Still Kickin'

Hey, ya'll. We are still alive, I promise. I'm just currently suffering from a bad case of the Too-Much-To-Do-And-Not-Enough-Energys. My appointment with the guru last week went well, but I needed to do a repeat progesterone test today just to be sure that my ovulation was...wait for it...robust! Bear in mind that any doctor's appointment around here involves orchestrating Brian's schedule and the feeding and nap schedules of 5-6 kiddos. Yeah, I love to do that once a month, much less twice in a week. But it's worth it, right? Can I have a nap now?

I missed Thank God...It's Friday last week, I know. I'm occasionally a slacker like that, you may have noticed. Sometimes we don't have anything huge going on, and sometimes life is so crazy that it's Saturday morning before I realize that Friday is gone. Anyway, do me a favor and pray for Big P on Thursday. He's supposed to have his tonsils and adenoids out. Hopefully he'll feel better, speak more clearly, and snore a lot less once it's all done.

I hope to not be such a slacker this week. For some reason I can't just can't seem to drag it off the couch these days. Yesterday getting up and getting ready, going to church, having lunch with Brian, and grocery shopping (by 2 PM!) wore me out and necessitated an hour nap...and two hours of sitting around time.... If anyone sees my Get Up and Go, please send it home!

Whirlwind

Wow. It's finally 2010. I am so happy to be done with 2009 I almost cannot express it. I just read back over my last post from December 7, when Aunt Margie was struggling for her life. So much has happened since then! If you had seen Aunt Margie on Christmas Day, at her rehab center, laughing and joking and sneaking the deer bologna we brought her when her nurse left, you'd swear I'd jumped the gun by posting that. She is doing great. Is she healed completely? No. Do her lungs work? Nope. Never will again, but that's not new. But she's survived and she's ready to bust right out of that rehab center. After my post on December 7, Aunt Margie suffered a heart attack. She had a fever so high she was packed in ice. There was an obvious infection, and she was diagnosed with sepsis. Finally, the doctors uncovered four different areas of infection in her body and said that if she was able to be stabilized, then surgery would be necessary as one of those places was a heart valve, according to the Hill Grapevine. A few days later, she was responding well to antibiotics, was moved from CICU, and was discharged about a week later to a rehab facility here in town to receive eight more weeks of IV antibiotics. She has good days and bad days, but she's doing so much better than anyone anticipated. At one point, she told us that she remembers waking up and seeing her whole family standing around her bed, crying. She said that she realized at that point that something was bad-wrong, and that she must be in a bad way, and that she better get better right away. She's strong, I'll give her that.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, 2009 continued. And continued to suck. The week before Christmas, my great-uncle Billy passed away. He was Mama's maternal uncle and the only remaining sibling of my grandma. We lost his sisters last year, three weeks apart. Uncle Billy had cancer and was recently admitted to the same rehab center where Aunt Margie is hanging out. His death came as a blessing to him, but a blow to us. While it was expected, we're sad to lose the last of an entire generation.

The following week, Uncle Billy's brother in law, Mama's uncle Ray died. He was Aunt Ruby's widower, and had suffered from dementia for a few years. He took such good care of Aunt Ruby during her struggle with Alzheimer's, and we think the strain eventually took its toll on him. He was a sweet man, always smiling, and dearly loved. At his funeral on the last Sunday in 09, we all remembered how much he loved life and his family. He will be sorely missed, but his family knows he is better now.

This has been a horrid year. We've seen Cousin Mike, The Bum, and The Godson move too far away, lost an uncle, two great uncles, nearly lost another uncle and an aunt, saw Mama through major surgery, a minor but scary surgery for Brian's sister, dire financial straits for us (and many others in our close circle of friends), a hospitalization for Brian, and so many little personal tragedies that I never even posted about because it was too depressing. I am so glad it's over. Already 2010 has a brighter gleam to it, and is full of so much promise.

