Wayne and Rebecca Madsen

We got 6 inches of snow on Friday. Every weather station's favorite joke was about mother nature pulling a spring prank on us. Luckily, it all melted again that very same day. We snuck in a snowman before it was all gone, and didn't even have to shovel. That's the kind of snowfall I'm talking about.

Wayne had a consultation about his wisdom teeth. He never had to have them out before, but they are now recommending that one of them come out. It's not urgent, so he scheduled that surgery for late May after the semester is over. Smart man, from what I remember about wisdom teeth surgery. 

Aderyn had her weight check this week. She gained nearly a pound and a half in one week's time. She's back on track again. We all have colds now, but that never seems to get in the way of growing like normal, so whew.   read more »

The level of busy continues to be crazy. Ask me offline if you care about the details. Wayne was busy all week, and I was busy all week. The girls are busy all the time.

Aderyn had a 15-month check up (only a month late...) on Monday. Unfortunate timing, really, because she had gone through about 8 diapers in 4 hours time. They still had me bring her in, but didn't give her shots because they decided after asking me details and weighing Aderyn that she was too sick. They also were shocked that she had not gained an ounce in the last four months. And so I get to bring her in again tomorrow for the shots and another weighing so we can be sure she's bouncing back. Fun times.  read more »

Wayne is incredibly, overwhelmingly, insanely busy for the next several weeks, so I will take a few extra turns with our weekly update. Even when he's able to be home, we still sometimes pretend he's not so he can get more done.

I just looked at my calendar to see what we did. Spring Break was this week??? No kidding. Huh. I guess we did our job of pretending Wayne wasn't here during his usual campus time pretty well! Plus, he went to Axiom to gallery-sit Thursday evening, and spent much of his time troubleshooting some installation problems with the artist.  read more »

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 »