Let me be the first to say Congratulations Dr. Cooper

My defense could not possibly have gone any better. The whole family drove to Dayton and I set up the conference room with goodies. Usually the defendee brings in snacks and drinks for the committee and audience. I brought chocolate covered chocolate chip cookie dough balls, chocolate chip cookies, peanut butter cup cookies, caramel bars, a cheeseball and crackers, and a veggie tray. My advisor thought I spent just as much time baking as preparing for my defense :).

Erik and the girls waited outside while I presented for an hour. I had pretty much memorized my defense so it went pretty well. I did have to look at my notes a few times. Then I had questions. None of which were really hard. By the way, my results were significant as I had a p value of .0143 if anyone actually knows what that means. After the questions, which were not that hard, the committee asked everyone to leave including me. I stood outside with the girls and the rest of the people.

Dr. Raymer called me in and he said, "let me be the first to say congratulations Dr. Cooper". I almost cried. Wow. 8 years and I've finally made it.
Of course I do have a couple of weeks left of editing and more research to do but not as much as I thought.

Then we went out to Red Robin with a few guys from the lab and the girls made a tremendous mess. It's all good.

What a wonderful day!

4 more days!

My defense is in 4 days!!! Right after the defense we are going camping so I don't know if I'll blog about how I did or not (I'm sure you're sitting at the edge of your chair in anticipation). However I'll probably tweet it. You can follow me @gina_m_cooper
My advisor wanted me to do a t-test of my results to determine their significance and I was telling someone in church today that my results were not significant! Then some person standing near us said "at what p-value"? You gotta love a place where random passers by ask about statistical tests.

I also have to post a link to this video of Sarah. She calls flowers "haachis". I'm not sure how she got "haachi" out of flower but that's what she says.

Today on Quiddler I got 66 points and made the word equine. Which I thought was totally awesome but apparently not good enough as the high score was 91.

Our Las Vegas Trip

Las Vegas was so much fun- better than I expected! We arrived on Tuesday night and spent the evening eating $20 ice cream!! from Serendipity while watching the fountains at the Bellagio.

On Wednesday, Erik spent the whole day in the room while I attended the conference. I learned quite a bit at the conference and my mind is full of new ideas! This conference was excellent! On Wednesday night we went to the Tournament of Kings at Excalibur. We ate dinner with our hands (no silverware) and saw an excellent show. We did notice that the knights were wearing chainmail made of cloth. Hmmm....not quite so authentic. Then we got Haagen Daas ice cream.

On Thursday I did my presentation. It went really well. I was one of maybe 3? women at the entire conference. Really...where are all the women geeks??? I know there's more of you out there. I was actually surprised at how well the presentation actually went. After the presentation Erik and I went to see Cirque Du Soleil Ka at the MGM Grand. This was incredible. The acrobatics were amazing and I loved watching them. It took a lot of balance to do what these athletes did.

The best part about Las Vegas was the food though. Wow! We went to the Monte Carlo buffet and the MGM Grand buffet. These weren't normal buffets. In fact, I think I gained 20 pounds just from the three days I was in Las Vegas. I've never eaten so well. While they were expensive, MGM Grand offers an all day buffet for $30 per person. So you eat all day for that price - not too bad actually.

To work off some of our new weight, Erik and I went to play squash today at lifetime. Our membership ends July 31 so we wanted to squeeze one more squash game in. When I'm feeling down because I'm losing or playing poorly, sometimes I'll sing this song in my head. I sang that song in my head prior to tests in college too (don't ask). It seemed to bolster my confidence. Which I needed in college (not in high school - that was easy).

I've included a picture of the Luxor hotel from the bottom (you can see the Transformers logo on it). I didn't like the logo on the hotel - it detracted from the sleek glass beauty. I also included a picture of the front of our hotel - the Monte Carlo. It was beautiful.