I was actually getting on here to post pictures of Christmas and of some of the craftiness that occurred around here in preparation for the holiday. I'll set those up to publish later tonight or tomorrow, because later tonight I'll be watching the recorded version of the WVU Bowl Game with Brian tonight. Please do not tell us what happens, we prefer to watch it!!

Instead, here's a quick Thank God...It's Friday because I just realized it's Friday. I love holidays....

Praises

• Aunt Margie's doing well!
• 2010 is here!
• One of my little guys from daycare has become a big brother Wednesday. I don't post their names, so suffice it to say that Big P welcomed Little P and everyone is doing well.
• Mama may have found out why her legs have been swelling, causing her a lot of pain. The culprit? Country ham. Hopefully now she can continue to heal and run around like a crazy woman (seriously, she ran the other day) once she gets rid of all that salt-induced fluid.

Requests

• Brian needs a new job. I am so not kidding.
• I think I've pulled a muscle in my back. I'm used to my back hurting in the morning, but it hasn't stopped today and it's in a different place than usual. It hurts a bunch, so I'm taking it easy today in hopes that it heals up fast!
• We're hoping to go to West Virginia in a few weeks. We pray that trip will go off without a hitch, as we've had plenty of hitches in the last few times we planned to go. We miss Brian's family, The Bum/Godson/Cousin Mike, and all Brian's friends that we only see a few times a year.
• We're hoping to start IUI this month. I'm nervous and there are a million details to iron out, but we're praying it all goes smoothly. And is successful!!

Rainy Wednesdays Make Me Tired

How on earth is it already a third of the way through November?! I'm not ready for Thanksgiving or Christmas or any of this stuff. Things around here continue to be a little hectic, but hopefully it will slow down soon. Brian's hours at work are picking up to a ridiculous degree, so I'll have abundant time at home alone to accomplish stuff. Yay...not really. I'd rather have him home.

There's a lot going on right now, but I haven't really had time to mention it on here. Here's kind of a bullet list....

Happy Birthday to Little Bro. He's technically 26, but he said 25 was so good he plans on repeating it. So he's 25+1 today! I have been incredibly blessed in the brother department, and I couldn't ask for better.

One of my day care children's grandmothers fell Sunday night and sustained a traumatic brain injury. I can't imagine what their family is going through!!

Stellan had major surgery this week and God was there in full force, of course, deserving all the praise. I'm sure there's a lot more to be done yet, but I know Yaya Princess and I were ecstatic over the outcome!

I'm making felt play food for my day care kids. It's so much fun I can't hardly stand it!

I'm geeky excited about a designer handbag bingo this weekend. Nothing like free purses for a good cause.

Someone needs to come clean and organize my house for me ASAP. I'm accepting applications now....

Have I mentioned how much this rainy Wednesday is making me want to veg out?! What motivates you to get off your duff on days like this?

Thank God....It's Friday!!

It's been so long since I blogged about anything that I'm surprised Blogger didn't say "Who?!" when I logged in. I cannot explain to you all how busy it's been around here, but I also know that's no excuse. Heaven knows I've had time to farm on Facebook, embroider a tablecloth, try to learn to knit, dodge housework, and have slumber parties with Mama. Of course, there are also countless crazy children running around my living room most days so that kind of kills any desire to do anything more than nap once they leave. Today is Friday, thank the good Lord above, so we'll jump back on the TG...IF train today, as well as a mini-update.

When last we left our superheroes, they we had survived Mama's double knee replacement surgery (yeah, we only had to sit in the waiting room while she went through the surgery...but we all survived so there!) and she was well on the road to recovery. While Mama's chomping at the bit to be back up and around and feels that her recovery is taking literally forever, in all actuality she's doing better than expected and is healing amazingly quickly. Thank you to everyone who's prayed for her and the rest of us, brought food, checked in, hung out with her, or in general forgiven our forgetfulness because we were exhausted. Things are settling into some kind of normal. I'm back home, Mama's talking about going back to work in the next few weeks, and sometimes she can be found out and about taking in the sights.

