Dirty nerdy gal turns thirty... at Kimball Farms.

Dirty: Cami is not afraid to get her hands in the mud. She plays a mean (really, hurts people) game of soccer, and loves mountain biking, skiing, running, hiking, camping, and desert dwelling.

Nerdy: Cami's IQ is higher than mine, yours, or anybody any of us knows. She has an advanced degree in super-cali-fragi-nerdy theoretical mathematics, and puts Freedom Trail and Smithsonian tour guides to shame with her historical knowledge.

She chose to spend her memorial-day birthday at Kimball Farms, where you can get fresh ice cream and participate in myriad fun activies. First we hit the bumper boats. Cami and I pretended this was for the kids' sakes, but we had just as much fun as they did:

Calvin squealed with joy every time we ran into him or vice versa. Especially if we got wet.

Bryn was an excellent driver, and enjoyed going around and around and around and around in circles. She let out a loud, uninhibited war cry every time we charged another boat.

Next, we got our Jason Bay on at the batting cages.

Ivy hits a mean line drive.

Lazy Squiggles slept through most of the day,

But woke up to cheer me on when I was at bat. I can't make this picture rotate.

The children had as much fun playing with rocks (free) as they did riding the bumper boats (not-so-free).

Ivy smiled and squealed every time she saw the baby,

so we told her to watch her carefully while we hit the bar.

Just kidding.

After a lovely afternoon in the hot sun, we ate ice cream.

Peter shared with Ivy,

And Tim shared with... d'oh!!!

Tut tut.. and asymmetry

Point: The computer machine said there was a 25% chance of rain, based on statistics.
Counterpoint: My husband said there was a 100% chance of rain, based on the cloud cover.

I talked him into a visit to the arboretum anyway, and ... it rained... sheets of water. We took shelter under a tree for a spell, but finally decided to embrace the rain. We were both soaked but had a nice time anyway even though our nature walk turned into a wet tee-shirt contest.

The arboretum was beautiful - it's a lovely getaway without actually leaving the city. Mom, I will take you here for your morning walk - there are hours of good, hilly walking paths.

Don't worry - the squishy little baby stayed dry under the stroller canopy.

Perspective

During the past 12 weeks, I have found myself weeping occasionally as I've tried to adjust to post-pregnancy hormones, a shocking lack-of sleep, and a complete revamping of my life.

A couple days ago, I was having such a spell and Tim asked me what was the matter. I explained that I felt a little overwhelmed by the fact that I was responsible for keeping Baby Squiggles alive. Forget worrying about ways to create a loving and stimulating environment in which she will thrive and reach her full physical, emotional, intellectual and spiritual potential - I must first and foremost keep the child alive.

I ended my tearful speech by exclaiming that I didn't know how I was going to care for the child when I couldn't even keep most of my plants alive. Tim nodded in concession. He looked thoughtful for a moment, and said, "But... look on the bright side - your fake plants look fantastic!"

I've decided to take comfort in this.

The Annual Geek-fest Post

Today was the Annual Russek Student Achievement Day. This was the first year I was eligible to apply, so a couple weeks ago Sqiggles and I spent a day writing an application abstract, letter, and c.v. Then we stayed up most of Monday night making a poster for the affair. We had a grand time and our hard work paid off (literally) because we won 2nd place and $500.00! My friend Daniele (or was it you, Erin?) suggested that I might have won 1st place if I had used both hands to prepare my application materials. Maybe next year...

Here is our poster:
We figured a day of science talks and keynote speakers is kind of like PBS kis, so we brought Squiggles along for the fun. She was a big hit, and every female in the Boston University School of Medicine greater community approached Tim with squeals of delight. Most of these were friends or professors from his medical school days, but some were complete strangers. Babies are a little more rare around here than they are back home...

Here I am receiving my award from the very generous Russek family:

Squiggles pretended to sleep all day, but actually she was fascinated and forming millions of dendrite connections.

My friends humored me and pretended they were talking about science for these photos.* Daniele studies The AIDS in brains:

Erin studies VSV in innocent baby hamster kidney cells:

*Actually, they were. Geeks.

**Neither Erin nor Daniele applied for the award. They totally would have beaten me. Tim wasn't eligible since he won first prize last year.

Help needed

Dear Abby,

I might look like a cute little human,

but actually I'm a large-scale flatulence-production device. Sometimes I'm able to sleep through this foul-smelling problem,

but other times I wake myself up with a startle.

Luckily, I find my gas expulsion quite funny at times.

My mom has given up onions, spinach, milk, garlic, and broccoli (not a huge sacrifice, I'm told). In addition, she burps me and keeps me upright for a half hour after every meal. Still... I just can't help myself.

Please advise...

Dateless in Boston

Say Cheese...

My daughter's first moments ex utero were celebrated with a rather large welcoming party that included not only me, Tim, and the panel of premature-birth specialists, but also my mom, dad, two sisters, three digital cameras, and at least five camera phones. At one point, I asked the doctor if he normally had that many people watching him. He laughed and said, "Well, most women don't want this many people watchingthem give birth. And I've never had this many cameras in the room. I feel like a rock star."

We met dozens of nurses and doctors during Squiggles' stay in the NICU, and usually they would say, "Are you guys the ones from Boston?" followed by, "and you're the ones who had all those people at your delivery," followed by, "and everybody had cameras?" My favorite was, "And one of the cameras had, some kind of, like, Tupperware attached?" (It was a filter, Lance tells me.)

Cami shot this short video a minute or two after the birth. My favorite part is Karen squeezing in to take some shots. Lance's Tupperware camera makes several appearances.





At one point (unfortunately not in the video), the NICU nurse (who was prepping my daughter to be put on oxygen support and to be taken to the intensive care unit) apologized for being in Karen's way. She smiled and said, "No problem," as though she were completely accustomed to emergency personnel interfering with her photography efforts.


I'm so delighted that we have so many awesome pictures of my daughter's birth - some of them are gory, but... well, I like gory. For more pictures (and a long narrative that is far too long and boring to read), see my baby blog. I was also happy to have all those people in the room - it was a fun party, and made it less terrifying to give birth with all that support around.

To my favorite mother

Dear Mother,

Thanks for being a perfect mother, mother-in-law, and grandmother - we love you so much and are so excited to see you soon!

Laura, Tim, and Baby Squiggles

Public Service Announcement

Dear Boston,

Don't drink the water.

http://www.boston.com/news/local/breaking_news/2010/05/catastrophic_le.html

(Just in case you don't have radios or televising machines, but happen to check my blog...)

Laura, public health interest person