Dublin Autumn - Pure Survival mixed with Beautiful Days

 

This my friends....is a ponytail. You might say..."Huh? What on EARTH is the significance of your near 3 1/2 year old having a ponytail?" Well...I'm glad you asked. It's the very first ponytail 1) she requested and 2) that held and wasn't more than 6 strands of hair. Norah may be big on brains and big on personality....she is not big on hair length. :)

A couple weeks ago, after I picked Norah up from school, I decided to take her to UCD to visit Wayne at school. We had only taken her there twice in the two years we have been here so I decided it was time for thrice. :)

Norah drew us this Fairy. Yes, its a fairy.

Looks likes she's going "Oooo". :) Are you SURE it's not a ghost or a peanut? "No, that's a fairy!"

N - check! O - check! RRRRrrr...on the way.

N-O-R-A-H Booyah!

I think this was the same day we visited Wayne at school. Instead of hopping the bus back home, we went into the city to our favorite Lebanese restaurant. It's inexpensive, family-owned and they always remember us. I'd say we've been there four times in two years (places in Dublin city centre are hit & miss and expensive, so when you find a place that's not those things, well, you stick with it) Norah drew the waitresses a picture and so the owner came over and told us this young waitress (maybe his daughter?) is studying drawing in University. Well, then she offered to draw us something, disappeared to grab some paper and came back to sit at our table for the next 10 minutes. She did this sketch of Norah with a ball-point pen and it was adorable! We have it hanging in our kitchen now.

Another afternoon after school, exploring with Norah.

Ahh, Dublin Rain in the fall/winter. It's begun and has come with a vengeance. They say this winter is supposed to be record-setting cold and wet. That's just fannnntastic! Not having a car is starting to get a little old.  It's been two years now without a car and this is the first time I've felt that it's honestly getting to be difficult. Everyday, we leave at 8:30 am to walk Norah to school and 50% of the time, that means walking in a full monsoon for one mile (and then one mile home). This means...colds all around and lots of wet clothes.

                  

Norah at People's Park some afternoon last week.

Walking down to Sandycove. The weather here can be a bit manic-depressive - monsoon rains/wind and flooding and then blazing sunshine the very next day. I think this must be the Fall-process which eases us into full-on Winter.  

This afternoon was so beautiful! We walked down to Sandycove beach (15 minutes south of us) and it was so warm out that Norah played on the sand in her bare feet. We started our walk in full coats and by the end had stripped off all our layers and sat here in t-shirts. (mid-October, mind you, so it felt amazing!) 

Speaking of being manic - on one of those rainy "indoor" days, Norah and I had a "crafter-noon" (credit for the term to my sister, Mimi). No joke, we sat here for nearly 3 hours one afternoon.

The picture quality is not great but this is a herd of deer in Phoenix Park - one of several herds of deer who roam freely here. Phoenix Park (8 miles from our house) is the largest gated park in all of Europe. It is Dublin's Yellowstone.

This last weekend, our sweet friends Nolan & Karen invited some friends over to celebrate Canadian Thanksgiving. (which was Oct. 14th) Well, their place is just past Phoenix Park and while it is a mere 8 miles away from us, the bus journey takes 1 hour 45 minutes. Not kidding, we've done it. So, given the rain and not wanting to spend a total of 4 hours of our Saturday commuting, we decided to rent a car for the weekend. The €35 we spent on this did absolute WONDERS for my mental health and we had one of the best weekends we've had in a really long time - simply because we got to drive in a Toyota Yaris to our friends' house, have dinner, and drive home. It was so NORMAL! I loved it so much. We were all so giddy to be driving around Dublin. We've rented a car a few times, for trips around Ireland but never to do just "normal life things". This was almost more exciting for me. We stopped in at the grocery store (LOVED it), we "ran a quick errand" in Blackrock (LOVED IT!) and neither of those things became our entire day. Honestly, if we have to pick something up in Blackrock, that's our entire afternoon. (and that's 2 miles from our place). It's just too expensive to have a car in Dublin otherwise we'd be getting one. So, instead, we've vowed to rent a car like this, for 48 hours, once per month. If for nothing else than to save our sanity a bit. Or to "stop in" at the grocery store and buy more than we can carry home.

