Quick update

I know this is way late, but I got Friday's beta results on monday, and it was good.  7000.  That's a tremendous growth.
It's now Thursday and we have an ultrasound scheduled for next Friday.  I'm excited, but at moments I don't feel quite as pregnant, and I just wonder how everythings going.  I'm looking forward to all kinds of nausea and sickness so I have more confidence.  Ultimately though, I know my confidence is in Christ and that is enough.
But I still struggle with worry.  So...praise Jesus for each day this baby is growing and developing.  I'll post more when I know more.  Happy weekend everyone!  (early)

keeping you updated

So this morning I got a hold of the RE and the nurse had me do some blood work.  They checked my Beta and Progesterone.
Drum Roll Please...
Beta: 1500
Progesterone:  24.6

She broke it down for me.  My LMP was June 21st (maybe the 20th, depending on how you look at it, I started the afternoon of the 20th, but not full flow until the 21st). 
Anyway, The nurse said this afternoon that they like to see the numbers over 100 for this time.  And I'm at 1500.  So I'm not thinking twins, I'm thinking I ovulated early.  And if it were twins, I would have to publicly apologize to J.lo. and Mark An.thony*.  But seriously?  That's a high beta.
Also, she said the if someone is not on a progesterone supplement they want to see the level around 14-15, and if they are, they want it to be around 25.  So without a supplement I'm super high.

I'm hoping this is a sticky baby for sure.  Thank you for all your nice comments.  I feel like there have been so many 'second' baby announcements lately and I know up until last night I was worried that wouldn't ever happen for us.  So I'm still praying and thinking for this baby and for all of you ladies.
I also know that there is a LONG journey between now and whenever the due date would be.
All I know is that right now I want to go put my fee up on the couch and watch the lastest Next Foo.d Network Star with my husband. 
My next blood draw will be this saturday, and then an ultra sound the first week in August.  Thank you for being so encouraging.  It was hard not to tell everyone today what I was thinking about, but it's helpful to share this with you all sweet ladies.

On to the tv!

*I was really mean when JLo announced that they had a hard time conceiveing and then 'suddenly' became pregnant with twins.  I think the words 'liar' and 'false' were used.  It's difficult to imagine there was no reproductive help for them to concieve.  Althought ultimately, who cares, right?

Surprise

I'm supposed to get AF today, so last night I took a preg.nancy test just to confirm it was negative before gearing up for this FET.
Um...It was positive. 
It was REALLY positive.  I didn't take a picture, but the control line is much darker than the hcg line.
I didn't even have to wait for the test.  By the time I finished going #1, I glanced down, and it was positive.
Does this mean I'm pregnant?  I had that chemical pregnancy last March/April, and I'm a little gunshy, but you bet your bottom dollar I'm calling the RE today.  Not only because I need to update them about the cycle, but because I think I want to be monitored by them.  I know it's an out of pocket expense, but when it comes to this pregnancy...I'm trying hard not to be too excited. 
I also know that last time I started spotting at 4w1d, and that would be tomorrow.  So I'm not calling the ob/gyn for a week or so.  But the RE?  I'll be calling him as soon as they open.
I'd covet your prayers here.  We're not telling anyone IRL, for as long as we can, so that's why I'm sharing so early here.  There has to be a place to talk about it, you know?!

Oh.My.Word.  A positive pregnancy test.  Hoping for good numbers and everything!  I'll keep you all updated as soon as I know what hte plan will be.

What we're up to

 We did two weeks of 'parent and me' swim lessons.  This equated to 30 minutes a day of holding Macie trying to get her to blow bubbles.  It was terrific.  I loved every moment of it.  She enjoyed the water more and more each day, and by the end, we even 'dropped' her off the diving board (into the hands of her instructor).  She signed that she wanted 'more'.  It was super cute. 

 

 Isn't this girl just adorable!  Below is us today.  The swim lessons have made me look super tan, but now I don't have foundation that matches my skin tone (I know, poor me!).  I'm just justifying the lack of makeup I have on.

 And lastly, my cousin got married on Friday and posed for a picture.  It was beautiful, and we had a nice time.  Macie missed her afternoon nap however, so by 7 o'clock she had had it. 

Dh only has 2 more weeks of summer school and then we'll get two weeks off together as a family before teacher meetings start.  Where does the time go?  I'm not worrying about it, but every once in a while I have to remind myself that summer won't last forever.

And in other infertility news, we have decided to persue a FET at the end of August.  I had an intake appointment with the same RE we used before.  We have two embryos left, one 6 cell, one 7 cell (at 3 days I think) and everything so far looks like a go.  Tomorrow I will have a mock transfer for the Dr. to make his notes, and once I start my period in a few weeks I'll begin the nuv.a ring and it'll be on!  We're trying to avoid telling anyone IRL, just two girlfriends that I meet with weekly know.  Not that we have anything to be ashamed of, mostly because we want to maybe have a chance to surprise people.  Maybe.

What have you been up to?

d

All About Macie!

