I'm still here...

I know it has been a long time since I've written anything here. I don't have an awesome excuse other than I have been busy. I've been working as much overtime as I can tolerate so we have some extra cash when the little one arrives. Things in this neck of the woods have been pretty normal. It's been snowing here like crazy. I haven't seen this much snow before Christmas in a long time. It's nice, even if it is a little more challenging to drive in.

On the baby front, we went to the doctor today. We met Dr. Lomax for the first time. He's pretty interesting to say the least. Let's just say he walked into the room with a pink lab coat on. Hmmm...No he was alright. He answered our questions and was able to find the baby's heartbeat. The heart rate was 156. He also said I was measuring big for my dates. He asked me if I was sure about the dates and I assured him that I was relatively certain of the dates since we did artificial insemination. We scheduled our ultrasound for January 12. Hopefully (if the baby cooperates) we will know whether we are having a boy or a girl. My brother Rob and his wife Carmen weren't so lucky. They had the ultrasound last week and the baby was lying on its belly in Carmen's belly and they were unable to coax it into turning over so they still don't know what they are having. However the baby looked healthy and was moving all over the place. It was very fun the listen to my baby brother describe that experience!

We went to Tabby's Christmas program last week and I will post some pictures of that soon. It was a great program. Mackinaw Schools do a great job with the program. We have thoroughly enjoyed the two programs we have attended.

Well I must sign off for now as it is nearing my bed time, especially since I have to work tomorrow!

Happy Birthday to me...

Yesterday was my birthday and I love my birthday with my whole heart! It has nothing to do with ageing. It just makes me happy. I had to work yesterday, but I was with all of my work friends. Overall it was even a great day at work. I made cup cakes for everyone. They kind of gave me a hard time about bringing my own treats, but they all seemed to really enjoy them. I think I had just as much fun making them as they had eating them. Rick is going to take me out to dinner on Thursday and we are going to our favorite Chinese place in Mattawan called Chin Chin. It is so yummy and I am really looking forward to an evening with my hubby!

On the baby front, we went to the OB on Monday for our first appointment with the doctor. It was nice to meet her and I think we are really going to like her. She answered all of our questions and didn't think any of them were silly. She told us that she was going to try to hear the baby's heart beat, but that it is kind of early and she wasn't sure if we would be able to hear anything. The minute she put the doppler to my belly we heard the heart beat loud and clear. It was amazing, so amazing that I cried. As a nurse I have heard that sound a hundred times on echos and dopplers, but it is so much more unbelievable when it is your own. I could have listened to that for hours. The heart rate was 160 beats per minute. Modern medicine is amazing and I can't wait for the next doctors visit to I can hear that sound again!

She cried...

Ok so there is way more to the story. My mom and I picked her up from school and before we even left the school driveway Tabby yet again asked if I had a baby in my tummy. And again I didn't tell her the whole truth. I wanted Rick to be there. It was something we needed to do as a family. So once we got her back down here Rick and I took her aside and showed her the ultrasound picture of our little (very little) one. She was immediately excited. Then Rob and Carmen showed her their picture. She held both pictures and cried. I think she was just extremely overwhelmed. After we had dinner we took her home and stayed up until after 11:00 pm answering questions. Some crazy and some very important ones. Tabby is very excited about being and big sister! On Sabbath when we were in church she drew a picture for her new baby brother or sister. Then on Sunday before she had to leave to go back home, she wrote a note to her new sibling on her white board in her room. It was very sweet. There was only one time where she got a little sad and told me she was afraid we wouldn't love her as much now. I think she is going to need a lot of reassurance over the next few months! Below is her note...one of the sweetest things I have ever seen!

The note says (with some spelling corrections):

Hi baby sister or brother. It is your big sister. I am going to teach you when you are out of mama's tummy and you will like me so much that you will hug me so much.

Love Tabby From Tabby

The big day...

Today is it! I'm nervous and excited. Rick and I are going to tell Tabby about her baby brother/sister. I hope she is excited. I hope she will look forward to being a big sister. I hope her mother doesn't sabotage her. I hope we can help her through this transition. I can't wait to tell her, but I hope that it is the exciting moment I've hoped for. I hope God will grant us the wisdom to give her the right answers to her questions. Please pray for us today and for Tabby!

On a side note, today marks 9 weeks! Only 217 more days to go. WOO HOO!!!

Attempt #2...

I have tried this post once before and it all got erased somehow, so here goes my second try. Hopefully this will go better for me or I may just lose my patience and forget it for today!

Let me just start with yesterdays election. Yes, I did vote and I am extremely proud that I am able to participate in the process. I think that today is a new day for our country in light of yesterdays results. It will be interesting to watch and see what happens in the next four years. I hope that Obama is able to follow thorough on the promises he made. This country is in dire need of change and hopefully he is the man for the job. Now that is all I have to say about politics!