Look at the baby deer! :)

So this is the angel we went to see at Nolan & Karen's. We didn't want to see them, just their baby! Hannah is 4 months old and so precious. Hannah is just starting to coo and make sounds, and she lit up when Norah would sit in front of her. She told Norah alllll about her day.

On Sunday, we were so excited about still having the car, that we drove back to Phoenix Park. :) The park is a bit of a runner's paradise with several thousand acres of wooded/gravel/paved paths all crisscrossing. So, one of my main reasons for going back was to do a run there. (I've done two races in the The Phoenix Park - a 10K and a half-marathon - but obviously when you're in those, you're pre-occupied and not quite "strolling" to take in the landscape). So, this time, I felt like I was going there for the first time.

This dog, outside the visitor center at Phoenix Park was....killin' me. He's making sure we're all safe from that devilish "reflection dog" that keeps popping up.

They have one of the best playgrounds we have ever seen too - (this is a small part of it, it was huge). I have about a 5-minute attention span for playgrounds and in this one, I could honestly see myself playing with Norah for 45 minutes before I told her some 'white-lie' about why we needed to leave, to coax her to the adjoining cafe. :) My normal M.O.

Wayne, on the other hand, can easily handle a full hour in the playground and does it with ease. I don't understand it but I'm in awe of it. Anyway, while they played here then, I snuck off for a 30 minute run. It was just as good as I had hoped. I ran 3.5 miles, with no pain in my knee and absolutely loved the location.



After the run, we drove to another part of the park and parked to run around the hills with Norah (to give an idea for the size of the park, it would take you probably 20-25 minutes in a car, to drive the circumference). As we park, Wayne points up to the crest of a hill (WAY up above us) where racers were zipping past. A race! A running race! It only took 3 seconds before I said, "You don't mind do you??", as I jumped out of the car and ran up the hill to see.

Well, turns out, this was the All-Ireland Men's Cross-Country Final (Women's had been earlier).  Anyway, it was very exciting and I've almost never seen guys run this fast. They were from clubs all over Ireland and were doing 5 laps of a 1-mile loop. The spectators were all situated in the center of the 'loop' so you could walk back between sides as they passed. It actually made for a pretty exciting race. (I am such a running nerd...I am aware of it... I just can't stop it) 

So here comes the "peloton" with one guy out in front.

This guy in the red ended up winning it. He finished 5 miles in 24 minutes. (the same pace, mind you, that I finish only 3 miles) That means he runs at 4 minutes 50 seconds per MILE.

To put that in perspective, I run 8 minutes 15 seconds per mile in a 3 mile race and the VERY fastest guy I know in my running club, runs at 6 minutes per mile. And that's lightening fast. So.......4:50/mile?? Well, it's Olympic at the very least, and quite possibly approaching the speed of light. :)  

This is a very, very steep hill going down into this gully, and then climbing back up to the other side. Just off center, in between the trees, you can see Norah's pink coat. They were pretending there were bears and my job was to chase them. Then, for at least 30 minutes we played "Attack the naughty policemen with sticks and knives" (this was Norah's imagination...not mine). haha! We ran and ran and ran, yelling "Hai-YA! Hai-YA! Yaw! Heee-YAW!" while pretending to wield daggers and sticks, chasing...(you guessed it) the naughty policemen who kidnapped "Norah's sister". We eventually attacked them, sufficiently, and rescued the sister. Thank goodness. I need a burrito.  

On Saturday, we left my essential umbrella at Nolan & Karen's house. So, we asked if he could bring it into school on Monday (Wayne & Nolan are Ph.D. buddies in the Psychology department). Seeing as how Nolan also rides his bike into UCD, this is how he had to carry my umbrella. Karen sent me this photo Monday morning.

Well, then Wayne brought it home that evening and I decided to send this picture back to Nolan & Karen. (and now I share it with you) :)

I caught her, huddled in the corner with a make-up bag filled with stuff I never use. She decided to add a few dabs of eye shadow to her cheeks and just under her nostrils. I'm sure it was 'shadowing'.

They were yelling, "Cirque Du Soleil! Take our picture!".

Norah inside Wayne's shirt. I don't know. Things get weird pretty fast after dinner.

And, for your viewing pleasure, here are a couple videos of Norah BUSTIN' a move. This girl can dance. As I told her, I think a dance studio should pay US to have her as a student. This is all 100% her. Sheesh, I couldn't dance like that 'til college. :) Maybe not even still actually.