I feel like I've been neglecting Mitch and all his accomplishments, in lieu of all the excitment this year with Addie and her milestones, so I thought I might dedicate a post to Mitch's first successful year of dental school at Marquette University.
His first semester he learned how to take radiographs (x- rays), he learned how to clean teeth, although all of his work the first semester was done on fake teeth.In all of his semesters he has had what the students nicknamed PRES/RES or preservations and restorations, of teeth such as drilling cavities, filling cavities etc. Had classes like Histology (study of tissues), Biochemistry he was lucky enough to get out of because he had taken it before, and a Fundumental Class of Dentistry that included Bio material, nutrition, radiology, developmental biology & a clinical rounds class that discusses moch clinical scenarios.Because he didn't have to take Biochemistry he feels like school wise this semester has been his easiest, but as Addie was born this semester as well, it made it a little more interesting and busy too.
His second semester he learned about some Behavioral sciences, Cariology or the study of cavities, he did some Periodontal or gum studies, and had course work in Oral biology and gross anatomy that focuses on the head and neck, but also touched on body cavities and organ systems.He also had the clinical rounds class again and continued training on cleaning teeth on manakins and taking radiographs. He also got to go into the clinic and do some assisting to the older students. He feels the second semester was harder because he had more credit hours to do, but he also thinks that his second semester was sucsessful because he really buckled down and studied hard.
The summer semester by far has been the most trying semester for him. The bane of his existence has been the Dentures course. It was only two credits but he says the work he was doing made i feel like it was 8 credits. He worked on a lot of hands on projects like making a pair of dentures for a patient, creating casts and replicas of his own mouth, and making a whitening tray for himself from the molds of his mouth. He also got to do his first Prophy(where he cleaned his first live patients teeth). He also had the opportunity to go to the AIDS clinic downtown and learned how people are managing there disease and how dentists can help. During the summer semester he spent a lot of time at home working on his dentures and other projects. He even bought a propane torch so he could melt the wax and do other things for his projects, which he says was a highlight.This is a pictures of his teeth that he shaped and made.The yellow is the mold and the white and pink is all the work that Mitch did. They even have to make the gums look exactly the same, they even give them a stippled appearance! Lots of work went into these.


So that's his first year in a nut shell.
He's had three weeks of this summer to spend with his family and we've had lots of fun while he's been home with us. He heads back to start his second year this upcoming Monday. Good luck babe, Addie and I will miss having you home during the day!

Mitch and I were invited by our friends the Sessions to go to the Dells this week for a little get away from Milwaukee. Wisconsin Dells is the water park capital of the world so they say, so Mitch and I were pretty excited to go. We stated at Chula Vista in a nice condo that we shared with Marianne and Schuyler and their two kiddos. Mitch and I hit all the rides of the indoor and outdoor water parks at the resort and Addie really like playing in the little kids areas and splashing in the water. She especially liked the lazy river. I sat in a tube and put her on top of my lap and Mitch would push us around and around, she would look at everything and she even held onto the black handles that were on the tube which was so adorable. I'm not sure if she did it for support or just something to hold onto. One of the rides was nicknamed the "toilet bowl" because you would go down the slide and end up in a circular bowl shaped whirlpool that would take you around and around then drop you down another tube to the bottom of the slide. They had a half pipe ride, a "bonzai" ride for those of you who rember Wet and Wild waterpark in Caldwell. (it's a slide that goes straight down. My favorite was called the cyclone that was a tube that went around and around in a tight circle, it was super fast. Mitch and I got to go by ourselves that first night while Marianne and Schuyler watched Addie. I hadn't been to a water park since high school and Mitch swears I was talking an octave higher and ten times faster than I normall do. I attributed it to how excited I was, I felt like I was 10 again, it was awesome.

Adelaide started to wave at people, things and pretty much any thing else she wanted to about a month ago. We were feeding the Elders and one of them waved to her from across the table and to our surprise she waved back. Well a new development to the wave is the word "HI" her first official word!! When we say hi and wave she says hi and waves back to us. I consider it her first word because I think she actually connects it with greeting people and things, instead of just putting the constanant/ vowel sounds together like "mama" or "dada". A new development also is she has started to clap, well in her own way. She can't really make the "clap" sounds yet but she brings her hands together and immitates Mitch and I when we clap with her.