Since then, I've been working on planning our Annual Halloween party for next Saturday. Growing up, all the family that lived in the county (you know, where there's plenty of cow tipping but no trick or treating?) came into town and used our house as a home base of sorts. The kids went out and canvased the neighborhood for junk food, and the adults stayed home and enjoyed chili, gossip, and whatever costumes the neighborhood kids had to show off. Our neighborhood growing up (which is a whole three blocks from our neighborhood now) was great for kids, and car- and truck-loads of them would show up for Halloween. As time went on, this tradition continued with slightly-more-grown-up cousins dropping in to show off costumes, as well as all the munchkins Mama had for daycare. Unfortunately, Mama and Daddy's house is a split foyer, so there are lots of stairs involved in answering the door. A few years ago I offered to take that responsibility off her hands and have Halloween here. I love it. I love having our family, old friends, new friends, my daycare kids, and Mama's daycare kids over to the house, and about 500 neighborhood kids (not exaggerating) at the door. So if you're in the area on Halloween and want some chili or cake, drop in! Until then, I'll be cleaning our house and maybe have some curtains hung by then. Ha!

Brian had his second sleep study and now sleeps with his Luke Skywalker mask (seriously click that link -- it's hilarious) at night. It's so quiet in our house. Ah...... Hopefully in a few more weeks he'll feel even better as he catches up on some missed sleep! I've noticed a difference in him lately, and I hope he will be able to soon!

Meanwhile, we're both dodging the flu like crazy people. Folks are sick at Brian's store, kids' parents are sick here at the daycare, and it seems like everyone we know has someone sick with the porcine plague. I woke up feeling all queasy and Brian feels like trash today, too, so hopefully it's just because it's been a long week. Here's hoping!

Now, without further adieu....

Thank God....It's Friday!

Praises

I am incredibly thankful for my husband. Always, but I'm just throwing it out there again this week. He understands me, he gets me, and he loves me anyway. That's just cool.

Thank God Mama is doing so well, and that she has such an awesome "support staff" there with her throughout the day!

Yay for grass-fed, organic, locally grown beef. Our second beef will be arriving tomorrow to stock our freezer, and I'm so excited. We weren't sure we'd be able to afford it this year, but God provides and makes things happen. Yay for yumminess that is so good for you!

Some projects that we've been working on for the past year or so are finally coming to a head. That includes things like curtains, finally decorating our house, screen doors, and many other things that we've been hoping for but putting on the back burner.

MadHat76's husband had a great report at the foot guru this week!

Sealgair is getting all tatted-up this weekend! I know she'll have a ball! Of course, she has only added fuel to the fire of desire for my tattoo number two....

Thank heaven for great friends and simple weekend plans like this.

Requests

Please continue to pray for Mama's knees!

One of my daycare families has a cousin affected by the H1N1 flu. She is 12, and is not doing well. She's had the flu for three weeks, and her lungs are affected. Please be with her in prayer.

MadHat hates her job. She's working for some seriously screwed up people. Please pray she finds a new job, preferably before she needs bail money....

Brian's in the same boat. Pray on that one, too!

Our neighbors are a hot mess of white trash drama. Not to be judgmental, but my doors are perpetually locked now. Please pray that this situation resolves itself quickly and painlessly!

Well, it's time to get ready for a three year old's birthday party!! Have a great Friday, and I promise I'll be better about keeping you updated!

Monday, Monday....again

Ugh. Yet another Monday? Where do these things come from? We had a great weekend, and I hoped to go into the week well-rested and at great peace with the world. Unfortunately, when I was still laying awake (lying? laid? Whatever - prostrate in bed, ya'll) last night at 2 AM....well, all that flew out the window. I couldn't shut my brain off and I couldn't stop Brian's freight train-esque snoring (more on that in a minute). And a couple random men were talking outside (it's two AM!!). So today I feel like I've been hit by a truck.

Saturday was lovely, as I spent the day with Mama at a bluegrass festival nearby. We saw several great bands, ate yummy food, talked a lot, and generally hung out. The weather was gorgeous and we were home in time to get ready for the next day's reunion.

