Crafting and House Decorating

Kinda late posting this one! I wrote it almost a month ago but because my hard drive was full I couldn't upload the pictures... here they are!

I wrote this post a month or so ago and was just waiting to get the photos off of my camera and phone. Here's a few pictures of our wreath making and house decorating!

One of the things that I've really missed about my parents moving to Atlanta is getting to spend time with my mom during the week. We used to enjoy lunches together, dinners when our husbands were out of town, and target shopping trips. Lucky for me my mom kept her dermatologist when she moved and came back for an appointment this week. She arrived late Tuesday evening with all the goodies necessary to make several wreaths for my home.

Wednesday afternoon we spent a few hours putting everything together. I had found some cute ideas on Pinterest for fall and halloween and my mom (an avid Women's Day reader) found this cute candy corn wreath.

I also started decorating for fall. Here's a few pictures of the house decorated and our wreath making extravaganza!

Week 6

Still here and still pregnant! Here we go! We had so much fun this week traveling to see our families! We are so glad that they are just as excited as we are about this pregnancy!

Pregnancy Highlights:

Today's Date: Friday, November 25th

How Far Along: 6 Weeks

Size of baby: Baby is the size of a sweet pea

Total Weight Gain/Loss: Back to normal

Maternity Clothes: No but I can't wait! 

Gender: No Clue!

Movement:  None yet! 

Sleep: I have still been sooo tired! Jay has to wake me up (and I am grumpy!) to give me my shot at 9:45.

What I miss: Feeling normal as in not nauseous! 

Cravings: Nothing really this week. Pretty much still loving carbs!

Symptoms: The morning sickness arrived with a vengeance on Thursday morning. Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday and I was barely able to stomach anything! On our drive to Atlanta this morning, I slept until we arrive in Charlotte and then proceeded to get sick in a gas station bathroom. We immediately ran by target to pick up Dramamine and sea bands. Me + Sea Bands= Love

Best Moment this week: Spending Thanksgiving with our families and discovering Sea Bands

your baby's the size of a sweet pea!

The average embryo at week 6 is about .25 inches and will double in size again next week. Wow!

Week 5

It is so crazy that this is my third "weekly" posting! I am so happy to report that I am still pregnant. We've had a few scares with some bleeding today (I'm chalking it up to not always taking my medicine on time, and being active) but everything is still going well! We are so anxious for the ultra sound that's coming up on the 30th.

Pregnancy Highlights:

Today's Date: Friday, November 18th 

How Far Along: 5 Weeks

Size of baby: Baby is the size of an apple seed (moving on up!)

Total Weight Gain/Loss: Up a pound, but I'm blaming it on birthday week eating :)

Maternity Clothes: No but I can't wait! 

Gender: No Clue!

Movement:  None yet! 

Sleep: Yes please! I have been so tired! I left my birthday dinner at 8:15 yesterday because I was soo tired! I also came home from school a little early on Wednesday to get in a 45 minute nap before cheerleading.

What I miss: Definitely missed having a drink to celebrate my birthday! Also helping out in cheerleading. At practice this week I stepped back and didn't "spot" any of the girls. I was scared too death that one of our flyers was going to fall in her stunt and it was hard not being close enough to break her fall.  It's weird that I'm thinking about protecting my own child now instead of someone else's...

Cravings: I have a definite craving for sushi yesterday. I satisfied it with a fully cooked california roll.

Symptoms: Holy heartburn! Zantac is my bff! I've also had some spotting, the cramps have subsided but my breasts hurt to so badly that I wake up when I roll onto my stomach, 

Best Moment this week: Hmm! We had a few! On Monday we learned that our Beta numbers had well beyond doubled. I wish I would have written them down. I think Monday's test was 1228? Thursday's beta was also high at 3262. Other fabulous moments include having the whole family in town to celebrate birthdays, dinner with friends, and a birthday shopping trip with my husband.

your baby's the size of an appleseed!

Your embryo is now measurable -- though at week five, it's a wee .13 inches -- and she's gearing up for much more growth. In fact, in the next week, she'll almost double in size. Grow baby grow!

Yay! 13dp5dt beta result

Today is Monday, November 14th.

My nurse just called to inform me that my hcg was 1228. They expected it to be 928. It more than doubled in the time it needed to.

My husband's reaction "oh wow!"... "What does that mean?"