In another exciting note - Erik is reading Mistborn by Brandon Sanderson! He wanted to bring a book and I suggested this one. So while he read Mistborn, I held Thomas Covenant in my hand but read over his shoulder (because I like Mistborn more). Finally I gave up and just read his book over his shoulder :). Now we are reading it together at night - yea!!!

Sarah likes to tell me when things are hot (stove, pans, car seat, etc) by saying "hot" and blowing on them. It really is very cute so while making french toast, I had Erik take a video of her telling me that the French toast was hot and blowing on it. Check it out. That French toast was awesome by the way. I made maple bread in the bread maker and then made french toast out of it - absolute yum!!

78 points on Quiddler - really clug should be a word!

I have a date!

Not that kind of date....I will be defending my dissertation on July 30 at 2pm. If you happen to think of me at that time, please say a prayer for me. My final rough draft :) of the dissertation is 203 pages. My advisor wanted me to keep it below 200 but I couldn't think of anything to take out.

We leave on Tuesday for Las Vegas too! I can't wait! I'll be presenting my paper on Thursday but we'll have some time before that to walk around and see the sights. I can't believe it's almost here.

I'll keep you posted. We just got a netbook for me to have when traveling!

Iron Chef Phyllo Dough

Erik totally surprised me with Iron Chef Phyllo dough! I didn't see that one coming. However, it was tied with apples for the best iron chef ever!! Of course - this was also an ode to Erik's favorite foods :). If I would have added bacon and beer it would have beat everything else! I made:

• Caramel fondue with phyllo dough dippers - I made a homemade caramel sauce with brown sugar, heavy cream, corn syrup, butter and vanilla. Then made cinnamon sugar phyllo dough to dip in. Erik thought the phyllo dough as a vehicle for the caramel dip was great!
• Pizza roll ups - I put pepperoni and mozarella cheese with pizza sauce in phyllo dough and rolled it up with fresh basil on top. It was delicious and the lightness of the phyllo dough made the flavor of the pizza shine.
• Phyllo dough encrusted salmon with honey pecan sauce - This was amazing! I knew you could cook salmon in phyllo dough but didn't realize how moist and delicious it would be. Unfortunately I didn't know how long to cook it so I just kept cooking it :). It didn't burn though. I cooked it at 375 for about half an hour and was cooked perfectly. Maybe the phyllo dough seals in the moisture so it doesn't dry out or burn? Whatever - it was awesome!
• Phyllo and berry cream parfaits - I layered raspberries and blueberries with phyllo dough and a cream cheese/whip cream mixture. This was delicious but Erik mentioned that the phyllo dough was a little lost in all the cream and berries. I had to agree.
• Raspberry tart - I made a raspberry tart by arranging raspberries in a little pan with phyllo dough as the crust. Then I melted some sugar and strawberry jam together and poured it on top. Wow. Yum.

This iron chef earned me 16.4 from Erik and 15.4 from me with no dish earning less than an 8/10. I've never scored that high on taste for any of the iron chef competitions!

I had this fabulous idea (in my mind) to reach women at the abortion clinic. I bought 10 $5 Starbucks gift cards to give to the women going in the clinic for just coming to talk to us. I really want to reach these women - it's so hard watching them go in. Anyway, Friday was exciting in that one guy drove up to us. His girlfriend was not there to get an abortion, rather she was getting a DnC after a miscarriage. I gave him a card and some information from the Pregnancy Decision Health Center. Even so - someone came and talked to us which was exciting.

One thing in my life that has built my strong pro-life stance is something my Mother did long ago. My mother refused a DnC after a miscarriage prior to my youngest sister being born. That has had a lasting impact on me that she took such a strong stance on this. I hope to show my girls by my words and actions that unborn babies are important and loved as well.

I did terrible on quiddler with a dismal score of 57 losing the t, r, and l. But I made the word pliers which is slightly higher than insignificant in its importance :).

Red, white and blue cake!

