Back in Houston

I'm back in Houston, although my curse nearly struck again for bringing bad weather with me, there was a huge storm over Houston last night, and it nearly meant my plane was diverted to Austin, but apparently some clever routing work from Houston Approach Centre got us down just before the thunder and lightening struck. It was that close that the thunder started when I was still in the immigration queue at the airport!
Anyway, my presentation seemed to go OK this morning with the client, and I'm kind of at a loose end for an hour or two this afternoon before my MD and I attend an awards dinner at a hotel in Houston where Geotrace is in the running for a prize... we'll see, but I'm hoping the bosses don't pick on the youngster (me!) to give the speech if we win!

What a weekend!

It's such a lovely weekend here, misty and atmospheric in the mornings for Mishka's walk, then sunny and warm in the afternoon. I really should give the lawn a mow (and finish the job I started 2 weeks ago!) but yesterday I had to finish some work before I go back to Houston on Wednesday (cue another hurricane, I'm sure!) so I went to the office, and today it's Olga's turn to get some work done in peace and quiet, so Lara and I should really go out for a walk in Marlow while Mum works, but instead we're in the office, at least while Lara sleeps. She did wake for a while and needed some cheering up, but putting her in one of our office chairs didn't really work:

Maybe we'll go out now and do a little bit of shopping; we'll be getting some fresh air later this afternoon when Chris & Cara come round for a few games of table-tennis!

One crawl forward, two steps back

Poor Lara! She seemed to be getting better at the start of last week, her runny nose had pretty much stopped, and whilst she still had a cough, it didn't seem as bad as it had been. There were still broken nights, but we were putting this down to teething, there definitely seems to be 2, if not 4, upper teeth on the way through now.
On Thursday Olga took her to London, as Lara's Russian Citizenship has arrived, and we can therefore apply for her Russian passport. By the time they got home, Lara wasn't a happy bunny, and since then she's been having periods of high temperature, over 39 degrees, which we've been treating - successfully - with calpol, but she's certainly not been well. Whether this is because of another bug she's picked up, or the result of a little bang on the head when she tumbled over while sitting on the floor, or just from teething, we're not sure. It might be a combination of those things; it's upsetting for us to see her when she's clearly upset herself, there are times when she doesn't cry, but she looks at us in such a way that says "Mum, Dad, I'm not well, help!!" and she looks so sorry for herself. However, there are moments when she seems fine, and that reassures us that there's nothing seriously wrong we should be worried about, like here, when she enjoyed crawling around in the hall and kitchen on the nice floor Mum had just cleaned for her:

We've not given her any calpol today of course, as she's been on it for three days already, and her temperature has actually been more stable and not over 38 degrees (famuos last words) and when she has been getting noticely hotter, just taking a top off her and letting her cool down naturally seems to be working, and all this up-and-down in temperature is wearing her out, she's actually sleeping more during the day, which is a silver lining to this cloud!

Don't blame the wine waiter

So long as the waiters in this clip aren't being coerced into doing this, and they enjoy it, I think this is very amusing!
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/7654267.stm

Lara Update

Lara still has her cough, although it still only bugs her at night, and the runny nose hasn't stopped either. She's not on any medication for it other than the odd dose of calpol before bed if she has a coughing fit, as recommended by the quack. Other than that she's fine, she's eating well and certainly looks like she's back to putting weight on.
However, teething has started now in earnest. Olga reckons she can see the initial bumps of four upper teeth forming, and certainly Lara is giving the teething rail on her cot a good chew. It does mean more broken nights, on Sunday we were up three times to soothe her, and last night we just brought her to bed with us at the first opportunity. We might be making a rod for own backs there by not trying to get her to sleep in her cot, but frankly we'll just cross that bridge when we come to it, at the moment soothing Lara as quickly as possible and giving all of us as much sleep as possible is the priority. It's a bit of a rock-and-a-hard-place scenario though as ideally I'd try to soothe Lara during the night so Olga can get as much rest as possible so she can get rid of this sinusitis that is still troubling her, but Lara quietens down almost instantly when Olga holds her whereas it can take a good few minutes of loud complaining before I convince her that going back to sleep is a good idea, so Olga has to get involved.
All of this broken-sleep rubbish is instantly forgotten though once we see her happily crawling about in the nursery in the morning, or sat on her potty, brushing her teeth while watching the news (hygenic so long as someone is there to stop her poking her toothbrush into the contents of her potty!)