Sunday was the Hill Reunion. My cousin and I organize the whole thing, and it's a ball. The weather was just as lovely, the food twice as good, and the people entertaining as always. I'll be posting some pictures here and on our reunion website hopefully later tonight or tomorrow, so be sure to check them out.

Other than all that, I don't have a lot to write about. We're just working, trying to get a few big projects around here taken care of (like rebuilding a bookshelf, done last weekend!), and thinking about Fall and Winter. We're shooting for a mostly-handmade Christmas again this year, and I can't very well blog about that, can I? Over half our family and friends read this! Just suffice it to say that I'm teaching myself to knit and embroider, and leave it at that. Mama is preparing for her double knee replacement, so I'm trying to figure out the best way to help her for a few weeks/months as well. Brian was diagnosed with mild to moderate sleep apnea last week (yay for concrete diagnosis of something!!). He'll go back in next week to be fitted for a CPAP machine and will hopefully be better rested very soon.

So, bear with us. I'll blog when I have something to write about. Look for pictures coming soon. And pardon me while I go take a nap.....

Playing Catch Up, the Monday Edition

Yes, it's been a week since I posted. Yes, I missed a Thank God...It's Friday. Yes, it's been incredibly busy this week, and yes, I'm going to attempt to make excuses for my lack of posting. Seriously, though, it has been nutty around here in such a good way. Let's hit the high points...

I've filled all my day care spots. Woo hoo! Our live is arranged around my having five children in day care and that hasn't happened since last August. It'll take a few months of finagling, but I'll have five actual bodies in care full time by March 2010. Between now and then I'll be covering for Mama's surgery leave and another day care provider's maternity leave. But I start a new child part time next week, and a new child full time the week after that, so I'm not complaining.

We're battling ants again. Imagine my surprise when I came downstairs and found a huge (HUGE!) pile of ants on my downstairs carpet. Someone, who shall of course remain nameless, spilled her Pepsi the night before and only thought it was well-cleaned up. Apparently not so much. So for now, there are ant traps and some manner of "perimeter defense" that Brian put down that makes the yard off-limits for a week.

I've been working with Ford Maverick to make a logo for my Baileys Basics shop. I'll link to it once I get the shop all finished up. I'm working on making my shop stand alone instead of being connected to Etsy, so it's time to brand that baby. You'll notice I didn't link to Ford's site...if you know him, you have the address or can find it. I don't want anyone to hop over there from here and be completely shocked, so there's no link. You'll understand, I know.

I'm full-tilt into working on our Hill Reunion for 2009. This year there will be website for our family to use. Check it out at www.hill-reunion.com and let me know what you think.

I've been busy collecting fabric to make slings and baby wraps for the shop. Someday I'll actually get it all ironed, cut, pinned, and sewn. Sure I will.

This past Thursday evening, MadHat76, VA, and I left for Washington, DC. We attended Women of Faith on Friday and Saturday. If you've never been to a Women of Faith conference, you are seriously missing an amazing experience. I can honestly say that it was one of my best experiences ever, that I was surprised by how much I loved it, and that I learned so much about myself and my relationship with the Lord. I cannot wait to go again next year. If you're interested in joining us next year, please let me know. We had an absolute ball!

Yesterday I spent the day recovering from the weekend. I was exhausted so I slept in late and then took a nap in the early evening. Now that my spirit is refreshed from WOF, I need the rest of my body to get in line and get caught up.

Even though it's been a busy week (month, really), we have a busy August coming up. Some things we're looking forward to are a George Jones concert with my family, hopefully a sewing weekend with the YaYaPrincess, another yard sale, and several reunions and picnics.

For now, I'd encourage you to go straight over to MaxeyWeb and catch up with Annette. She is not doing well and I am very worried, as I know many other folks are, too. Please love on her family and pray for this sweet little girl. Her family lost their first daughter to cancer and simply shouldn't have to lose their second little girl, too. Pray hard for her!

Smooches and love to you all, and a hope for a great Monday!