I'm writing again as Erik is at the store buying ingredients for Iron Chef. What will he buy? It is my birthday iron chef so the idea of chocolate as the secret ingredient is one I'm toying with. Another idea is red, white and blue. He could buy strawberries, blueberries, and something white? so that every dish I made had to have all three ingredients in it. I'll keep you updated.

Erik and Jenna made me a red, white and blue birthday cake. The cake was cherry/strawberry and he put blue and white icing between the layers and then covered the whole cake in cherry frosting. It was fabulous! We had dinner with Tim and Jen and then played our new games! The games were great and Tim beat Erik at railroad tycoon!

Our friends Brian and Maureen stopped by and we went to the zoo and Culvers for dinner. We actually let our girls eat ice cream at Culvers and Jenna had a cone. I think the mess traumatized them!

I've also included a picture of my garden. It is HUGE! There are also little tomatoes growing. The whole garden is massive and overflowing its tiny space. You will also note that I took the picture before I mowed the lawn. Since I am now mowing the lawn instead of Erik, I have found great enjoyment in trying to perfectly gauge my row size such that the last strip of grass to mow is the exact width of the mower. It is a difficult feat - one I can only attain through great practice.

I finally got a video of Sarah doing the "gorilla sign". She's such a doll - when she's not writing on our walls, standing on the kitchen table, climbing out of her crib....

This other picture is taken from the inside of our camper. The girls loved the bunk beds and now that Jenna is on top, we might shopping for actual bunk beds and put them in the same room. How exciting!

44 on Quiddler today. That was terrible but I lost the V. It wouldn't let me use the word Venn. Hello? Venn diagrams??

Games!

Today Sarah and I went to the Origins Game Convention at the Convention Center downtown. It was unbelievably cool. Of course I wore my awesome math t-shirt (pictured, although that's not me wearing it). This gaming convention was filled with everything from D&D to cthulhu to rpgs to magic to zomies to swords to board games and more!

There were tables with board games set out for people to play. I wished I had more time - I would have joined them :). There were hundreds of board games there that all looked so interesting. There was even a celebrity there - the creator of the Star Wars game that Joel plays!

It was an interesting time at which I looked odd as a mother pushing a stroller. Some of the people there didn't know what to think of me (I could tell) until I started talking their vocabulary *smile*.

Even though there was a plethora of games there - I chose to buy an expansion for Railroad tycoon called Rails of England. I also bought Roll Through the Ages a strategy game and Last Word a family word game. Games were 25% off so I probably should have bought more. I certainly found neat games - ones I had never seen before and some that were $70!

In other news, Sarah has officially climbed out of her crib. She turned 18 months two days ago. Erik thinks her DNA somehow was spliced with monkey DNA, or that we got the wrong child. Why do we have an extroverted, athletic child who loves dogs??? This confuses me. We removed the side from her crib so she can get out whenever she wants. Wonderful.

Tomorrow we leave for camping - yea!

69 points on Quiddler today. I would have had 93 if it let me use the word "tivo". That is a word!!

Bugs, Monkeys, and God's provision

I'm absolutely in love with this bug pancake pan from Nordicware. Can you imagine making cute little lady bug pancakes? How cool is that? Too bad it is $35! It's putting me in the mood to make pancakes. I'm pretty much always in the mood to make pancakes though.

We walked to Handels ice cream from our house on Saturday which was a 4 mile round trip walk. We pulled the girls in the wagon and they actually enjoyed it. Of course we had to bring wipes because Sarah spilled ice cream all over everything, and we made the mistake of getting Jenna an ice cream cone (messy!!).

On Friday night we put the girls to bed at Tim and Jen's house so we could game. Sarah crawled out of the pack and play 3 times. This morning, I found her straddling the top of the crib trying to climb out to the changing table. Sarah = Monkey. Incidentally, monkeys and gorillas are her favorite animal. We have given her the nickname bumblebee but maybe she needs a different one...

