Wedding Shower, field trip, NF1 presentations...busy times

Sorry I haven't been keeping up with my blogs. The last few weeks have been crazy. In addition to Jillian's Bridal Shower for Brit's side of the family, Jessica Busman's wedding in Grand Rapids (Jacki was a bridesmaid) and chaperoning Caitlin's Biology class field trip to the Waterloo Recreation Area to visit a bog, I have been to the Children's Tumor Foundation (CTF) Consotium in Aspen, and to the Society for Developmental Biology (SDB) Symposium in Ann Arbor to present my NF1 posters. I also submitted a paper to a journal and am in the process of submitting another one (keep your fingers crossed for luck). I work with mouse embryonic stem (mES) cells to study the role of neurofibromin (the protein product of the NF1 gene). I am especially interested in the effects of steroid hormones on cells depending on the level of neurofibromin they produce. Anyway, here are a few pictures.
I have lots more, so I hope to add to these later.

Happy 16th Birthday, Caitlin!

We went to Cedar Point yesterday for Caitlin's 16th birthday (which was Friday). We picked up 2 of Caitlin's friends from Holland on Friday to go with us and we stayed at Jillian and Brit's new house (thanks so much!!). Jillian bought Caitlin a beautiful cake and we had Chet and Matt's Hot Wing and Cheddar pizza (our usual) to celebrate. Saturday was a beautiful day and Caitlin and her "crazy sisters" went on most of the coasters. Caitlin and Brad went on the Skyhawk, CP's newest ride, and I think Brad's face just says it all! I spent some time on the beach in the afternoon and got some nice shots of the park from there. It was a fun and exhausting day. Click here to see more pictures.

Jillian SMC graduation

We had a great time at Jillian's graduation from SMC and the weather was gorgeous! We sure wish Jacki and John could have been there, too. Click here to see more pictures.
We are all so proud of our Jilli Bean!

Starting a blog

Welcome to our blog. I am not sure how faithful I will be about updating it, but I will try. We are going to Saint Mary's College (SMC) in Notre Dame, IN later today to watch Jillian graduate cum laude tomorrow. I hope the weather is nice. When Jacki graduated from SMC in 2002 (has it really been 4 years?!?) it was the coldest graduation they ever had, and it even snowed.

This picture is of Brad and me last week at the Tulip Time Musiekparade in Holland. Ihe weather was great until Thursday, when it started to rain and didn't stop for a week. We still had fun, though, and Caitlin enjoyed being an exhibition Dutch Dancer. Click here to see the pictures.