$2 Tuesdays at Rosenblatt

Omaha Royals games have become one of our favorite family outings. The kids love it and at $2 a person it's pretty reasonably priced. Erin's not in the picture because she, along with Alicia and Chelsae, was at a baby shower. So, they missed the first couple of innings. Craig and I had a bet on when they would finally make it and I won the bet by a couple of minutes.

Weekend Happenings

Friday night we had fun going to the first Omaha Royals game of the season. They gave out bead necklaces and kazoos.

Porter just had to get his picture taken with KC the Lion. Peyton was terrified of the mascots and cried every time he saw one.

Chelsea and Craig brought some blue candy, so everyone had blue tongues.



Saturday:
Lynn and I got to dress up and go to his Senior Banquet. We had fun watching all of the Senior Videos.



This is me with two of my good friends Jessica and Lisa.

Which one is Lynn?

Lynn is with his friend Jace. All of the teachers used to get these two confused with each other.

Lynn and some of his dental school buddies.

Visit from the Acors

Last week Porter had spring break and so my sister Jodie came with her family to visit. We had so much fun with them here. The kids had fun playing with eachother. Jodes and I had fun shopping together. Barry and Lynn had fun playing basketball together.

Here are a few pictures of when Jodie and Barry were here last week.

Group hug!

The kids on Easter morning

Kara and Kendra

Porter and Tanner had fun playing video games.

The kids and I made bracelets.

My boys at the hotel getting comfy.

The Acors took this picture without us knowing, but it is so cute!

We had so much fun. We wish they lived closer so we could do this more often!

New place to call home soon

So, here is the condo that we have decided to rent. We are very excited to have found a place in Columbus to live that is within our price range, close enough to Ohio State, in a good neighborhood, and has a nice/understanding landlord. Porter is excited to have a pool to swim in. I am excited that there is a workout room. We were hoping to find a place with a back yard, but we think that the back patio will work well for now. It is a three bedroom, 1 1/2 bathroom with a finished basement.

We loved the kitchen because the cupboards are very spacious and have organizers in them.

The fireplace will be a fun addition especially when we want to roast marshmallows :)

Main floor with the living room kitchen and dining room.

The front of the condo. We like that it is on the end because it provides more light and less neighbors to share a wall with.

The back patio.

Master Bedroom. The closet space in here is awesome, I'm excited to take up the big side of the closet.

The basement. There is a little work room through the door with a lot of storage space. Lynn is excited to do his lab work down here. Get this, there is a laundry shoot that comes down to the laundry room! Super cool.

Updates

Updates, updates, updates...

Well since we've failed to be good bloggers this past month, I thought I'd catch up on all the stuff we've been up to.

-We've traveled through Iowa, Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio.

-We found a place to live in Columbus!!!! I'll have to post pictures later.

-We visited my sister Jodie in Wisconsin and got to leave the kids there while we went to Ohio. Grandma Belcher came and helped watch the kids too!



-We got to represent Brazil in our Branch's World Fair.

Peyton just ate a bunch of black beans :)

I was the server of the Brazilian feijoada

-I threw a shower for my good friend Alicia with these two lovely ladies. (I don't know why, but this is the only picture I took at the shower)

-Meghan and I threw another baby shower for my good friend Jessica. (She's the one sitting by me in the beige jacket)

-We celebrated St. Patty's Day with a green meal. A leprechaun came to our house and sent Porter on a scavenger hunt to look for a pot of gold (aka a pot of rolos). He thought that this was so fun and wants to catch him next year.

-We went to Mahoney State Park and played in this ginormous play place big enough for adults. I don't know who had more fun, the kids, or the adults. We plan on taking my sister Jodie and her family here next week when they come visit.

Can you find Lynn?

I finally got a picture of Porter holding still. He wouldn't stop running. The slide he is about to go down was so much fun. I caught air at the bottom of it.

Peyton wasn't too sure about the ball pit.

-Jeff taught Porter how to skateboard.

-We had our first tornado warning of the season last Monday while we were taking our friend Maddie a get well treat (she broke her finger at our house). We ended up staying at their house until the tornado sirens stopped, and then they invited us up for dinner. Thanks guys!

We waited in their rec room until the sirens stopped. Here's Maddie with her little cast.

-We've been wondering when this crazy winter weather will let up so that we can enjoy the spring. We need to get out can you tell?




-Last but not least....LYNN IS DONE WITH HIS BOARDS (hopefully he passed)!!!!! Now all that's left is graduation, wahoo!