On a more serious note, I must share a prayer experience that I had with Jenna's preschool teacher. As a little background, Miss Jessica had been trying to get pregnant for 2 years. She has gone through clomid, invitro fertilization, and multiple other procedures that she told me about that I don't remember. It has been a difficult two years and she had become depressed. She knew I was praying for her. At one point, she told me it's all she can do to get through the day. Poor Miss Jessica. About a month ago, I went to Jenna's spring teacher conference. After the conference, I got in my car and put the key in the ignition to go home. However, God said I needed to go pray for her. So I left the car and went back in and asked Miss Jessica if I could pray for her. I prayed for her and she said she felt something. I found that interesting but went home and didn't think much about it. A week later when I dropped off Jenna at preschool she said she needed to talk to me privately. She said, "I took a pregnancy test and it was positive!". We both started crying! Praise God for this miracle! I was the first person she told besides her husband. She said "thank you for being obedient and coming back to pray for me." Wow. Sometimes God amazes me with his wonderful provision.

On a much less serious note - I got 58 on Quiddler today and made the word lathe! cool word :)

Swimming!

Jenna and Sarah had their first swimming lessons on Monday. Jenna is in Guppy 1 and Sarah is taking Tiny Tots at the Worthington Rec Center. Both loved their lessons even though Sarah was shivering at the end of the lesson. She really doesn't have enough fat!

This is finals week for me so once I turn in my grades, I'll have two weeks off! I'm not sure what I'm going to do. Here are my thoughts:

1. Read
2. Level my EQ2 characters
3. Read
4. Iron chef
5. Read
6. Sleep
7. Read
8. Camp
9. Read

I'm just finalizing my list of course....

Erik and I discussed canceling our Lifetime membership to help us pay off the house quickly. Unfortunately, this will hinder my opportunity to become super buff. I guess eating chocolate every day also hinders my opportunity to become super buff.

56 points in Quiddler today because I lost the Q, but I made the word Skited!

Kissing Goats and Joel's feet

Everytime Joel leaves we are saddened and reminded about how far apart we live. Joel arrived Wednesday night and just left a few hours ago. We had a fabulous time with him and Mom and Dad Cooper visiting. We played several games (yes, Erik won Railroad Tycoon - but I won Stafarers of Catan - no cheesecake factory for me though!) including Seinfeld Scene-It which was a thorough butt-kicking by Joel. I think he's memorized every Seinfeld episode.

On Friday we all went to the zoo. It was a perfect day and we really had the opportunity to see a lot of animals. I've been taking the girls to the zoo once a week lately as it's a fun trip and they love it. This time, with Uncle Joel, Gramma and Grampa, and Daddy it was much more fun! Gramma even caught a picture of Sarah kissing a goat. Obviously she has baaaaaaaaad taste (haha!).

At the zoo, we rode the train and Sarah did her gorilla impersonation. Sometime I'll have to get a video - it is TOO funny.

Joel and I also had great fun writing limericks to each other. Mine reflected on Joel's smelly feet and he wrote about my height (not sure why as I am NOT SHORT).

We also got a picture of Sarah sitting on Joel's legs. You will notice the size of Joel's feet as compared to Sarah. I think Joel's feet are 0.95 Sarah's and sometimes emanate the same odors.

The girls loved having the visitors here and we got Graeters ice cream twice!

My reading progress:

1. Lords of Sargoff - While Joel was visiting, I read his book for the second time and enjoyed it! I'm impressed that he created a world and characters for this fantasy novel. I edited it somewhat with minor changes. Hopefully he will get it published soon.
2. Black Unicorn - this is getting good! I'm starting to like Terry Brooks very much and if I ever recreated my top favorite authors he would move up considerably. This series is better than Sword of Shannara.
3. Shaman's Crossing. Wow - Robin Hobb! Why have I never read her work before? The story is good but the writing is fantastic! She is a good writer and I'm enjoying this series.
4. The Shack - haven't really gotten into this one. I'll read it more later I'm sure :).
5. Not for Sale - This is a nonfiction book about human trafficking. It is a difficult book to read but I'm almost finished with it.
6. Illearth War - Yes... I picked up the Thomas Covenant series again. I must be really bored.

