The Nelson's Visit

Last week Paul and Lisa visited. We went to the Rodeo and saw Darus Rucker, did some site-seeing and we put them to work. Well, they volunteered. We painted our kitchen and living room Soft Camel. It turned out really nice. They also bought us patio furniture to go with our new pergola. I then bought the ottoman to match with my birthday money (Thanks Nancy and Grandma Tigger).

(sorry the coloring is off, but it does look great)

Lisa's bum found the wall and of course Ryan had to photograph it and then of course I had to post it.
Ryan is in the process of making me a cement table for our patio. We found the instructions in the handyman magazine. It looks really cool with the fern impressions in the top.

Unfortunately, the cement needs to be really runny to prevent bubbles. But letting it set for 2 days wasn't enough because the areas around the ferns was still a bit wet and then washed away when we went to clean off the foliage. So my birthday present is set for round 2 after Ryan makes it home from 2 weeks of golfing in LA.

So to finish off my ossom outdoor patio, Ryan and I bought globe lights and hung them around the pergola. Its set for a great party. Who's coming?!

I miss you all. Have a wonderful spring.

Our Pergola is Built

My parents came to visit for a week and while they were here they helped build a pergola over our back patio. I had been wanting one since we moved in, but Ryan and I don't have the knowledge to be such wood workers. My dad has build many a items in his day (including our shelves in our garage and the arbor Ryan and I got married in front of). It was his present to me for Christmas and my birthday. Ryan helped out a lot and hopefully learned a thing or two. My mom and I stained all of the boards. I can't wait to get some patio furnature and take advantage of it before it gets too hot. It was great to see my parents for a while. We did some sightseeing too, but I'll save that for another post.

Olive gets Ryan

So we tried to organize our 'den' because the piles of papers really get to me and stress me out. So I bought these red boxes to throw things in until we can file stuff away. Olive loves getting into things and Ryan was playing with her while she sat in the box. I laughed pretty hard throughout, as you can hear. Enjoy.

New Years and Beyond

A New Years Kiss. We went out with a few friends on New Years (Sara, Casey, Doug, and Bryan) to Sky bar for dinner and then to Tsunami's for drinks. Unfortunately, I had a headache, again and didn't drink.

Ryan and I went into Houston to get him some car speakers at a show at the convention center and found an ice skating rink! It was t-shirt weather but there were plenty of people skating. It was a really small rink and there were patches with standing water on it.

So we finally covered up our maroon accent wall with primer. We put on 3 coats of Kiltz and still see a hit of red. Now were are in the process of trying to find a color. We are looking at a tan of some sort, but have yet to be successful. So far we have tried 5 different colors and don't like any of them.

And one of the swatches we tried was painted a bit too low...Olive got her paws in it and then proceeded to paint a little. Luckily it mostly rubbed off and we didn't find it on the carpet or elsewhere. Too curious for her own good.

Christmas

So now that its February, I guess I will post a few photos from our Christmas trip home. I still do not trust our computer so I am directly downlading the photos from the camera. We spent a week at home in OR and had a great time. Unfortunately, the snow kept us from travelling too much and prevented us from seeing everyone that we liked.

Before we headed to Redmond we stopped at the hospital to Jonh Jordan and family. John was recovering from open heart surgery and doing very well. We also got to see Hazel again, but she still wasn't too keen on seeing me. Someday!

Heading over Mt. Hood to Redmond we (well Steph and Ryan) had to put on chains. I was busy taking photos of it. The drive wasn't too bad and we got there in one piece.

So this beautiful camo outfit was purchased by Tanner at the Prineville 2nd hand store for about $10. I think it was worth it just to have the laughing that occurred with me in it. It was quite warm and will be ossom at my parents' John Day cabin.

Marques, Tanner, my mom, Ryan and I went hiking out at Smith Rock. It was perfect. Of course, I tried to get us up and over on a trial that I distinctly thought I had been on before and were turned back due to a 500ft cliff. It was really pretty with the snow and the river had froze over in some areas. It was nice to wear my fleece joker had from high/middle school. I think that my family (particularly Ryan) is embarassed everytime I wear it.

