Wordless Wednesday XXI

So lucky

So very lucky.

Big Sister Quote of the Day XVI

I don't wanna feed da baby all by myself because... because... I'm naked!

Plans for the future

While watching "A whole new world" from Alladin:

Ellie: Hey, Mommy, I have an idea!
Mommy: What's that?
Ellie: I know what we can do!
Mommy: What?
Ellie: When we bof get bigger, do you want to ride on a carpet wif me?
Mommy: A magic carpet ride?
Ellie: Yeah, jus like Princes Jasmine and dis guy?
Mommy: I would love to! That would be fun!
Ellie: It would be lots of fun. Dat's a good idea, right Mommy?
Mommy: Right.
Ellie: But not today. Maybe when we're bof bigger.
Mommy: Ok.

Merry Christmas

As hectic as I sometimes feel like the holidays are, I am reminded that it's really all about two small things. Nothing else matters.

Mary Did You Know?

Have you ever heard the song "Mary did you know?"

Let's for a moment forget the fact that Mary was a virgin (I think she'd be a little suspicious about what was going on if she were)...

The words really hit me hard. In particular, "Mary did you know... And when you kiss your little baby, you have kissed the face of God."

It makes me think about my own children differently. When I'm holding Addie, she's just a little baby so dependent on me. Mary's baby was the same. I'm guessing she had no idea (though I'm sure I'll be told wrong). It's impossible to imagine all the things a little baby can do when they depend on you for absolutely everything.

My baby Addie may never walk on water or calm a storm with her hand, but imagine the things she may be able to accomplish?? Maybe she will rule the nations? Or maybe she'll start smaller like give sight to a blind man? Give hearing to the deaf?

The point is that I just don't know the amazing things this little baby might accomplish in her life. I don't know what sorts of technologies she's going to help create. I don't know the lives she will change. All I know is that she changed mine.

I look at my children, and though they may not be "the son of God," I am awed by the thought of everything they are and will be in years to come. I am humbled to know that all they need right now is for me to hold them and love them.
Merry Christmas, everyone.

Big square with a holy moly inside

Our recent favorite toy is a set of blocks that each have a letter on them. We make squares out of them and long rainbows. Ellie wanted to make a really really big square so we set out to make the biggest square possible. If the square is filled in, the biggest possible is 5x5, but she wasn't satisfied. That square was the same size as all the other squares we made yesterday. So Mommy had a good idea and made a square without blocks inside. The biggest we can make is 7x7, with two blocks left over.

Mommy: Where do we put the two extra blocks?
Ellie: We can just put them in here (places them inside the square).
Mommy: Wow! That's a big square!
Ellie: Holy moly!
Mommy: It's a holy moly square, look Daddy!
Daddy: Wow! That's a big square with a lot of holy moly inside of it!
Ellie: (removes the two extra blocks) Now it's just a big square, Daddy. The holy moly is all gone, Daddy.

WOW! I say WOW!!!

Check it out! The Prosthetics program that I was a part of in MD has made it to the cover of National Geographic! How awesome is that?!?

I have to say that I have mixed feelings about that project. I have never before, and most likely never will again, had an opportunity to be involved in such an important project. Imagine the number of lives that can and will be changed with this new "bionic arm"?!? As an engineer, you can not ask for a more rewarding program.

Or can you? I was only involved at the beginning of the game. I helped design one of the nodes that moved the wrist and the node that would provide tactile feedback to the patient - way back when the Revolutionizing Prosthetics 2009 program started in 2006. Unfortunately it was such an aggressive program that it burnt out a lot of fantastic engineers. I "got out" just in time because Ellie was born the Spring of 2007 and we moved back to Colorado to be closer to family in early 2008.

I didn't get burnt out. It's a shame when I think of the effect that this program had on some of my amazing colleagues, but what do they think now? They're on the cover of National Geographic! Look at what their hard work has resulted in?! People said it couldn't be done. I'm not sure how many of us engineers believed we could actually do it, but we did. Or they did - finished what I started.

Part of me wishes I had stayed to the end of the project, but I know that I would have been burnt out too. Who knows what kind of effect it would have had on my family life. A demanding project like that does not mesh well with starting a new family. But I can not express how proud I am that I was involved, even if just at the beginning, and how proud I am of those I used to work next to for pulling it all off. There are some amazing engineers out there and I had the honor of being in their presence, and possibly even considered as one of them.

I hope my daughters are proud of their Mommy. I'm sure they'll be proud of their Daddy because he does all sorts of things for NASA (the only way you can get cooler than that is if you're an actual astronaut), but maybe they will look at this one piece of technology and know that once upon a time, their Mommy wasn't too shabby either.

Wordless Wednesday XX

Big Sister Quote of the Day XV

After showing Ellie her ornament for the year, she brings it up to her little sister and says, "See Addie? Is me and is you. I made it for you! See?"