Happy Birthday!

In honor of a certain someone's birthday today (who just happens to be a vegetarian)...

Calling all detectives

Take a look at this video and see if you can explain what's going on here, and why. There are no tricks, no magic, nothing hidden going on. Just some weird science that we happened upon in our kitchen the other night.

Will you play with me?

Beware if you have a four-year old girl who asks you to play with her, and you say yes before asking what game she had in mind. You might end up like me, sitting on the floor putting Barbie dresses on Beanie Babies and other small stuffed animals. This is Melaina's new game she likes to do, so I should have known better.

















But I got her back yesterday after work, when I asked her if she wanted to help me outside, and she said yes before asking what I had in mind. Hah! She helped me stuff 4 trash bags full of leaves and brush I had pulled/raked up from the yard on Sunday. It was dark, drisling rain, and about 40 degrees outside. Brrr! So I think we're even now.

Infection D-FEET-ed

Woohoo! Thank you for all your prayers concerning Livian's toe. We are finally seeing improvements. The Cleocin that Livian started taking on Saturday started showing improvements by Monday, but gave Livian a rash. And this new antibiotic that Livian started taking yesterday, that treats both staph infection and pseudomonas, is also working. Livian's toe is looking so much better now, and it's not hurting as bad anymore either. Tonight Livian was walking down the sidewalk from our neighbor's house and asked if she could jog a little to see how it felt! (I said "No! Your toe is still broken, even if it doesn't hurt all the time!!")

For those of you who were brave enough to see the pictures of Livian's toe in the previous post, you will notice the improvement in how it looks tonight.

WARNING: Gross Toe Pictures Below

For those of you who have been anxiously waiting to see some pictures of Livian's fractured and severely infected big toe, your wait is over. Here are some pictures that will walk you through the various stages of Livian's broken-toe incident. Due to my desire to NOT lose the few blog readers I have, please do not continue viewing this post if you don't want to be grossed out by pictures of yucky, swollen, oosing, rotting-looking toes. OK, you have been warned...






This is a picture of Livian's toe on Monday, Nov. 2, right before the pediatrician drained it to get the chunky pus out.













The next picture was taken right after the toe was drained by the pediatrician.














The next two pictures were taken a couple hours later Monday afternoon.
























This final picture was taken while waiting on the ER doctor to see us on Friday night.

A Day in the Life of a Bag

Check out this video from the Today Show that aired on Monday. In the middle of the video, my project, T-Link, gets mentioned. You'll notice a mobile computer screen mounted in one of the tractors that carries the bags from one airplane to the other. That computer is part of the T-Link program, and displays the optimal delivery sequence of transfer bags to the drivers. And we developed it! Pretty cool, eh?

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My Four Green Peppers

Yes, you read that right. I know I'm deviating from the whole green bean theme, but I just had to share a picture of my harvest of green peppers. I planted a whole packet of pepper seeds back in the spring, thinking I would get a bushel-basket full of colorful peppers by early summer. Well, all the plants almost died before they got bigger than sprouts, and then when about 6 survived, they grew tall but didn't produce any peppers. I just kept watering them (or forgetting to water them) and then pretty much gave up on them. Then, astonishingly, I noticed a few peppers growing big and healthy in October! Maybe I just didn't read the instructions on the seed packet closely, but I thought for sure I planted early summer peppers, not fall peppers. But oh well, I was happy to get at least something from all my gardening efforts. Unfortunately, no one in my family eats peppers, so they will sit and sit until they wilt enough that I finally throw them away. But don't they look cute all lined up next to each other?? I'm so glad I'm not a farmer! I would be very, very poor!