98 points on Quiddler and I learned that "quire" is a word!

Iron Chef Nectarines

Nectarines - sweet, succulent, slightly tart, and in season! What a great choice for a secret ingredient.
I made:

1. Grilled nectarines. This was a twist on grilled peaches. However I did not add enough sweetness to the grilled nectarines as they are more tart than peaches. The dish needed a little more sweetness.
2. Fruit salsa with cinnamon crisps. This salsa was yummy and was filled with nectarines, strawberries, mangoes, pears, coconut, and chopped pecans. I drizzled fresh lime juice and honey on this fruit salsa. It had a good balance of sweet and tart.
3. Cheddar cheese and nectarine stuffed chicken. I wanted to pair nectarines with sharp cheddar cheese and see how the combination would work (I thought it would work well). It was incredible. I stuffed a chicken breast with a combination of cheddar cheese, cream cheese, and chopped nectarines. Then I breaded it with bread crumbs mixed with apple pie spice for a sweet breading (not sweetbreads like they always use on real iron chef). This was my favorite dish.
4. Vanilla bean and nectarine pastry with vanilla bean pudding. Erik's mom brought back vanilla bean paste from New Zealand. This stuff is AMAZING! So I definitely wanted to pair nectarines with vanilla bean. I made a vanilla bean cream cheese, pecan, and nectarine mixture that I put in the middle of some phyllo dough. Then I rolled up the phyllo dough to make a pastry and baked it with cinnamon and nuts on top. Finally I made some vanilla pudding with the vanilla bean paste. This dessert was superb and was Erik's favorite.

Our ratings were: 15.75 from Erik and 15.125 from me (20 points would be a perfect score).

In other news - my friend Jon just finished his 75 mile trek on the Appalachian Trail. I followed his tweets and was happy to hear it went well. I'll be looking forward to hear how the week went!

57 points today on Quiddler - that was dismal!

Lazy River, lazy weekend

We returned an hour ago from a fabulous camping trip! Thursday - Sunday we went to the Lazy River Campground in Granville. Behind us was a creek filled with minnows and crawdads that created a boundary to a beautiful hill of trees. Our view was magnificient! Kids were wading through the creek and catching fish in little cups. And if you look close you will see a thin line across the trees that was a zip line. People were swinging across the zip line for hours.

We played in the pool on Friday and Saturday and had a wonderful time. This campground also had a splash pad with fountains and waterfalls. I thought Sarah wanted to go in it so I took her there but she started shaking and crying so we left immediately :).

This was also carnival weekend at the campground filled with crafts and games and a magic man. The girls made clowns, played games, and won prizes. Jenna even participated in a golf game from which I realized she has no golfing talent. We took long naps and spent a good amount of time relaxing.

The only downsides to this campground were that there was no soap in the bathrooms and the showers were pretty cold. Maybe next time I'll just stink and not shower :). Other than that we had a great time!

In even more surprising news, Erik read a book while we were there. He hadn't read a fiction book in awhile and said he liked it. So he asked me for a recommendation on another book he could read. Yea!!! My husband has rediscovered the joy of reading :).

84 points in Quiddler!

Stay tuned.... Erik is at the grocery store as I'm writing this buying me a secret ingredient. We are doing iron chef tonight!!!

Fashion Show

Jenna had her last day of preschool yesterday. This brings me to reminisce about the last day of school for me when I was in elementary school. The summer held so much promise - there was so much to look forward to. For Jenna, she's just going with the flow. Okay, no school. That's fine. What are we going to do today? She has been doing well riding the bike and I've included a picture - go Jenna! Ride .5 mph and wear that helmet!


