Oh, Hai

Ya, been gone a while.  The last loss was hard.  I took some time to deal, and honestly, I’m still dealing.  I’m sad, heartbroken, afraid to hope for the next try.  It’s weird, the “Next Try” was always what gave me the energy to pick myself up, let the last failure go, and let the hope build again.  But now, the Next Try seems … scary and painful.  I actually feel a little dread and a lot of fear.  I don’t want the hope to creep back in.  It hurts so f’in much.

But of course it won’t stop us from trying again.  We’re planning on the next FET in February.  We’ve got 4 frosties that we’ll break up into 2 tries with 2 embryos each time.  I’m still struggling with United to make the final payments on the last two tries.  I really want to get those paid and  finalized so I can put this year behind me and be ready to go next year.  Once those are paid, we’ll be out of insurance fertility coverage.  Next year’s FET’s will be on our own dime, so we’ve each set aside Flex Spending Accounts at work so we’ll be prepared to pay for those.  If we aren’t lucky with our two FET’s, I’d like to try one round with adopted embryos, so hopefully we’ll be able to afford all three tries next year.

Next year will be our last year of trying.  How bizarre that we’re so near the end.  I feel so differently that I did in the beginning.  I used to pee on sticks freely … now I know I don’t ovulate, so OPK sticks are useless.  I’ve learned that a positive pregnancy test doesn’t mean a thing.  Whether it’s positive or negative, I can rationalize myself right back into doubt.  Even positive blood tests can take me from great joy to crushing pain.  It’s still so hard to make sense of the ectopic and the surgery that followed.  I want to see God’s love, I want to be back in a close relationship with Him.  I know we make our own choices and have to live with the consequences.  But I also know that at any time, He could have answered our prayers with a baby.  It’s just hard to see His plan, to understand the why, and to let go of the hurt.

So onto other things (you know, that mythical thing they call life outside of TTC) …

We’re still trying to work things out so we can get a house with my parents.  We need more information on Troy’s dad’s VA loan.  We’re working on being sure our credit is cleaned up and all debts are paid or up-to-date.  Until we get the VA information back, we’re at a bit of a stand-still in that area, though.

I’m still couponing faithfully!  I’ve had some trouble at Walmart lately not wanting to take coupons.  I think with the Extreme Couponing show on TLC, stores are getting stricter with their policies, clerks are getting confused and scared of making mistakes and it’s getting harder and harder to coupon. 😦  I still enjoy the challenge, though, and it’s made a huge difference in our budget and my parents.’  I’ve been able to provide groceries for two families for less than I was paying monthly for one family before coupons.

This week I got free Lindsay olives at Walgreens – yay for free!  There are some great deals this week on stuffing, turkeys, soups, canned veggies and whipped cream (especially if you have a Kroger in your area, which I don’t, sadly).  At Dollar General I got 10 free toothbrushes, 14 free Nivea shave creams and 6 jars of Smucker’s topping for $1.25.  (I had already put some of it away in the pic below)

Davie Ann is 19 months now.  She talks so much!  We had 18 month pics done but I can’t seem to get them load on my computer.  I’ll work on that tonight, but I took a few pics with my iPhone while we were at the Penney’s studio.

I got the dress and wings on Etsy.  The dress was made by LoveBug11 at Bailey Boo’s Boutique here: http://www.etsy.com/people/lovebug11  and the wings are from The Princess Doodle Beans Boutique here: http://www.etsy.com/shop/princessdoodlebeans.

Davie LOVED Halloween.  She LOVED her pum-pins. 🙂

We used her wings and dress again for her Halloween costume.  Her favorite part was going up to a house and sitting on the porch with people handing out candy (she didn’t meet a stranger!) and trying to share hers with them!  Cousin Kinley was dressed as a little Pixie.  There was a lot of POUF going on!

She’s such a big helper.  She loves to help clean up toys (just to get them all out again, of course), help splash water everywhe with the dishes and carry laundry upstairs (one pair of undies at a time. :)).  She helped Daddy clean all of MooCat’s nose prints off the window!

Moo sat in a bag on the table with his namesake’s picture on it and plotted how to replace all the nose prints.

 

I’ve been practicing a new nail polish technique that blends two or more colors together.  My first effort was blending turquoise and dark purple.  I thought it didn’t turn out too bad for a first try, but I thought the colors would blend more in the middle.  It was fun, though!  I’ll definitely try more colors.

 

Finding new recipes that Davie and Troy like has been a new challenge for me, too.  It’s hard ’cause Troy hates vegetables and is a really picky eater.  Davie is all over the place – she’ll love one thing one week, and then won’t eat it for two months.  That’s ok, we just keep offering her a good mix, and she’s gaining weight right on schedule so I think she’s fine!  We still supplement with toddler formula at night to be sure she’s getting plenty of vitamins and minerals.  She always loves hot dogs, french fries, rice, cottage cheese (any cheese!) and tor-ta’s (tortillas with butter on them).

This week I made an awesome calzone.  It started with Pillsbury pizza dough (in a cannister like the crescent rolls) all flattenend out.  In a bowl I mixed 1 cup of Ranch dressing, 1 cup of shredded parmesean and 1 cup of shredded Swiss, a few good shakes of Perfect Pinch Italian seasoning and a few shakes of McCormick’s Garlic salt with Parsley.  I spread the mixture over the flattened dough, then I topped it with slices of Oscar Mayer turkey lunch meat and crushed up slices of bacon.  (I think you could use any cheese or meat, though.  It would be great with chopped up chicken breast or pepperoni slices.  Mozzerella would make it nice and melty-cheesy.  You could add any seasonings you like, or chopped up olives, grilled onions or roasted peppers.)  Then I rolled it up long-ways and baked it for 20 minutes at 350.  OMG, it was amazing!  The only thing I would add next time is to brush the top of the dough with melted butter, olive oil or beaten egg and then sprinkle on a little more of the seasonings.  I could even add a little cheese on top at the end and let it melt.  It was sooooo easy and Troy and Davie loved it!  I forgot to take a picture at the beginning, so here are the left overs (which don’t look near as appetizing):

We both ate ’til we were stuffed and there was still plenty for Troy to take for lunch the next day.

 

I wanted to tell ya’ll about a new podcast I’ve been enjoying lately called Bitter Infertiles.  It’s so great!  You can download them at the link or subscribe to them on iTunes!  It’s free!  It’s hosted by Mo, and you can check out her blog at Mommy Odyssey.

Much love!