb and jump off.
i’m looking forward to a whole season of these nature walks.
i’m missing my west coast friends this weekend so i thought i’d do a visual venture back a few weeks to one of the most enchanting wedding weekends i’ve ever had the pleasure of partaking.
my five day stay in the bay city was FRANTASTIC.
a visit to the haight, a drive down the PCH, and a weekend stay at the holly farm were all part of the getaway.
my only regret is that i didn’t take more photos to reminisce!
missing you tons left coast friends. lots of love vibes to you.
1. reunited 2. sourdough! 3. sf style 4. fireside chat by the ocean 5. new friends 6. miner’s cup 7. wall-to-wall music 8. wedding pretty 9. i love these faces 10. officially the raddest couple
i haven’t been posting lately, but guess what folks – i just renewed the domain name for momjeanz so i’m recommitting myself to the project.
i know. i’ve just given your lives new meaning.
in true elaine fashion, this is about me not you. self-centered, as always.
we’ve been going through some things lately and i’ve found it difficult to muster the energy to do the blog and to feel authentic about what i’m putting out there. i say this because when i look back at the blog it makes it seem like life is so happy and carefree when in reality it’s been a bit rougher than that.
but then i remembered that these rough parts have always been here. as long as this blog has been around they’ve been here. and maybe that’s why i started doing it in the first place – to remind myself of the good parts of the day, of the bright spots.
these are my bright spots. with a few pity parties and emotional outbursts sprinkled here and there. but mostly these are the good moments when i look back and am filled with such gratefulness for all of life’s spots, dark and bright.
and i want to continue to share my brightest spot:
well, order a stickygram of that and slap it on my fridge. if that isn’t a summary of my child in one frame then i don’t know what is. if i could conjure one image of her as a 3-year-old it would be this. leaping. LEAPING. she’s forever leaping. fearlessly. in a way that puts anxiety straight into my heart while at the same time comforting me and saying “that one, she gonna be ok. she gonna take on de world.” (for some reason this voice is that of sebastian the crab.)
this year has been about us taking the leap from baby to big kid. and she is ready for all the big kid challenges. she basically wants me to hand her a stack o’papes and a cap and let her raise herself on the street. i’m almost tempted to because i love (LOVE) the movie newsies so much. alas, she is a girl and not a young christian bale so i’ve decided to keep her and raise her myself.
why?
because it’s so much fun. everything turns into an adventure. trips to the nursery and apple orchard turn into teachable adventures. and also, there’s the snacks. obviously. when you’re raising a child there’s an endless stream of snacks and i, for one, benefit from that. so does my gym.
anyway, a few more snaps from our nursery/orchard visit with a girl who wants to be dorothy:
i’m off to san fran for 5 whole days. FIVE.
so i made sure to have some quality time with my little peter venkman – as she sometimes likes to be called.
we spent a nice afternoon picnic lunch date at wallace garden plots in our neighborhood the other day after we visited the library. it was pretty cool to walk around all the different plots and take in the different gardening techniques. it was good to be around abundant gardens. it was peaceful and educational. i was able to show darla where sunflower seeds grow and we discussed the different ways plants grow their fruit.
yay for free teaching resources!
i’ll sure miss that girl.
ps. that yellow flower is for my hair. laughy laughy.
here’s our week from my iphone:
we found walking sticks and were proud of it. we said hi to our sycamores.
we had lazy picnics in the park
and kicked our shoes off for a bit. we let our bodies become grounded again.
we hung our new nature prayer flags and added darla’s new books from maine into heavy reading rotation.
we rode ruju to the audubon center to continue the bird learnin.’
we dressed up like our forest friends,
and came to an understanding that darla has no chance of normalcy under her current parental guidance.
“the older i get the more i am into taxidermy.”
we gathered blossoms and walked trails,
and spied on the pond creatures.
did you know ohio has white sand beaches? oh. no. that’s just a volleyball court. my bad.
we tried out the thursday food truck festival at columbus commons and enjoyed the commons activities.
we took in a game at huntington park.
i was sure to wear my protective head gear since our seats were pretty close.
but really the most important development of the week was my complete surrender to my msg addiction. i think i’m on my second bag of rold gold cheese twists for the week. my body is NOT happy with me.
I’m incredibly thankful for all these moments the universe has bestowed on us this week. Goodness is abundant.
ps. if anyone is interested in obtaining maine themed books you can find them here: One Morning in Maine, Blueberries for Sal, The Little Fisherman, About Birds: A Guide for Children
momjeanz 