Not to get too Stephen Covey on you, but I think I've been more of a manager of my children and life rather than a leader. My view is discipline, rules, efficiency in the moment, etc rather than focusing on fostering long term relationships with the girls in a loving environment. In my life too I'm just moving one day at a time without looking at the big picture. Erik and I have been praying lately about our finances. We are taking actions that are counter cultural. Right now, we've cut out our 401Ks and all our savings and are dumping our money to pay off our house in 3 years. Erik just took the Crown Financial Bible study course and decided that he wanted us to be out of debt. So we are moving our lives in this direction. We'll be living miserly for the next few years but it will pay off. This will also give us the ability to put Jenna in Christian school if we feel she needs more individual attention.

On an absolutely different note, I've included Trillian's new fashions (my Everquest character). The white armor I have is my tier 1 armor and looks totally awesome (since she is a paladin). David created some dresses for Jenna's character "Siddra" (she is a fairy) and Trillian is modeling one of those dresses. Also, another guild member Michele, created this rather skin-baring dress for Trillian. I just thought I'd share all of these as her new fashions.

71 points today in Quiddler!

Check ? Light

Look at this drawing I've uploaded. This is the symbol that was lit up on my dashboard today. Huh? Now I understand that some people can't read and thus using pictures can help the illiterate folk among us. However, when the picture is so obscure that you have no clue what this warning light could possibly be telling you, doesn't it defeat the purpose? What is this? What does my faithful readership think? When this lit up on my dashboard I assumed that the lego section of my car was not working. Now if my car was actually built out of legos then we'd have a problem. As it is, I had no idea what this symbol meant until I looked it up. Driving home from Dayton, I wasn't sure if it was something that required immediate attention or just some thing small. I'll let you ponder it.


For our Bible studies this week, I was feeling particularly challenged. I made a chocolate brandy cake for the Monday Bible study and a white chocolate raspberry cheesecake for the Tuesday Bible study. The chocolate brandy cake had 1 cup of brandy in the cake and 1/3 cup of brandy in the frosting. Usually I like to lick the bowl when I bake but I couldn't do it for this batter. It reeked of alcohol. The cake and frosting were overpowering. I just could not eat this cake! The first time this has ever happened I think :). The cheesecake was a different story. Yum.

Jenna also decided to play restaurant too. We created a menu that Daddy was able to order from and Jenna made a mint cake for dessert. I measured out the ingredients and she poured them in the bowl and mixed it together with help from Mommy. It turned out great.

71 points today on Quiddler and I made the word "gaming"!

My Talkative Girl

Sarah has really started talking and signing quite a bit. I love being able to communicate with this little one - who really has so much spunk!

Here are some words Sarah can say:

• dada
• mama
• bird (baba)
• sheep (baa)
• cow (moo) I know it's a stretch but she does say it!
• Hi
• Hand
• Jenna (hi-ya)
• cat
• kitty cat
• doggie (dobaa)
• clock
• that
• ball
• high 5

Signs that Sarah does:

• more
• please
• water
• sit down
• gorilla - her favorite animal!
• bird
• eye
• ear
• mouth
• nose
• arms
• legs
• milk
• thank you
• fish
• baby
• ball
• Jesus
• banana
• flower
• rain
• hat

It's amazing that we can communicate so well with her at such a young age. Although sometimes the communication is one sided since she just laughs at us when we tell her "no" or "come here" or "don't touch".