On to something more fun...my pregnancy! Friday will be the 9 week mark. We are getting closer and closer to the end of my first trimester. I think I am ready for that milestone! Pregnancy has brought some things I expected and some things I didn't. I was ready for the nausea, thankfully no vomiting yet! I thought I was ready to be tired. However I had no idea the degree to which I would be tired. It is a tired like I have never felt before and sometimes sleeping doesn't make it any better. I have also been surprised by how sore my joints and back are. I knew that came later on once the baby gets bigger, but was surprised to see it this early. I guess everything is getting stretched and ready. While some of these symptoms are unnerving, for the most part this is an amazing experience that I think God every day I am able to enjoy!

Now for a little update on the last month. A couple of weeks ago Rob (my brother) and I drove to Georgia to see my sister. The drive was long but tolerable. Most of the drive (especially the mountains) was beautiful with all the trees in full fall color. Once we got there we had a great time hanging out with Tracey and David. I haven't seen Tracey since her surgery and it was good to see her in person and know that she really is doing well! We had a great time playing cards, playing in the woods, and sitting by the fire in Tracey's back yard. It was very relaxing and enjoyable! Here are a few pics of our adventures.

Rob drove the whole way, even though I offered to help!

Where we spent a lot of time playing games! On this night we made the boys cry!

Evidence of our overwhelming victory!

Boys and their toys!

Tracey the fire master!

Apples we baked in the fire...YUMMY!

See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil!

Last Wednesday Rick and I were able to drive up to Mackinaw for the day to see Tabby in her school Halloween program. It was worth every mile and every penny. The program was put on by the first and second graders and they all did a great job. They sang songs, recited poems and each class put on a short play. Each one of them were knew their lines and only a couple had stage fright. Tabby was a ghost and was part of a little skit about scary ghosts. Tabby loved having us there and we really loved being there.

Tabby in her Ghost skit.

The First and Second Graders of Mackinaw Public Schools! (Tabby is in the second row, second from the left).

8 weeks and counting...

Today is a lazy fall day here in Michigan. Rick and I spend the whole day yesterday driving to Mackinaw city and back. Tabby had a Halloween program and that program was worth every long mile. She was so cute and SO excited that we had come up to see her. She was dressed up as a little ghost and did her part perfectly! We got to take her to dinner and then had to take her back home. She was very sad we couldn't stay longer, but we will get to see her for the weekend on Nov. 7! During that weekend we will share our big news with her. I know that she will be excited, but I am also a little nervous that it won't go as well as we hope. Her life is about to change in a why she can't even imagine. I hope that Rick and I are able to balance that for her. I hope that we are able in the midst of all the excitement to make time to make her feel special! I know that she will love her little brother or sister, but I fear there may be some negative feelings as well. I pray that God will give us the patience and guidance to do what is right for her!

Tomorrow marks 8 weeks along. A week and a half ago we got an ultrasound and saw our little one for the first time. He/She wasn't much bigger than a pea, but we could see the heart beating. Life is so incredibly amazing. That little tiny pea will become our kicking smiling baby! It's amazing how much you can love it, even when it is just a pea. It is had to believe that 8 weeks have already passed. We keep saying that we have lots of time to get ready, but before you know it, it will be June 11 and we will be holding our little one in our arms. I can't wait for that day, but we are definitely not ready. We are currently remodeling the basement so we can move our "office"/junk room out of the baby's room. Our basement has a long way to go before it is ready for us to move stuff down there. Hopefully we will be able to make progress quickly and start working on our baby's room!

September 19...

That was a historic day for our family. Two wonderful things happened. First my sister Tracey had brain surgery. They found a small tumor in June and she went to Duke University to have it removed. It was removed by world famous neurosurgeon Allen Freidman! If he is good enough for Ted Kennedy he is good enough for my sister. We did not know before the surgery what kind of tumor it was, so we were all on pins and needles. My parents and brother and sister-in-law went down for the surgery (I'll explain why I didn't go in a minute). Mom called me once she was out of the OR and told me the tumor was a benign grade 1 polycystic astrocytoma and the only follow-up she would need is periodic MRI's. PRAISE GOD!!! We all breathed a huge sigh of relief.

