Wayne and Rebecca Madsen

Play: A few of the days last week approached the mid-50s, and we took the girls outside more to celebrate. They loved it (though eventually Paela declared she was too cold and went inside). It was rainy (most days), and we splashed in puddles, which Aderyn was a huge fan of. Her shoes took all day to dry out. Mental note, look for rainboots. Wayne even took a towel to the park one day so they could try and dry off a slide or two. We need more towels.  read more »

There was melting snow. The weather has been occasionally warmer. And now we see grass for the first time since we left for Christmas vacation. 

We tried to do something new to celebrate Dr. Seuss' birthday this year. Instead of cake, green eggs and ham or other food related items, we made oobleck. Rebecca found a few recipes to make a non-Newtonian fluid and Paela helped us color and play with it. I'm not a fan of the stuff, but Paela liked playing with it.  read more »

Aderyn learns from those around her (obviously) and she has picked up from Paela that we should hit one another. We try to convince them that the song actuallly goes "love one another", but it's a work in progress. Nowadays, we'll tell Aderyn "That's not nice" or "Say you're sorry" or "No hitting" when we catch her in the act, and she promptly gives Paela a great big bear hug. That's one way to apologize!

(Luckily, Paela agrees.)

I was in the other room when I heard Paela shout "I did it!" and race from her room. She ran this way and that way in our apartment, shouting "I did it!" over and over as she went, carrying a plastic tiger with her. When she was finally calm enough to ask, she told me she spelled "tiger". I was surprised, of course, and asked her to show me. She took me to a toy of hers that has all the letters of the alphabet on it. She pressed the "T" button which proclaimed "Tiger begins with T" and Paela shouted she spelled tiger again and ran all over the apartment. 

And that is the level of excitement I hope she maintains as she learns more about what this "spelling" thing is.

We are getting better. Mostly. Our colds took the opportunity of weakened immune systems from the stomach flu to make a huge resurgence, but we're mostly better by now and (finally) sleeping some again. Some sleep is better than none, though not as good as lots.  read more »

Most of what we did this week was be sick. Really sick. All of us. And it wasn't just the stomach flu, but also colds on top of that.

Paela skipped her class on Monday because of her nasty cold and then by Wednesday night, things got really bad. I had to drive Paela to the emergency room at the Children's hospital Thursday night carrying a bucket in my hand for both of us. She passed out and then caught a second wind LATE into the night at the hospital, around the time they kicked us out.

This wasn't a 24 hour bug either. Nope. Not even close. I'm still on a diet of crackers. Only crackers. But everyone else is doing better, somewhat. We all missed work and school and church and could barely leave the house. It is important to keep our vision focused on time beyond these moments, because they will be just a brief painful experience to be remembered. But perhaps not treasured.   read more »

New York city this week was fun, though exhausting all around. Tons of walking (and carrying heavy kids) for me, eight interviews in three days for Wayne, and a very busy city full of stimuli for all the senses for the girls. I'm glad we went, and it is good to be home today.

Monday and Tuesday were full of trip preparations and getting the house in order. Wayne also took down one of his art shows. Aderyn took the chance to decide to become a one nap kid. A rough transition all around, but frankly it meant we got to do more things in NYC, so not bad timing. Aderyn is also done with bottles. Another transition, though not so rough because she eats tons of food all day long.  read more »

Snow, snow, snow. In order to prepare for the additional snow, I had to borrow a electrical mini-snow blower and move the 4 foot tall mountains of snow a couple of feet closer to the center of the lawn. After about 5 hours of this, I decided that I would end up with a psychological disorder due to the stress. We are running out of room and places to put the snow. Our roof might cave in. The drainage pipes are full and when this snow melts it will cause a second disaster. [I am reassured that the locals are talking about how much snow it is too. At least we're not out-of-town wimps! -bec]  read more »

Princesses in our house:

"Princesses dance. They do not twirl and whirl. They just dance. They also sing. And they help people, like my friends. Princesses also hug and kiss people lots."

And then Paela gave me and Wayne each a great big hug. I guess she must be a princess! 

We all had colds this week. Except for Paela. I'm glad one of us could escape those little germs! I stayed home to work on Tuesday in part because of the on-coming cold and in part because of the on-coming snow. But with deadlines at work, I couldn't afford to just rest. We've had three demos of our application in the last week. And that translates to lots of things to finish beforehand, and lots of new things to work on after.  read more »