Macie is 13 1/2 months, and I just feel like time is going so quickly.  This is my documentation of all things Macie at this stage.
Macie has been taking steps since 9 months and walking well since 10 months. 
She currently calls almost everyone 'Dada' or 'hidada'.  It's cute, but I'm still trying to get a mama out of her directed towards me.  Ha.
Her first word was "agua" which is spanish for Water.  We're trying to teach her both english and spanish, but I know we need to be speaking more spanish at home than we do. 
Other words are 'touch' (it sounds like ta-ch), hi (usually hidada), ca for car, ka-ka for coffee (and in turn, all hot beverages).
Sign language words are more, please, all done, water, milk.

I admit, I wonder if because she's got 3 lanugages (including sign) that she's not speaking as much as she 'should'.  She has never even tried to speak please or more because the signing gets the point across so well.

She communicates well, if you ask her where something is, she'll usually point.  She knows who mom, dad, nana, and uncle Jim are.  And her dogs, Gipper and Nancy.
When she's really tired she'll start acting drunk and that's how we know to put her to bed.  She'll walk around in circles until she falls down, she'll get slap happy, and she starts to tickle EVERYONE.  It's really my favorite time of day.
At 13 1/2 months she is still taking two naps.  Generally one from 9-11 and then another one from 2-4 (or 3-4).  She goes to bed around 8 and gets up around 7.   well, those are the times she's in her crib.  She may actually wake up before 7, but she plays nicely and doesn't scream so I leave her in there until 7. 

Macie eats breakfast when she gets up, this week che.erios and bananas do the trick.  Lunch is when she wakes up from her morning nap, pb&j or girlled cheese are lunch time staples (with a healthy dose of cottage cheese since she doesn't drink a lot of milk these days).  Sometimes a snack when she wakes up from her afternoon nap, and then family dinner around 6.  She still takes a bottle of 8-10 oz of whole milk before going to bed, but she's less and less interested in that and it's just breaking my heart!  I love the cuddle time the bottles gave us, and I'm sad to see it go.  She weaned herself off the morning bottle just about a few weeks ago, and we stopped the lunch/dinner bottles after her birthday.
Macie drinks all liquids from a straw (beside the before bed bottle).  She never took to a sippy cup, and I'm so happy with the straw I just don't want to try the sippy cup again.

This little girl is a huge blessing and staying home with her for the summer is my own personal blessing.  I will say that it's not always easy.  Just this week we've had what i would consider her first full-blown tantrum (she wanted a cracker before her milk and that's not how we operate in this house!).  I know there are tough times a head, but she is so sweet and I'm so honored to be entrusted to take care of her that I can honestly say every moment is worth it.

That's all for now, just want to have some good documentation of how my little one was at 13 months.  Happy Thursday to you all.

Well, here we are and I love it! This is the second week I've been out of school and I'm just lapping it up. Last week was fun because dh had 3 days off before summer school started, so we really enjoyed ourselves. We had debated about renewing our dis.neyland passes because we knew she was just too little to appriciate all things di.sney. HOWEVER, we realized that most of our friends have them and WE miss them, so we took dh's coaching stipend and purchased them.
Family picture outside the petting zoo.
Waiting for the Mark T.wain boat to go!
We went on a few rides - I think Dum.bo was the current favorite, and have since been there 3 times (only for a few hours at a time...girl's got to nap).

Here's Macie girl with her dad on the teacups.

Then we were able to take a short family vacation to Huntin.gton Beach and stay at the Hy.att (which I HIGHLY reccommend, especially for families).

Okay, and this picture is just one of my favorites. my mom bought this outfit for Macie and I realized I needed to put her in it before she outgrew it. Shirley Temple Black lookout!

And this last picture just goes to show the bigger you are, the harder you cry. (this is my nephew with Macie by the way)
Happy summer everyone!

Back in it ...again

I just called the RE.
Oh my. What an interesting set of feelings I'm having.
No, I'm not PG, just trying to get that way. After last month's trial of se.x for 7 days in a row, I was really hoping that would do the trick. And then it didn't.

So I'm feeling like I have two more embryo's in storage, and I don't want to hem and haw about them. I don't want to ttc for another year and then have to make the decision about what to do. So we're just going to do it.
What spurred this is that we received the storage bill of 600 dollars that is due by June 4th. So it really made me think, am I going to store these two embryo's for the next two years and just try on our own? But then there is a small part of me that thinks since we did get pg, even if only briefly, maybe we don't need this FET? But both DH and I feel an obligation to these embryos to find out if they will take or not. I'd be so conflicted if I got PG without our dr. and then suddenly I'm 38 with 3 kids and have to decide what to do with these embryo's.
If they don't take, then at least we'll KNOW. And if we aren't pg again we'll cross over the bridge of another fresh cycle if/when we come to it.

All I know is, I'm back on the bandwaggon. I just called the RE and made our first appointment for July 5th. I'm a bit surprised that it is a fresh appointment, like starting over again. Meet with a nurse for a history, meet with the dr; go for an ultrasound. I suppose that's what's right, but I even have to get a referral from my primary care physician again, in hopes that my HMO will cover half the cost of the intake appointment. So that appointment is next Tuesday, June 7th.
Can you believe it? Back in it. Trying to win it. I am completely filled with different emotions. Adding number two feels much, much different than number 1 did.

I pray for God's direction in my life, and ask that the Lord would lead my family in the way He sees best.

Wouldn't be great to have another blessing like this one?