Rearranging the garage.

Life is full of rearranging and reorganizing.  Jeremy has decided that the whole garage needs reorganizing.  Of course it gets messier before it gets neater!

Chili mac and the Super Bowl!

There is no Super Bowl without some chili dogs / mac&cheese / chili mac / Frito Pie and an ice cream cake shaped like a football!  Go football, rah rah rah!  So here's Edda, being a good sport and watching the coin toss with the grown ups.



What are all the other kids doing? Are they participating in the awesome-ness called Super Bowl Sunday? No. Are they laughing at the funny commercials? No. They are all staring into their own computer screens editing their own dance videos or playing Minecraft.  Oh, they are also eating some leftover Halloween candy.

Biology 107.

I am working (one class at a time) on a nursing degree at the local community college. It's a chance for me to get out of the house and interact with people and (hopefully) learn new things. My work-at-home job is very solitary, I do a lot of reading about science, but I push a lot of paper (electronically) around and I don't need to talk to very many people - so it can get lonely.

Last semester, I took a wonderful intro to Sociology class which I loved, loved, loved, even though the professor was 7 years younger than me. This semester I'm taking microbiology which I realized after the first class that I could probably teach it. So it's a little boring, but I'm trying not to complain too much. There is a lab component which is fun. These are my lab partners who coincidentally also know all the material. One is a fireman/EMT and the other is a pharmacist. I will let you guess which one is which. We make an awesome lab-partner team.

 

Edda and outings.

As Edda gets older, getting her out of the house and doing something "fun" gets more and more difficult. Gone are the days we can just tuck her under our arms and go into the moon bounce with her or sledding with her - two of us on a small one-person sled. Edda is a big girl and it's just hard to maneuver her around this world. There are some weekends where come Sunday night, we realize that she hasn't been out of the house in 48 hours. I don't think she minds being inside all the time, I just wish I could get her outside and doing more stuff. Exactly what stuff is always hard to figure out. Edda is not very helpful in finding "fun" things to do outside the house. Edda often looks unhappy being outside, her chapped face buffeted by the (relatively) cold winter air.

This weekend we went to Barnes and Noble for the first time in a while. I told Edda it was this old-fashioned place where stories were actually printed on paper instead of lit on a screen.

Children's hospital.

We are so lucky we don't go to Children's Hospital very often.  Here are some more photos from our visit.

So the appointment with the hematologist seemed to go well. The main culprit to Edda's depressed platelet levels seem most likely to be caused by the Trileptal she is on for seizures. They actually ran a CBC in the office and her platelets are even lower than they were in the beginning of the year. So we are running a bunch of blood tests including something to find out how well she is metabolizing the medication as well as coagulation/immune stuff and finally the malignancy testing which is (thankfully) very unlikely because all the other values in the CBC are perfect.

Parting Time Again

After spending almost two weeks with my family, it is departing time again for me to go back to China, working. This time, I deeply realize what a wonderful family Rena & I have together. In addition, with Jeremy, Doris and Donald, together with our grand kids, what else in the world would we ask for. Not much, I have to say. Right? Right!

French braid.

Edda's hair is now officially long enough to make a ponytail to donate to Locks of Love.  Ten inches of beautiful, thick brown-black hair - but every time I bring this up, I get resistance from all sides.  Especially our caregivers who braid masterpieces such as this:



Did I mention that Edda has low platelet counts? We were trying to figure out why she was losing teeth so early - she's already lost a bunch of molars which were not slated to come in until she was 12 years old - so we did some blood work at the suggestion of the dentist. We were trying to figure out if her thyroid was out of whack. But, of course, the thyoid is fine, but her platelets are low. So tomorrow we are headed to the hematologist to figure out why she has low platelet counts. We are trying not to freak out too much - so I just sit here trying not to freak out.  Sometimes I think I'm just to tired to freak out anymore and we have also totally abandoned the search for the reason why her teeth fall out early.

Skylander.

Vince is obsessed with Skylander - a Wii video game - which involves collecting a million figurines one-at-a-time from Target.

Are you famous?

Every year, Jeremy likes to do a little science experiment for Vince's school. He coordinates with the teachers about what they are learning in science class and comes in and does a PowerPoint presentation and an experiment. This year Jeremy's topic is "How Grass Helps the Chesapeake Bay".  Basically, he talked about how plants prevent erosion and run off from getting into the streams and finally into the bay.  Here he is holding a piece of sod.  



Everyone raised their hands to be chosen as a volunteer.  I've never seen so many excited future scientists.



Jeremy did the presentation twice - a total of about 120 students. He answered many questions, including my favorite - "Are you famous?" All the kids wrote and illustrated thank you notes for Jeremy and he read each and every one of them. It's not often you get to see yourself drawn by other kids besides your own, so seeing Vince's classmates drawings (god, these possessives are killing me) of Jeremy was really enjoyable.  Notice the goatee and the cardigan! And he's yellow like a Simpson.

Superglue.

Someone superglued his fingers together.

Wonderful weekend -

It is not often that the Lees are together.  We are far flung and all have demanding schedules. On a rare weekend together, we managed to celebrate my parent's birthdays. Both turned 70 a few months ago and we haven't been able to celebrate until now. We did get the parents matching iPads. I am still not sure how much they will use them - I hope they love playing Angry Birds as much as I do.



Uncle Donald came and it is always a good time when he is around. He is such a good sport, playing Wii with Vince, helping Edda with a bath and he is all around advice person for: bikes, electrical work, Mac adjustments, games, puzzles, things that are "cool" and dancing. In other words, there was not a still moment for him! Also, do you think we look alike? At least 17 people this weekend told us we look exactly alike! :)

Our 70th Birthday Party

Tonight (Saturday, 1/28/2012), Rena, Jeremy, Doris, Donald and I dined out to celebrate our (Rena & I) 70th birthday. Actually, our 70th birthday happened in November and December last year, respectively.