It means that our baby is growing and that we are still pregnant. Everyone one of these check ups is a HUGE milestone for us. We are very well aware that this pregnancy could end at any time and are SO thankful that we continue to get great news!

They also scheduled our first ultrasound and I am so excited!!! We will get to see our baby on November 30th. It seems like FOREVER but hopefully with the holidays it will come soon! I'll also go in for my third and final beta on Thursday which also happens to be my birthday! This is the BEST birthday present I could have asked for!

Why Have I Not Heard of This Before?!

Just saw a link to Erin Condren on another blog. Her stuff is adorable and very much my style. I'm usually a Swoozie's Christmas card person but some of these designs are way cuter!

Things I like:

Been looking for a personalized case! 

way cuter than my plain blue boring lesson plan book

traditional and cute holiday cards. i'm a sucker for polkadots

loving the Christmans chevron

who doesn't love a pink chevron planner

It's Official!

I am officially pregnant! My beta HCG level was 433 which is really high for the point I'm at (9dp5dt) or 14 days past ovulation. At around 12:45 I was driving to work for parent-teacher conferences while on the phone with my sister. The nurse beeped in and I accidentally hung up on her. Luckily she called back and told me my pregnancy test was positive and that my number was really really good. I burst into tears. I had to sit in my car in front of the school for a while before I calmed down! I am probably the absolute happiest I have ever been.

I immediately called Jay and he didn't answer I tried about 4 more times. I called my mom and she didn't answer. I called my Dad and he answered but was out to eat with colleagues and had to contain his excitement. I called Allie back and told her and then texted my Mom to call ASAP. She called back and I got to share our good news. I tried Jay again. No answer. I called Bo and she was so excited! She has just gotten off the phone with Jay so I tried him again and on the final ring he answered!

I was so mad with him for not answering right away I almost didn't tell him :) I told him that he was going to be a Daddy and he was sooo relieved!

I'll go back in to the Dr. on Monday morning to check my beta levels again to make sure they are rising appropriately. I am just soooo excited and thankful right now! I am so glad we decided to go the IVF route and look forward to the coming weeks!

Here's a shot of all of the pregnancy tests I've taken in the past week! I can't even think of all the money I've spent!!! Ha!

And just because he's cute!

Week 4

It's been a rough week! I was sure that I was not pregnant as of Tuesday morning but Tuesday evening came home to the best surprise! I've also been told by the nurse to stay off of my feet to keep the bleeding I've experienced to a minimum. I've been coming home from practice and heading straight to bed!

On Thursday I decided to take a digital pregnancy test to be certain that they faint pink lines weren't playing any tricks. When "pregnant" popped up on the screen I stared at it for 5 minutes. My eyes filled with tears. While I am very cautious about this pregnancy, I also want to enjoy every minute of it. IVF has sort of robbed us of the excitement most couples receive when finding out they are pregnant and instead replaced it with skepticism. Of course we are VERY excited, we just want to guard ourselves. I keep reminding myself to be happy and excited. At the same time, I cannot believe a living thing is inside of me right now! I keep pinching myself to make sure its true. I take a pregnancy test every few hours just to make sure it is still there. It still amazes me how I went from dark and depressed, worrying about donor sperm and adoption on Tuesday morning to finding out I was pregnant Tuesday evening. Crazy. 

Pregnancy Highlights:

Today's Date: Friday, November 11th (11/11/11!)

How Far Along: 4 Weeks

Size of baby: Baby is the size of a poppy seed

Total Weight Gain/Loss: Haven't gained

Maternity Clothes: No but I can't wait! 

Gender: No Clue!

Movement:  None yet! 

Sleep: Lots! I've been going to be around 8:30. Put I've been waking up early to test.

What I miss: Still wine and my family has decided to cancel our camping trip this weekend because of my doctor's "stay off your feet" instructions.

Cravings: none so far

Symptoms: A few cramps here and there. Really sore and swollen breasts. Started to get a little nauseous on Thursday. Some heartburn.

Best Moment this week: At first I was going to say, "seeing those two pink lines show up over and over again and reading "pregnant" pop up on the digital test", but after today's call from the nurse that moved me to tears I would have to say finding out we are "officially" pregnant was definitely the BEST! I would also like to add that learning our high BETA number of 433 was pretty awesome too!

Off to the Dr.