The other great thing on that day was for Rick and I. That is the day we got to go to the Grand Rapids fertility clinic for our intrauterine insemination. So we were hoping for a good turn out for both Tracey and us. Rick turned in a spectacular performance with 37 million! Woo Hoo! They inseminated me at almost the exact moment they took Tracey into surgery. The only draw back for us was that we would have to wait for 2 weeks to know our results! So we waited and we waited. That was the longest 2 weeks of my life. Then we had planned to wait until the following Monday because I didn't have to work. If we tested on Friday and it was negative I didn't want to cry at work all weekend because things didn't work. However once Thursday night rolled around we decided we couldn't wait. So at 2:30 am on Friday Oct.3 we got our first positive pregnancy test. I did do another home test on Monday...just to be sure. :-) Then the fertility clinic wanted me to confirm with an HCG test. That is a blood pregnancy test. I did the first one for them on Monday Oct. 6 and it was positive at 750. They told me that anything over 500 is considered positive. Then I did a second test on Wednesday, Oct. 8. They had me do the second one just to make sure the level was rising. It too was positive at 1393! So I guess that means I'm PREGNANT!!!! We are so very excited and so grateful to all our family and friends for all of their thoughts and prayers!

I remember...

On this day 7 years ago our country changed forever. I will never forget that day as history unfolded before our very eyes. Here is what I remember. I had been a nurse less than a year and was working at Bronson Hospital. I worked in the float pool but had yet to start training to the Peds floor. Up to this point I had only been trained for NICU. On this fateful day I got pulled to the Peds floor. Once I got there I discovered that I had been given a full assignment of 6 patients. Not only was that terrifying as a new nurse, but also I had never taken more that 3 babies over in the NICU. So needless to say I burst out in tears. Luckily my now friend Jeanette was in charge that day and rescued me. It ended up that I had a nice little 3 kid assignment with all babies. Whew...that crisis averted! The day was progressing along when all of a sudden I notices that some of the parents were watching a very strange movie...or what I thought was a movie. It was very violent and planes were crashing everywhere. Then I noticed that the nursing students were all crying. I couldn't figure out what the heck was going on. We have a big screen TV in our play room and when I walked past there I happened to look in and saw the second plane hit. I think that was when I realized that this was no movie it was real. Somehow I didn't burst into tears again, but I felt a fear like I have never known before. Once I could peal myself away from the TV I had to call my family. I knew none of there were anywhere close to NY or were any of them flying, but in that moment of panic I just needed to know that we were all OK. I couldn't reach anyone because all of the cell communication had been shut down. However eventually I did discover they were all OK. My mom was at a trauma class, dad at work, Rob at work as well, and Tracey was working in Georgia. All safe and sound. Once the towers fell and they just kept repeating the footage over and over we decided it probably wasn't the best to have it on all the TVs. It was back to cartoon network for us and business as usual. However the mood was very mellow and somber. It was odd to look outside. It was a gorgeous day, much like today, and the sky was completely silent. The streets were very quiet as well. It was almost as if all the people were hiding. What an incredibly eerie feeling. I didn't realize how much plane traffic there was over little Kalamazoo until there was none. I survived my first day on Peds and went home to my family. The scariest thing I noticed on my way home was that gas was $5.00 or more a gallon. Thank goodness I had gotten gas the day before.

It was a terrible day for our country and has changed many things around us. I remember all of us stopping and praying right in the middle of the Peds floor and I still continue to pray for the family and friends of those lost on that terrible day. So today I remember how awful that day was, but I also remember how our country rallied and pulled together like never before (in my lifetime)!

Rob is a Stud...

One of our Famous Self Portraits
Heather's Pride

Kissy, Kissy Mel
We just found out that Rob (my brother) and Carmen are going to have a baby. While the news was quite devastating to me in light of my own infertility, I couldn't be more excited! My brother is going to get to know the joy of being a parent. He will get to experience all the firsts and all the wonders that comes with being a Dad. They were very nervous to tell us and it didn't go so well, but I have had an opportunity to explain what is going on with us and our infertility treatment. Now I hope they have a clearer understanding of my tears. It wasn't for them it was for me. Next tuesday I get to go to the fertility clinic and have an ultrasound to see if I have produced any eggs. Cross your fingers for me. If all goes well there they will give me an injection and then shortly thereafter will do the artificial insemination. Then we are back to waiting again. I'm very nervous and excited all in one. Who knows it might be kinda fun to be pregnant at the same time as Carmen.

My friends Heather and Mel are here on their way to New Hampshire. Heather just recently finished up her sports medicine fellowship in Colorado and in now joining the medical community in Keene, NH. It has been fabulous to have her here and I am extremely excited for her and her new job. While they were here we did a little fishing. It wasn't terribly productive, but we did have a good time. Above are some quick photos of our fun afternoon...Enjoy!

Welcome! I hope this blog attempt turns out better than the last time. My goal here is to have a place to just share about my life, my joys and my struggles. Rick and I are just begging another phase in our long journey to have a baby and I figured this would be an excellent place to share that journey. I also would like to participate with the self-portrait challenge. I'm an extremely amature photographer that needs an excuse to take more pictures. At least that is what Rick tells me. In fact, he just bought me a really awesome new camera. I am having a great time trying it out. So welcome to my life and come back soon for more updates!