Future in Prosthodontics

I have to relate a funny story that happened the other day in the clinic. It was actually two days ago. I thought I should write it down before I forget the funny details of the experience. Anyway, I was schedule to see one of my patients for a 24 hour denture check. To better appreciate the story I'll provide a little background; I received this patient about 1 year ago next month from a graduating senior. As part of his treatment plan with her she elected to extract her remaining upper teeth and replace them with a complete denture. She was missing a couple of teeth on the lower and we suggested to make a lower partial denture to help support the upper. She didn't want to do that. I got everything ready to go by making her an interim denture that she would be able to wear during the healing process immediately after the extractions. I informed her that I placed her denture teeth slightly forward to cover up her lower teeth a little more due to their crowded nature. Immediately after her extractions I inserted her interim denture and saw her the next day. I was sure to explain to her multiple times that there would be a huge learning curve going from natural teeth to denture teeth, especially with interim dentures. She actually handled the interim denture process very well. I saw her as often as she needed to be seen to make adjustments to the denture to make them as comfortable as possible during her 6 month healing period. She at first thought her teeth looked different, but after a while she liked them. The healing time passed and it was then time to fabricate a final denture. Making a denture requires multiple visits. She missed several visits along the way for different reason, but eventually we were able to get all the visits in she needed. One of the visits required what is called an anterior try-in. During this visit I place the anterior teeth onto a denture base and try-it in the patient's mouth. At this visit the patient has the opportunity to personalize/adjust what she likes or dislikes regarding the dentures appearance. I told her that this time I set her teeth a little differently, not as forward. She told me that she liked it and "it looked more natrual." I made sure that things were the way that she liked them. She insisted that they were fine. I finished up the dentures and finally inserted them after a couple more canceled appointments. She loved them. They fit very nicely and looked really good. My instructor thought they looked very nice as well. She went home very happy, so it appeared. As I mentioned above we like to see denture patients 24 hours later to make sure they fit ok. She missed her next appointment so I saw her 48 hours later. I was pretty excited to see her, due the past experiences I've had; she seemed pretty pleased. I greeted her in the loby and as we walked in the clinic I asked how she was doing. She said "Not so good." I then asked her what was going on? She said, "Well, everyone says that I look like I don't have any teeth!" I asked her what she thought and she said "I don't know, I can't really tell, I just don't want people to think that about me." We sat down in the operatory and I began to try and find out exactly what the problem was. She informed me the "everyone" was her daughter. Her daughter said "Mom, you look different." Then she told me her what she first told me when I asked her how she was. Then she told me that her grandaughter told her that her teeth looked small. I said "Ok, lets have a look and see." I examined her appearance and her soft tissue profile looked pretty good. I could notice that her lip wasn't as full as when the interims were in, but she still looked pretty good. I tried to explain that maybe her family noticed the difference between the interim and the finals and they might get used to it. She then said "Well, my interims look more natural than these do. I don't want to look like I don't have any teeth." I explained the process why we did the dentures the way we did and then explained that if she wasn't happy with the way they look now then I would do my best to correct the problem until she was happy. I started to explain the different options we might have to correct the perseption. One option might be to thicken the plastic above the teeth, another might be to make a new denture. When I mentioned that option she wigged out even more. She said, "I've been driving all the way here for almost a year now. I'm not doing that again. I just won't." I said Ok lets look at the thickening option first then. I grabbed some soft wax and placed a thin layer abover her teeth and had her place the denture back into her mouth and then look at herself in the mirror. She looked and proceded to tell me, "I'm not the expert, I don't know how to fix it, I just don't want people to look at me like that." I tried to explain again that I wanted to help her and the different options she might have. She looked at her wax adjusted denture and didn't comment. She just got more upset and repeated the previous complaints again. This time she kept trying to get out of the chair and started telling that she just wanted to leave. I tried one more time to explain that I was there to help her and I was tring and I would do all that I can to help her. Then she threw up the arm rest grabbed her purse and stormed out of the clinic. I was blown away. I was somewhat at a loss.

Morals of the story:
When making a denture invite the patient to bring someone along who they respect their opion (daughter in this case, she broke the success of this case)
Explain to the patient that other might see a difference in their appearance when they receive a new denture
There is a good chance that if something else is going on in a patient's life you might be the scape goat for them to release their anxiety

What we did for Valentines... (a little late, I know)

Lynn and I had the opportunity to go out alone for Valentines Day. Thanks to some great friends. I had an idea to go and get our pictures taken professionally. We haven't had this done in a long time with just the two of us, so I thought that it would be fun. We had a great time! The photographer made us do the most cheesy poses, but we did get a couple of good shots. Here is the one we chose...