Books I'm reading now:

1. Black Unicorn by Terry Brooks. I just finished Magic Kingdom for Sale by Terry Brooks and was very happy with the book. While I loved the Sword of Shannara series, much of it seemed to rip of Lord of the Rings - even the plot twists. Whereas in Magic Kingdom for Sale, it was fresh and interesting.
2. Shaman's Crossing by Robin Hobb. Robin Hobb is a fantasy writer whose work I have never read. She was listed among Brandon Sanderson's favorites and was the only one I hadn't read so I wanted to read her books. It is an excellent story about class war - something I'll expand upon in a little bit.
3. Knight in Shining Armor by Jude Deveraux. This is a fun romance book that my Mom recommended. I like the story and it is unfolding like something I'll really enjoy.
4. The Shack. This is a book about the Trinity and apparently will make me never want to go camping again - at least this is what my friend who loaned it to me said.

While I was pondering the books I'm currently reading, I was thinking about fantasy and realized much of fantasy can be grouped into the following 4 categories:

1. Class/Race war. Shaman's Crossing and Mistborn are examples of these kinds of books. The lower/oppressed race often rises up and overthrows the one in power.
2. Journey/Quest. Lord of the Rings and Sword of Shannara are examples of these kinds of books. A long journey is taken for some reason or quest and may span several books.
3. New world colonization. Red Mars and Pern are examples of these kinds of books. Some of these books may fit more in Sci-Fi but these books often have fantasy elements in them as well.
4. Hero/Heroine. Wheel of Time and Sword of Truth are examples of these kinds of books. Often a hero is foretold and the series is about the hero and his/her exploits (more often him than her... I'm still waiting for the awesome heroine story!).

While these may be broad generalizations, I feel that much of the fantasy I read falls into these categories. Books that are outside of these categories such as Song of Ice and Fire tend to be interesting and different. Thomas Covenant is an anti-hero which I also find interesting - even if the book just trudges along.

80 points today on Quiddler!

Do kids make you less busy?

As I was sitting outside in the sandbox the other day, I thought about what my life would be like without my two kids. Certainly on that beautiful sunny day I would not be outside playing in the sandbox. I would be inside working looking outside and thinking it was beautiful. I probably wouldn't have quit my engineering job to teach nights and would be at a computer all day. How my life is different now as I wplay with sand and run around the backyard playing tag and looking for ants. Sarah is always trying to pick up ants!

Since having kids
I laugh
I play
I wonder
I love
I kiss
I hug
I smile
I fix
I splash
I jump
I swing
I run
I hide
I seek
I lead
I follow
I sing
I show
I listen
I stop
I dance
I twirl
I climb
I cry
I worry
I savor
I squeeze

How my life is different yet so blessed for having these beautiful girls!

Cheesecake Factory Here I come!!

The day has finally come. The earth has stood still. Various parts of the underworld have frozen over. All because I BEAT ERIK AT RAILROAD TYCOON. Yes! Yes! While it seems impossible and the odds were stacked against me, I beat Erik 73 to 65. Even though we are still at Buckeye Lake camping, I had to pull out the laptop and the free wi-fi (since no camping trip is complete without wi-fi) to inform the world (or at least the few people who read my blog) that I actually won!

While I'm at the computer though, I might as well post some pictures of our trip so far. We've had a wonderful time and it only rained for about half an hour tonight (Friday night). We arrived on Thursday and when putting the girls to bed, we decided to put them in the same bed (bottom bunk) of our camper. This did not work so well as the girls could see out the window and were looking at us sitting by the fire. So (you will notice the picture above) we had to devise a way to cover the window. This is engineering at its finest. We took a trash bag and some string and tied it to the ends of the camper. No we did not have duct tape. It worked though. The girls couldn't see us and did end up sleeping in the same bed.

Friday (today) we had a jam packed day of fun! Erik took Jenna on a pedal powered go-cart all around the campground. He actually got a pretty good workout from it. Then the girls (and Erik) jumped on the jumping pillow. Here's a video of Jenna jumping. They also had old-time playground equipment that I love! Erik was surprised that I actually liked the equipment in this video as he says it makes him sick.

Well back to stuffing my face with smores. We may be the only campers who eat smores with pricey Sharffenberger dark chocolate but yum yum!