Big Honkin' Update

Disclaimer/Update: I started this post on Monday. I'll hopefully get to publish it tonight, which is Tuesday. We'll see. I also intended to have tons of links to help you better understand all the tests, results, and wildness of our week. Yeah, not going to happen. Little tip: highlight a word, right-click on it, and choose

"Search Google for...". 'Cause I'm tired!

Original post:

Holy mother of pearl, it's been a crazy week. I mean seriously-crazy-not-fun-ER-visit crazy week. I'll try to catch you up as best I can, but bear in mind that it's been so nuts that I don't have the four days it would take to do our week justice. Or ten days, to be exact. Starting in order from when last we saw our superheroes....

Father's Day was lovely. Brian worked and I had a nice day celebrating Father's Day with my family. Last Monday was fun because I had a trial run with the new baby who will start here tomorrow, and it was wonderful to get baby snuggles again. The Big Kids have gotten to the point where they don't need me at all and would be just as happy if I let them go outside by themselves thankyouverymuch. Monday was the end of any fun and normalcy around here until....well, some point we haven't reached yet. Brian mentioned in passing that he had a headache Monday night. Then......

On Tuesday morning, Brian called me around 9:55. He sounded terrible, and I could tell he had a migraine and vertigo from the way he sounded. I'm becoming horribly familiar with that sound in his voice. He said he was on his way to the ER. From what I can gather he started feeling dizzy around 7:45 and went to the break room to grab a bite to eat. He was dizzy and had a headache. When he started dropping his food he started to worry, and stood up to go downstairs. He fell, and caught himself on the wall. Knowing that he couldn't make it down the stairs, he called for his friend/co-worker who is huge and very capable of lifting all 190 pounds of him (along with anyone else he happened to pile on, too, as he is very, very strong). Big Guy helped him down the stairs, to the front of the store and into a wheelchair. Apparently at this point Brian realized that he was hallucinating. Or else snakes had invaded the store, which is unlikely. Actually, not unlikely if you know the building, but it was a hallucination this time....

When I arrived at the ER 15 minutes later, Brian and Big Guy were in a darkened room and Brian was barely able to speak coherently, and was still seeing people and things that weren't there. Whenever he closed his eyes for more than a blink he was instantly dreaming, too. When he was taken to back to the ER, they wanted to treat him with meclizine. We knew from experience that when he is seen in the ER for vertigo they just give him this drug and send him home, and that it doesn't help him at all. They did not seem pleased that we refused their panacea. Then they sent him for a CT scan. Upon returning to his little curtained area, he immediately fell asleep. Huh?!?! Who sleeps in the ER?!?! The problem here is that he was asleep and snoring within 45 seconds, and was hard to wake him up. I tried for a while, nudging him and telling him he was officially that guy snoring loudly in the ER but eventually it was impossible to rouse him at all. When I could get him to wake up at all his eyes were going different directions and he made less sense than your average drunk. Soon I couldn't get him conscious at all. I was seriously worried, but no doctors were around. I alerted an orderly (the only person I could find who would make eye contact with me) and he started monitoring Brian. His pulse oximeter kept beeping as his respiration fell into the low 80's. No one seemed concerned at all. The doctor who finally showed back up around 3:00 suggested a spinal tap to rule out an infection.

It took me about a half hour to get Brian awake enough to sit up for his spinal tap. Then he had to lay flat for an hour afterwards. It came back clear, and he was starting to be more coherent by that point. So...they admitted him to the hospital. We reached his room around 5:00. That evening, we met his hospitalist, the neurologist who would be seeing him, and had some visitors. Brian slept well Tuesday night, and I stayed in the chair in his room. Rumor has it that I slept at least 2 hours that night, but I doubt it.... As we've been talking through this whole scenario, it's becoming clear that Brian has little to no memory of anything after about 10 AM through Wednesday morning.