I'm currently 9 days past my 5 day transfer (9dp5dt) and my early onset bleeding and over worry has convinced my nurse to let me come in early. I'm off to the Dr. for my first real pregnancy test! I'm excited and scared all at the same time. I've tested soo many times at home that I'm pretty sure I'm pregnant just want to make sure it has implanted where it should and is not a chemical pregnancy (i.e. early miscarriage).

Phone Dump

I've finally hooked up my iphone and got some pictures off! Here are all the pictures from the last few posts I've been missing. A camera dump will be coming soon!!!

Our recent visit to NC State to see the Wolfpack shutout the Tarheels.

The yummy bruschetta chicken Mary Clare made for me when I was on best rest after the transfer. It was so good! I wish she would post the recipe!!! Thanks so much for doing this for me MC!

The following are some pictures from transfer day

Nervous Jay in the waiting room before we were called back for the transfer. He is so tired of having his picture taken he won't even look at me anymore! 

Feet ready for surgery!

Did your husband look this excited that day your possible baby was conceived? I certainly hope not!

Since I could have a real spray tan I had to use a little instagram action. Here I am in the waiting room waiting to be called back to become (hopefully) pregnant!

Panther vs. Vikings games. Great seats with great friends. Too bad they lost. 

With the family at Oktoberfest in Helen, GA enjoying a beautiful fall afternoon with fabulous beers!

The best pasta recipe ever with carmalized greenbeans and onions.

Signing Off

It's that time again. My official Dr.'s office pregnancy blood is coming up on Friday so I'm going to stop all baby talk until sometime in January. Please keep us in your prayers during this time.

Thanks!
Anni

I can hardly contain my excitement! I took another test this morning and it was positive! I'm pregnant! I am trying to be very cautious about this having only told my family. It is so surreal. I have been waiting to see those pink lines for a year and a half. I have found out that I am not pregnant 16 times. Everyone always said that when you are pregnant you will just know. You will be able to feel it. I'm here to say that I haven't "felt" anything. It has been completely normal. I feel like exact same as I do before I start my period. Crampy with a lovely breakout on my chin.

I am weary of being too excited but overjoyed at the same time that this could be a real pregnancy that would actually result in a real live baby.

Whirlwind of Emotions- We're Pregnant!!!

Again last night I had crazy dreams. I dreamt I had a positive pregnancy test and was telling EVERYONE including my kids at school! I woke up and realized I was only dreaming and continued with my early morning pregnancy test routine. It was again negative and I was sooo upset. I bleed a tiny bit too. I also noticed a ton of acne on my chin which usually appears before my period. I was in a really sad mood as I headed to work. Jay had to go to an early meeting and was unavailable. I called my parents on my drive to work and pretty much lost it. I had even skipped mascara this morning because I knew this would happen.

I spent the rest of the day on the verge of tears. I researched adoption, sperm donors, and new ivf clinics. I called the nurse early in the morning to report the additional bleeding and she called me back during my lunch to tell me that it could go either way. I was at a loss and completely devastated. I wondered if I would ever be a mom. It was terrible. Luckily I had a very busy cheerleading practice and it kept my mind away from my infertility.

I was talking to my mom on the way home from practice and discussing the days events and having a pity party for myself. I walked into our bathroom and (I know this is yuck) but noticed the pregnancy test i had thrown in the trash that morning. It had a faint pink pregnant line on it. I knew results didn't count hours after the test was taken but I decided to take a new one anyway. To my utter shock a faint pink line appeared again! Holy cow I may be pregnant. Jay ran to target to pick up more of the expensive tests (I had been using dollar store brand) and I took another one when he returned. OH MY GOD! That pink lined showed up again. I am pregnant. I am so excited but so cautious. I feel like I'm pregnant until I'm not. Here's to hoping it will stay pink! Luckily when I talked to the nurse today I asked her to move my Beta test up. On Friday I should know if I am really pregnant. Ahh this is crazy!

Close call

Last night I had three crazy dreams. In the first I had started bleeding uncontrollably and the Dr. told me I would never have children. In the second and third I had dreams about taking home pregnancy tests. One of the dreams was so weird. The home pregnancy test looked like a large game board and compared my pregnancy levels to those of Kate Middleton with a bar graph. Weird huh?!

