Trips to the West

The lats couple of weeks, I've been in Colorado for a meeting and then in Montana to see family.  (Brendon flew with the girls to Denver, met up with me and we went to Montana together.)  All in all, it was 2.5 weeks of gloriously non-humid weather, [real] mountains, and a wonderful time with family and friends!!

First Colorado:
Steamboat Springs is such a wonderful location for a science conference.  It's located at about 6,500 feet in elevation and right in the middle of the mountains.  Tons of hiking, etc.  The conference was great (I gave a talk- see page 2- and got good feedback-- which also meant I didn't have to haul a poster there.  WIN). And I was able to see my former mentor, Missy Wong, and go hiking and to the hotsprings with her, some folks from my lab and and one of her postdocs, Nick, (who actually did grad school in Eugene right next to a lab where a friend of mine worked. Small world).  We found out the hotsprings were "clothing-optional" after dark, and some people were taking advantage of that.  Thank goodness it was VERY dark out!  Great trip!

Missy and I taking a break from a hike

Western US streams are something I will never take for granted!

One of the views as my lab mates and I approached RabbitEars Pass on a hike

My lab mates and I as we made it to the top! 9,500 feet!

Brendon sent me pics of the girls everyday.  This was a favorite.  They look so grown up!

Now for Montana:  We went and visited my mom and dad.  We didn't see my little sister Katy, as she was out in Seattle, but are looking forward to seeing her in December or January.  Mostly, we stayed in Great Falls, where I am from, but did take a 2 day trip up to my parents cabin they bought a couple of years ago.  It's 20 acres in the middle of the mountains on the Continental Divide in Montana.  Its a wonderful little spot and we felt lucky to visit it!

Ev loved digging in grandma's dirt!

Beer from the west!

Hiking

Frying fish caught by Grandpa with Grandma!

Out on the boat

Driving with dad

View from about halfway through my 18 mile run.  Missouri River. Gorgeous.

Dirt with cousins!

Dinner with cousins!

Dishes with grandma!

With great-grandparents!

Bedtime story on the porch at the cabin.  Best setting ever!

Ev and grandma

Feeding the trout at the hatchery

Family pic!

That's a moose. 

Grandpa talks to us about a bug.

The best way to grill fish is with no pants.

LOVE Montana!

Flying home. iPad is a savior. Such a big girl now!

Cora slept on the flight.

This is about the time we realized it was her first birthday! Whoops!

Visit to the County Fair!

Last Saturday we took our friend Elsa to the Williamson County Fair.  We loved seeing all the animals, doing the "farm to table" exhibit, riding a horse and playing on the tractors!  (Oh, and Ev's first funnel cake!)

2 months has passed! Where did the time go?

We're completely behind, so this will essentially be a photo blog of our last few months.  Here are some of the highlights:

1. Cora is 11 months today!  No walking yet, but she's eating pretty much everything we eat and started cow's milk this week (mixed with her formula, of course.)  We can't believe she'll be a year!  New for her is also- waving and saying "bye-bye" and her first word was officially "Uh-oh!"  She says it over and over when she drops something, etc. So cute.
2. Evelyn is almost 3.5 years old.  She's such a little girl now- not even a small bit of baby left in her.  We can't believe it.  As of a few says ago, she is also out of diapers at night time!  She's been potty trained for 1.5 years now, but has always needed them at night!  Now no more! WOO!!
3. We took a road trip and drove EIGHTEEN HOURS to Minnesota last month to visit my Dad and Stepmom and my other family there.  It was our first major roadtrip, and despite my trepidation, it worked out very well and we had a WONDERFUL time!
4. We will be headed to Montana here in a couple of weeks to spend a week with my family there.  I will go to a small conference in Steamboat Springs, CO for a week, and then Brendon and the girls will fly to Denver, I will meet them in the airport, and we will all fly up to Montana.  We are SO excited!
5. I'm running the Portland marathon again.  So, we will go to Oregon for a week in October and are definitely looking forward to that!  We continue to miss Oregon on a daily (if not hourly) basis.
6. Birthdays! I turned 32 last month.  We had some folks over and Brendon put all 32 candles on the cake! ha!  Brendon turns 36 on Sunday!  He's getting 36 candles too!
7. Pool!  We are officially now YMCA members and have been loving going to the pool to survive the Southern heat!  We are so much happier with a place to cool off (and a place to take the kids so mommy can do yoga, or kickboxing, or spinning or...) and we can't believe we didn't join sooner!

Here are some pics!

Saturday morning

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Accolades for Annie's hard work

It has been a good spring for Dr. Powell. She has recently been promoted to "Instructor in Medicine" which means Annie is out of her Post Doctoral Fellowship (in under 3 years) and is now on the first step of the faculty ladder. Her work and lab situation are similar to before but she is now setting up a plan to get her own funding sources and begin working on her independent projects. A very exciting time in her career!


Then, this last week she attended a Research Symposium at Vanderbilt and presented her work at a poster session. She won "Best in Category: Cancer Biology"! She has long been good at composing her work into visual form and showed again her attention to detail, thoroughness in thought and knowledge in her field of study.


That was Wednesday and on Friday she attended a Vanderbilt conference for the Department of Cell and Developmental Biology. At the end of the conference, there was to be awarded a Postdoctoral Fellow of the Year... she was that Postdoctoral Fellow! Her dedication to the science and furthering of the understanding of cancer biology in the colon was made apparent to the committee and they awarded her this honor.

Now for the bonus round. Later this month she will attend the American Gastroenterological Association meeting in Orlando, FL. With her submission representing her current work, they chose her and only 2 others amongst all participants worldwide to receive the Horizon Pharma Fellow Abstract Award. Their selection process was summed up as "Awardees will be selected based on novelty, significance of the proposal, clarity of the abstract and contribution of the applicant."

I am so proud of Annie for her continual pursuit of excellence yet balanced approach to life. Many in academic science never get such awards yet spend night and day in their labs thinking that more time=more success but Annie gives her family equal attention and dedication as she does her science.

Hey Ev, whatcha doin'?

"I'm peeing."

"In the yard."

Cora Jane- 8 months

Cora was 8 months old on Friday! She's getting to be a big girl. Babbling like crazy.  No crawling yet, but we think it may be quite soon!

Annie rocks the Country Music 1/2 Marathon!

It was a cold and wet day in Nashville, race time high of 55 and must have rained inches during the run (flash flood warnings are coming across the air as we speak). Truly a soggy day and one to better spend hunkered in the house watching old movies and playing games....that is of course unless you are Annie!

She got up well before the sun, prepped and was running at 7:00 am along with roughly 30,000 other troopers on either a 1/2 or full marathon course. Me and the girls were able to see her at both the 4 and 8 mile marks to cheer her on. Her spirits were high and she looked great albeit chilled and soaked! She completed the 13.1 miles in 2:05 which is not far off her personal best pace and even more impressive since she hasn't run any more than 8 miles at a time since last October! In the spirit of Cora, she went out there "chill cakes" style and pegged a great 1/2 marathon.

She tried the poncho a la black garbage bag to try and stay dry (only lasted a few miles).

Pics of West End Ave. just before the start of the race.

Annie at mile 4, soaked to the bone already but having fun.

Country Music Half- Mile 8 from Annie Powell on Vimeo.

A video I took at mile 8...

After 13.1 miles.

Bam!

New kiddo pack!

We'll break it in camping again this weekend!!





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