73 pts on quiddler today!

Systems of Equations

As I was preparing one of my lectures on systems of linear equations in 2 variables for my math class, I was saddened to realize that we do not cover matrices. Oh the humanity! Matrices are my favorite way to solve systems of linear equations. Then I was thinking....how would I rate the different methods of solving systems of linear equations.
Example:
3x-2y=-4
5x+y=15

1. Matrices. Matrices can solve linear equations with many variables and they are so awesome cool. Eigenvalues and determinants - yea! Give me some dark chocolate and some matrices and I'm in heaven!
2. Elimination. I just love eliminating variables by multiplying through the equation by a factor or what's even better, when you notice a variable can be eliminated without multiplying through. You'd see something like this:
x+y=8
x-y=2
3. Graphing. Who doesn't love graphing? The point at which the lines intersect is the solution to the system of linear equations. You get to play with your graphing calculator (or do it by hand if you are a rebel) to find the answer. Sometimes it's hard to find the exact point especially if it is something like (42/13, 11/26) so you might have to use your spidey sense. The way the graphing calculator spins those lines kind of reminds me of spiderman. With great power comes great responsibility!
4. Substitution. Sometimes this method works really well such as:
2x+7=-12
x=3-2y
but most of the time you have to solve for one of the variables. Not that it is that difficult, but I don't want to spend time doing that - I just want to dive into solving the system.


10 points to anyone who solves all of the above equations. Although I don't know what you would do with 10 points :). I'm not taking anyone to the Cheesecake factory that's for sure.

68 points on quiddler today

Kids Aplenty, Kids Galore

This weekend Jenna and Sarah had their first slumber party with Nicholas and Emmerich. Nicholas and Emmerich stayed the night and we had a great time planting the garden, digging in dirt, eating enormous amounts of pancakes and playing in the sandbox. Jenna and Nicholas played the entire time together and amazed me with the imaginative play they made up. They didn't even want to watch TV - they were having so much fun together. Sarah and Emmerich on the other hand didn't pay too much attention to each other. While we were playing outside, Emmerich sneaked back in the house and tracked mud all over the place. Later tonight Sarah learned that trick from Emmerich. Erik turned his back and Sarah had opened the screen door and was outside playing even though we were all inside. After I changed her into her nightgown for bed, I caught her trying to escape again!

Having 4 kids in the house was fun and filled with energy. Erik may have a different view though :).

Math went well for me on Wednesday. Since I hadn't taught math in 5 years I was a little nervous, however the class went well and I enjoyed it! The only issue I had was explaining to a student how to factor. I look at 3x^4 - 9x^2 and know how to factor it to 3x^2(x^2-3) but had difficulty explaining how to do it. For some things it's hard to have a good way to explain the material especially when the math is somewhat like art.

76 points on Quiddler today and I made the word "loser".

Railroad Yummies

I found this picture of a Carcassone cake on cakewrecks.com. This game is a lot of fun and found this cake rendition a good one. It has inspired me! If I ever do beat Erik at Railroad Tycoon - I might just make a Railroad Tycoon cake! Although the board is much bigger and hugely more complicated and I'm NOT drawing little hexagonal lines on the cake. So maybe I won't do this...

Next week starts a new semester and I'm nervous. I'm teaching math which I haven't taught since 2004. I love math but it is easy to get rusty when you don't "complete the square" every day. So I hope the class goes well. I'll be spending all weekend preparing. Except for the time on Saturday when we go pick up the camper! It is 80°F out today and beautiful! So it should be a perfect day for me to risk my life cleaning the top of the camper.

Missy, my "sister", bought the girls singing and dancing toys for Easter. These toys are played constantly. I do have a video but it doesn't quite show Sarah doing the chicken dance. She really tries to do the chicken dance. Jenna is having a ball dancing and Sarah is trying. Check it out.

Only 78 on Quiddler today!