On Wednesday, Brian had every blood test under the sun, an MRI, and an EEG. We waited patiently in his room for the rest of the day for the results and a discharge as he was feeling better. The doctor came around 5:30 and said that all the tests were clear and that she would send us home that evening after the neurologist finished looking at the EEG. I went home to teach two lessons. Around 7:15 Brian texted me to say that he had to stay overnight again. What?! Apparently the neurologist is a very cautious man who prefers to keep patients for 48 hours instead of 24. I'm not sure why no one told us this in the very beginning. Around this point, Brian got a roommate! He was an older gentleman suffering from congestive heart failure who apparently has very little time left. It was amazingly depressing to know this from over-hearing the nurses and doctors and yet realize that he and his wife did not realize it themselves. Because of the roommate, I was unable to stay overnight. We decided that I would work on Thursday so that I could more easily refrain from killing a nurse or a doctor. Brian was released at 5:30 on Thursday evening without ever seeing the neurologist again. He spent his hospital visit playing approximately 6 hours of Final Fantasy on his PSP, watching approximately 36 hours of CNN, one baseball game, and running through two Blackberry battery charges. He was bored out of his skull by Thursday evening, still stressed, and not rested.

The official diagnosis of sorts was exhaustion, stress, and extreme dehydration. Seems a steady diet of no food, caffeine, and 65 hour work weeks will do that to you. Go figure. Brian has been told to drink a minimum of a gallon of water or Gatorade daily, to eat regular meals and not just whatever crap he can find at the store when he has a minute, to get more rest and to have a sleep study to evaluate him for sleep apnea, and to get a new job as soon as humanly possible. The doctors told him that if he doesn't change his lifestyle, particularly his stressful job, then he will be dead in short order. I really, really hope he was listening.

For now, he's still off work (at the time of posting, today was ER Day +7, so that's a huge deal for him) pending a doctor's clearance. His sleep study can't be scheduled for at least 2-2 1/2 weeks, his actual neurologist can't see him until mid-August, and he's hoping to see our family doctor later this week. Thank you all for your calls, emails, texts, and especially prayers. We will be making (more) huge changes around here to de-stress, so we'll keep you posted on our new normal.

I Had a Monday

Yesterday, quite against my will, I Had A Monday.  You know what I mean -- when things go wrong left and right, everything you touch ends up on the floor, you manage to be sick out of the blue, and a kid hoarfs in your living room.  You've never had a Monday?  Lucky you.  I did, just yesterday.  Here it is, in bullet form:  

Things That Just Made My Monday

• I woke up sick as a dog.  
  
• I contemplated calling the daycare parents to say stay at home, but it was 7:40 which is entirely too late to re-route anyone.
  
• My stomach spent the entire day rebelling, but I managed to keep it in its place for the most part.
  
• Child #1 arrived "with a cold".  
  
• Child #1 took two bites of breakfast and heaved all over herself and the high chair in which she sat.
  
• Child #1 spiked a fever and went on home.
  
• Our water bill came.  It tripled in the month of March.
  
• We got the bill for Brian's MRI.  We may need to sell his kidneys now, if you're interested in purchasing one.
  
• The next occurance proved beyond a shadow of doubt that I am indeed not pregnant.
  
• I worked 13 hours in this condition, and then crashed hard.
  

Longest Monday ever.  If you know me in real life, you know just how well I deal with vomit, and with bills, for that matter.  Luckily, Brian took care of dinner and I spent the rest of the day (all two hours of it) on the couch.  Today has been moderately better (less of other people's bodily fluids on me, for sure) and I'm really hopeful for tomorrow.  Maybe by Thursday, I won't feel like death.  Yay for Tuesday!

What's Goin' On, What's Goin' On

10 Baileys Points if you can identify the inspiration for the title for this post.

I know I said I'd try to update with what all has been going on around here lately, and then kept you all waiting. It's been a long couple of days, so bear with me. Nothing much terribly important has been going on in the grand scheme of things. Unless you are me, in which case it's been a seriously stressful two weeks. Here's the background....