We also went sledding. My dad went out and got a few sleds- the yellow ones are ossom. There are not a lot of hills in Redmond so we made due with the trails down into the canyon. We were unfortunately joined by a family that was far from athletic. How much talent does it take to sit on a sled and head down the hill? We got a kick out of watching them. My mom even went down several times and I think she was able to steer the sled better than I.

We had great views of the surrounding mtns as we drove from Redmond back into the valley.

The sad snowman that we built at the Nelsons. It fell over just a few hrs later!

Snow volleyball! yes, Ryan went out with Jeff, Will and Gavin and played volleyball in the snow while Christmas dinner was beeing prepared. As you can see the only ones dressed for it were the little ones.

New publication

I just got work yesterday from Hong that our collaboration with Dr. Kole has finally paid off. I am the 5th author on our new paper.

RNA repair restores hemoglobin expression in IVS2–654 thalassemic mice.

PNAS January 27, 2009 vol. 106 no. 4 pp1205–1210

Repair of b-globin pre-mRNA rendered defective by a thalassemia causing
splicing mutation, IVS2–654, in intron 2 of the human
b-globin gene was accomplished in vivo in a mouse model of
IVS2–654 thalassemia. This was effected by a systemically delivered
splice-switching oligonucleotide (SSO), a morpholino oligomer
conjugated to an arginine-rich peptide. The SSO blocked the
aberrant splice site in the targeted pre-mRNA and forced the
splicing machinery to reselect existing correct splice sites. Repaired
b-globin mRNA restored significant amounts of hemoglobin in the
peripheral blood of the IVS2–654 mouse, improving the number
and quality of erythroid cells.

Now I need to get published from my current lab. Hopefully it won't be too much longer.

Coulton Turner has arrived!

Yeah, my girlfriend Jean had her son last week! He was nearly 9lbs and healthy. I can't wait to get home to meet him. I am so happy for the family.

I also found out yesterday that my friend from college, Mandy, is pregnant and is due in May!

(Ryan is still working on getting our home computer working- so I'll upload photos soon. It looks like we were able to save everything, but it was hidden. It is still removing everything from our favorites and desktop each time we re-start it! Ugh.)

Happy New Year!

I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas holiday and a Happy New Year! Sorry no new photos...our computer at home is fried once again (so wanting a Mac) so I don't want to take my photos off of our camera until we know what is going on. Ryan likes to leave the computer on overnight- well we woke up one day and everything was removed from the desktop and folders. All the programs are intact and we can get on the Internet, but we don't have any of our files. Much of it is saved on our external hard drive or jump drives, but not all of it. Ugh, I hate computers. My work computer is on the fritz too and its really old, refurbished and has a monster screen that takes up half of my desk. I don't anticipate getting a new one before I leave, so I hope it lasts another year.

My Christmas was White...maybe too much so. It snowed everyday I was there except the day I flew out. My parents had maybe 9 inches at their house. We made the most of it and went sledding and hiking in it. It was beautiful. I had a great time! I convinced my family to open presents early, since we wouldn't be doing it on Christmas anyways, so we could play with our gifts. The best was watching my Mom play tennis on the Wii (which they recently purchased). It got a bit of it on my phone, but the best was when she hit the ceiling with her little racket. If I had had a real video camera it could have won the $100,000 on America's Funniest Home Videos.

Steph drove us over the mtn and it was actually better coming over than it was once we go into Sandy. Originally I had wanted to go by way of the Santiam pass and see friends and family in Salem/Corvallis, but didn't want to drive anymore than we had to. The ruts and packed snow were terrible. We mostly stayed in and missed out on seeing most of Ryan's Mom's side of the family Christmas eve. Thankfully we made it out for the drive to Hillboro for Christmas. It was great to see everyone again. Ryan's cousin Kristen is pregnant again! This will be the 4th great grandchild in the family. All eyes are on me now, but we will wait a bit longer (Idocracy-rent it if you have not already seen it). I was also thankful to meet with my high school girlfriends and their sons. It was wierd. I had not seen them since last spring, but felt like it was last week from all of the pictures I have seen.

Time at home was way too short and I can't wait to be back in the NW. Thankfully I am back to work and am in the middle of an all-nighter experiment. It will be tough if it doesn't work out. Then I'll have to sleep in the lab again!

Have a wonderful new year! Stick to your resolutions...