The third dream I had was sooo realistic that I woke up in the best mood and almost woke Jay up to tell him I was pregnant. It took me a few minutes while laying there to realize it was only a dream. I headed into the bathroom to do my normal take a home pregnancy test every single day routine to unfortunately find out that I was/had been bleeding overnight. I called my doctor's office immediately and the Dr. on call told me to come in at my regularly scheduled time for my bloodwork.

As I was checking out from my appointment (which is for labs only meaning I don't see the doctor) I asked if my nurse had come in yet. She had and was able to talk to me about the bleeding. She explained that it could probably be from the crinone gel irritating my cervix. I sort of believed her but was ultimately sure this would be the end of this go round.  Around 11:30 she called to let me know that my bloodwork was awesome and low progesterone was definitely not the reason I was bleeding (like last time). Luckily, when I check at lunch time the bleeding had stopped and I am feeling much better about how this FET is progressing. If only I would be able to see those coveted two pink lines on the pregnancy test sometime soon!!!

Thanks so much for the continued thoughts and prayers!

Week 3

Here goes the baby posts! So right now we still don't know if we're pregnant but I started subscribing to babycenter and the bump to get my pregnancy updates. I'm thinking really positive thoughts. Here we go!

Pregnancy Highlights:
Today's Date: Friday, November 3rd

How Far Along: 3 Weeks

Size of baby: Baby is the size of a poppy seed

Total Weight Gain/Loss: Haven't gained

Maternity Clothes: No but I can't wait! 

Gender: No Clue!

Movement:  None yet! 

Sleep: I'm sleeping really well surprisingly!
Just had the embryos implanted two days ago and I've been on bedrest

What I miss: Wine. I've been substituting decaf peppermint tea though!

Cravings: none so far

Symptoms: A few cramps here and there, nothing really

Best Moment this week: Having our two embryos inserted and hanging out with Jen while on bedrest. It was so nice to have company!

Baby's now the size of a poppyseed! Your now-fertilized (yay!) egg is on a journey through a fallopian tube, dividing and re-dividing into identical cells

Catch up

So a lot has happened in the past few weeks.

1. Our IVF was unsuccessful. It was tough but we made it through. Here's the POST I wrote after we found out.

2. A few weeks later we had an appointment to figure out what went wrong.

3. Then we began our FET cycle.

4. We had a bit of a SCARE with our medications.

5. I was proud of myself that I waited until I would have been 11 weeks along to ANNOUNCE that our IVF was unsuccessful on the blog.

6. I BLOGGED throughout my FET procedure (while a little fuzzy from the drugs).

And here we are today. Today marks the first day of the dreaded wait. I'll be in bed the next two days taking it easy. In about two weeks I will be able to find out if the FET was successful. Things this time around have been very different from last time. I've been enjoying all the child-free opportunities that I can. Savoring wine, and nights out, and just being much more relaxed. I'm excited to see what happens, but still skeptical that this will work. I know I will be a mom at some point but just waiting for God to reveal to us how that is going to happen. Thank you for all the prayers and well wishes!

By the way- Now that I'm home in bed for 48 hours, I'm going to put up some pictures that I haven't put up for the last few blog posts!

Frozen Embryo Transfer live blog

10:45- nurse called to check on me to make sure I didn't have any spotting bleeding. I haven't so we get the go ahead to procedure with the transfer.

12:00- took valuim and chugged water as we drove to the clinic. Feeling very giggle-y.

12:21- Arrived upstais for lab work. Valium has kicked in and I feel wasted and relaxed at the same time. Waiting to be called back for blood work.I can hardly
Sit up straight. This should be fun.

12:32- checked in to the surgery center downstairs. Got outfitted
In cute hospital gown and booties. Hanging out in triage.

12:51- met with dr. Wing. Both embryos survived thawing!!! Yay! Lab is running behind so transfer won't take place until 1:15 or so. Just hanging out with jay in triage. Trying to persuade him to take some pictures. He reluctantly does. I'm super super hungry :)

1:36- the nurse came to get me and we walked into the surgical room. I met the embryologist
And received a picture of my two little embryos. I settled in and the doctor implanted my embryos. He said they looked great and had
Survived the thawing process extremely well :)

1:50- I was wheeled into recovery where I was able to take a 30 minute nap before the nurse came in to let me know I could go home :)

Additions: Here are some pictures from the day.

More later!