11/17/2009

Smitty Tour - Day 1 (And Only)

We returned from the Twohy Tour almost in time for the birth of Smitty - aka Danielle Jordan Smith. On our way home from Clemson on Tuesday, Jenny called to say she had been having contractions since during the night, and might be going to the hospital. She assured us we had time to get there, because she needed to work until noon and complete her annual review with her boss.

However, a couple of hours later, she called again, this time to say she was at the hospital, but the nurses said it would be five or six PM before she was ready - we would get there around 2:30, still time enough.

But someone forgot to tell the baby - Danielle Jordan was born at 1:57 PM. We missed it!

So, instead we unloaded at home, and then picked Naomi up at her day school. We all went to the hospital to see her new sister. Mimi got to hold her first. She's very pretty. (Danielle is, too.)

Naomi had fun raising and lowering her Mommy's bed.
Danielle can stick out her tongue.

We are very blessed!

11/14/2009

Twohy's Pool

The results are in! The scores are settled!


The September pool for Christopher's birth statistics have been tallied, and the winners hereby notified.










































ActualClosest GuessWinner
Date11/511/5Jenny, Jessica, Juliet, Mark
Time12:44 PM11:53 & “afternoon”Mimi, John, Naomi
Weught7 lb 3 oz7 lb 3 ozJeff
Length19 ¼ in19 & 19 ½ inMimi, Jenny, Jessica
HairBlackBlackPa




Winners may collect their prizes by logging in to Amozan.com and entering their selection and credit card information.

11/11/2009

Twohy Tour - Day 9 - Living

John enjoys holding his new little brother.Christopher enjoys being held.
John and his Daddy played the Cariboo game from Aunt Jessica.

Autumn Schizotreenia

There is a tree in South Carolina that couldn't decide what color to be this fall.
So it chose to be all of them.

11/10/2009

Twohy Tour - Day 8 - He SLEEPS!!

This is a completely new phenomenon...Oh, and here's his newly decorated bedroom.
Neat Dino border all around the walls.

11/08/2009

Twohy Tour - Day 6 - Coming Home!

In preparation for Christopher's homecoming, John and Mimi made a special arrangement of Dino Dominoes cards. "A-ok!"
John was happy to see Christopher, at last.

Someone said Christopher was acting hungry, so John brought him an apple.

John helped everyone remove their hospital bracelets, including Mommy...

Daddy...

and even Twohy.

John showed Twohy some of his "Cars" toys.

A little later, John got to hold his little brother for the first time.
And read a book with Mommy and Twohy. Things are getting back to normal.

Aren't they?

11/07/2009

Twohy Tour - Day 5

Sleeping babies are so sweet!


11/06/2009

Twohy Tour - Day 4- Twohy Gets A Name!

Twohy is now Christopher Anthony Penna.
Perfect name for a perfect baby!

11/05/2009

Twohy Tour - Day 3 - Birthday!

Today Twohy made his grand entrance. But not before a couple of hours of waiting for an operating room to open up. Jessica called, so Julie got to chat with her for a while. Jenny checked in too, and also gave us her own update.Eventually (12:44 pm, to be exact) the time came. Daddy did his usual expert job of washing the baby and brushing his hair. Yes - hair!
He was little sleepy after all the commotion.
Twohy made footprints for the nurse.
The baby doctor gave him a careful and gentle checkup. Everything was A-ok.
Naptime, at last.
Daddy made some great photos. See them at http://screaminjohn.blogspot.com/

11/04/2009

The Twohy Tour - Day 2

Mimi and Pa got to pick John up from school today in the van.

John and Mommy shared a together time playing a game on the computer.
Then John, James, Andy, Tony and Pa went to the park for a guys outing.
James and Andy rocked and rolled.

Andy rang the bell.
We had a snack. Andy had lots of snack.
We climbed.
And swung.
Tony spotted artistic playground patterns.
While we guys were having all that fun Mimi, Julie and Kerri all went to have their toe nails painted.
Nice toes, ladies!

The Twohy Tour - Day 1

It is time for "Twohy" Penna (Penna offspring #2 - get it?) to make his entrance into this world. It is decreed that he has enjoyed the pleasures of his private world long enough. We rejoice.

We loaded the van (on top of all the pieces of fort) and headed out on Monday.

As the sun was setting, we enjoyed a beautiful moonrise ahead of us. We thought that was a nice touch for Twohy.

We arrived Tuesday afternoon in time to help pick up John Michael.

10/27/2009

Ode to Enzymology

FWIW - here is a poem I wrote sometime in the past. I don't know when, but it was apparently when I was supposed to be working. I have now idea what prompted me to wax eloquent on the subject.
-----------------------------------

Sleeping or waking, walking or still,
Never requiring a thought or a skill
Inside your body and at all times
Cat'lysts are working - the friendly enzymes.

Some chemical actions are awfully slow
Taking forever, oh don't you know.
You just need something to make it go fast.
Enzymes will really give it a blast.

How do they do this wonderful feat-
Speeding up processes? It's sort of neat!
Though it changes molecules in form if not name,
The enzyme itself stays exactly the same.

Enzymes are useful for many a thing.
They assist doctors in diagnosing
Diseases and damage to tissue from ills
And checking effectiveness of helpful pills.

If an old drunk wanders in off the street
And enters a clinic, his sickness to treat,
Enzymes can measure the harm to his liver
Through which the alcohol flowed like a river.

When doctors suspect that deep down inside us
There might be a chance of acute menengitis,
They can use enzymes for quick diagnosis
Which leads to a sure cure by medicine doses.

Another condition that's fatal, it's true,
Affects little children all under age two.
We have no cure, but they're diagnosed with ease:
One missing enzyme identifies these.

Dikanut fiber is good for the diet;
Some diabetics are told they should try it.
Is it effective? This question it raises.
Measure with enzymes - they're called ATPases.

Aldolase, creatine phospokinase,
Serum aspartate amino transtrase.
Though enzymes have names that are way out in space,
It's easy to tell them - they all end with "ase".

What is the tool you often will find
Which furthers the welfare of all of mankind?
Clinical chemists all over agree:
It's Diagnostic Enzymology.

10/25/2009

Fort in the Van

It all fit in the van! Beam us up, Scotty.
I hope we can get it out when we get to Clemson...

Naomi Spends the Night

Naomi came over to spend the night this weekend. It was a really nice day, so we picked up some acorns from the big red oak tree in the back yard.

After we had a good batch, she took them to the bird pond.
There were a lot of acorns.
They looked really good in the bird pond.
After that, we painted things with water.
Naomi let Pa paint some, too.
We had a good time!

10/21/2009

Paint The Fort

Since we had a couple of nice, sunny days this week, we got the fort painted.
Before
During
After (it was getting late, thus the color shift)
It only took about 4 hours.