But, in November last year, we both were in China. Furthermore, last December, Rena was here and I was in China. So, it was a kind of catch-up birthday party for both. For this, Donald flew in from San Francisco specifically for this memorable gathering. And indeed, we enjoyed a lot.

In the morning hours, we also received our iPADs as birthday gift from Doris and Donald with their birthday greeting engraved on it. Really nice and, for us, it is a perfect gift and especially for Mom. She is going away in late February to work on AP1000 (Advanced Nuclear Reactor) Project as a short-term consultant. She needs a new one and this iPAD came just in time.

Vince is quite happy to see uncle Donald also. Edda is becoming very heavy for me to lift her upstairs to take a nap. But, she is as lovely as always.

Happy Chinese New Year to all - year of the Dragon :)

Mom rocking' out

With the Dr. Dre headphones.

Concert

We were delighted to attend Vince's 4th grade instrumental music concert on Wed. night. When it was time to pick what kind of instrument, I tried so hard to get him to play another instrument besides violin, which he has been playing for a year and a half already.  All the music they would have at the elementary school, even in the advanced class would be too easy for him. What about the baritone, sweetie?

I played the violin in elementary and middle school and I am wistful about all the marching band practices I missed out on. I should have played the bassoon. Actually, I'm not sure if bassoon is a marching band instrument.   I think I was a band geek in a former life. Alas, Vince did not want to practice another instrument, so violin it was.



This shirt/tie/pants outfit we purchased for Tony's wedding last summer is really our go-to formal outfit and has exceeded my expectations on the number of times we have been able to use it. Vince has had more dry cleaned visits than I have this year! I was really impressed with the music teacher, very sweet, but also very disciplined. The concert ended with a resounding rendition of Ode to Joy. Beethoven would have been very pleased.
 



Edda had a nice nap during the performance.  Poor girl, I know that she would rather be home in a warm bath or snuggled in bed during these night time activities, but somehow we take her along just to take her along.  She is a good sport.  I think she even went grocery shopping with Jeremy after the concert (there was desperate need of Popsicles (in January!) and bacon, I'm sure) - didn't get to be in her bed until 9 pm. 



On a completely different note, I found this to be hilarious - and so did my parents, they practically fell over laughing when they saw this --

Happy Chinese New Year - Year of the Dragon

Happy Chinese New Year - Year of the Dragon.

This time, I was in China to personally witness the mass movement of going home to celebrate the Chinese New Year. Practically, everyone that I know of is going home - near or far. All weeks, their eyes glue on the Internet Official Site of www.12306.com to buy train tickets inside China. It records billion hits almost every day. No wonder, the earth rotation rate might be affected due to different concentration of mass on top of it.

Well, I am also glad that I came back the USA on the Chinese New Year eve and stayed away from places that packed with a lot of constantly moving human heads :)

Jeremy's media coverage -

Today was a big day in the Lee-Martin household. Jeremy's interview (7 minutes long!) on NPR's Living on Earth aired today. You can listen to it here. I know I'm a little biased, but he sounds fabulous! So expert-like. I know he is an expert on this bio-fuels stuff, but the his voice plus the sound editing make him sound super fantastic. And now that he's had an interview on radio - he is, like, famous. I'm married to a celebrity. Ha ha.

He's also quite happy with this blog post: A Swift Kick, or a Polite Tap on the Shoulder. 

And a blog post is not a blog post without a photo. I had my eyes checked. No need for bifocals yet!
 

A suburban dog.

If reincarnation exists, I think I want to come back as a suburban dog. Warm place to sleep, enough to eat, every once in a while some table scraps. In the mornings, when I have time, Ruby and Maxi meet up with a bunch of other suburban dog for a good romp. Well, Maxi romps, Ruby runs around trying to catch balls before the younger dogs get to them and trying to find out who has the doggie treats in their pocket.

Ruby is 11!

Ruby turned 11 on Monday.  My first baby is 11! We fixed her and Maxi some extra-special goodness of chicken meat and some of that chicken gelatin that forms on the bottom of the pan when you refrigerate it.



Someone is super excited to be fed her breakfast. Ruby is the best dog ever - gentle, kind and loyal - she also has aged incredibly gracefully, all her parts seem to be in order and although she would rather sleep in on most days, she still chases tennis balls around the dog park. Sometimes the older dogs (and even some of the younger dogs) at the dog park seem to have a litany of ailments, we had lung cancer, breast cancer, knee replacements, hip massages and glaucoma which Ruby has somehow hit the genetic jackpot and avoided all of these ailments. Although, I must admit, she still smells pretty bad especially when she gets wet.

Sunday night dinner.

We have been having Sunday night dinner with the cousins for more than 4 years now.  It's amazing to see how big the kids have gotten.  We hosted at our house last Sunday where Jeremy did a roasting cook-off between "organic" chicken and "cruelty-free" chicken.   The results were not disputed,  the organic chicken was more tender and tasted better and the cruelty-free chicken, well, does not taste better and is a little tougher and is more expensive, but that is because presumably it got to run around outside some for some parts of its life. 

My mom came and brought 17 million pieces of assorted clothing that she got on super-duper sale for the kids from TJ Maxx or Ross:



This past weekend, Tilli, our new au pair, arrived from Germany - I do not have a proper photo, but you can see her in the background with the black scarf.  Much to my chagrin, the kids were at their best crazy, shirts were off - lots of yelling, running around the house, and barking from the dogs - there was also spirited demonstration of booty dancing and various other things that I'm sure convinced Tilli that the Martins are indeed CRAZY!


<