I use the Clearblue Easy Fertility Monitor to keep track of my cycle and find the two most fertile days to get pregnant. I highly recommend this little gadget to anyone trying to get pregnant, infertile or not. In fact, when the YaYa Princess decides to have herself a little tax deduction, I'll be happy to loan her my monitor, provided it's not in use at the time. And at something like $200, begging/borrowing/stealing is highly recommended. I bought mine secondhand and will gladly pass it along when we're done with our family. You know, in like 10 years when it's probably obsolete. But I digress. Every morning at 7:30 I push the button on this handy little computer. It records the time and cycle day, and if necessary prompts me to pee on a stick (POAS, if you're part of the infertile community). Then I put the stick in the monitor, it does some manner of magical divination (or scientific reading, whatever) and tells me my Fertility Status. Low days are like any other day, high fertility days may be a good day for ...um...yeah. And The Peak Day is the most awaited day in all of Infertilityland. That day and the next day are the best days to get all knocked up, or inseminated if you're going the full medical route. A fortuitous day, no doubt. The science of this works like so:

Your body uses hormones to control your cycle and fertility. You know that, I'm sure. I start out the month (we call it a "cycle", you know...) with Clomid on cycle days 5-9. Somewhere around CD 11 I start P'ingOAS. The level of estrogen in your body (and consequently in your bloodstream) begins to increase as you near ovulation. A follicle or two begins to form on your ovary, which contains the egg. At this point, viola: "High Fertility" is indicated on the monitor. This is a good day for extracurricular activities, but not mandated. Ha! Man-dated. ;) 24-36 hours before you actually ovulate, your body releases lutenizing hormone, called LH. This is the handy little chemical that makes your follicle rupture, releasing the egg. The follicle goes on to do other cool things, but they are not part of this story. So, this LH surge is picked up by the fertility monitor in your urine (actually, my urine, thanks) and the monitor goes to Peak Fertility. This means: Get Busy. Ovulation will be in the next 24-36 hours, so the following day is good, too. Since an egg has a lifespan of 12-24 hours, you need to have the other ingredient there prior to the egg. Cart before the horse sort of situation. After your Peak Day, the monitor stops asking for test sticks and you go back to waiting. This is called the Two Week Wait (TWW) in the happy infertility community. Basically the length of time between ovulation and either your period or a pregnancy test.

Sounds easy enough, right? Except for this month, when my life went like this:

CD 5-9 Clomid

CD 11 commence peeing on technology

CD 18 high fertility reading -- right on track for me to ovulate at day 20 like usual. That day 14 thing is bull, by the way

CD 19-26 still high fertility. No peak, no change, just ...................................high.

At this point, I worried. Actually, I commenced worrying around CD 22, but that's neither here nor there. By CD 26, I called Jan The Very Cool Nurse at my fertility clinic. She was equally puzzled, and concerned, and scheduled me for an emergency appointment Tuesday morning. This meant Brian had to change his schedule really quickly and we had to pay for an ultrasound....again. This is a monthly occurrence, so not too big a deal. But worrisome when you don't have a little window in your abdomen to see what's goin' on. The likely scenario was that I had not ovulated, and was going to need a little further chemical encouragement to pop that follicle. Or that I had ovulated and the monitor had missed it somehow. You know, because $200 technology isn't foolproof. But if Jan was worried, that worried me. That's where I was when I posted the other day, letting you all know that I was off to the doc's.

The ultrasound showed at least one, and possibly two follicles on my ovaries. It was impossible to tell if they were ready to pop, or if they already had ruptured and were now corpus luteum-s. Corpi lutei? Only a blood test would tell, checking for that ever-useful hormone, progesterone. I've posted about that before, so I'll spare you the link. An elevated progesterone level would indicate that I had ovulated, and a low level would indicate that I needed help to do so. Help in the form of a "trigger shot" of hCG. Since I was unable to stay in Charlottesville to get the shot if my blood work came back low, I got to learn how to give myself a shot, and was sent home with syringes and hCG to shoot myself up later that night. I was told to call back in an hour for my results.

This is where it gets a bit anti-climactic. My progesterone level was an 11, which indicates that I ovulated. The doctor estimated that it was around CD 20, based on my progesterone level. My monitor missed it. Two weeks of wondering and worrying, 2 hours of driving across the mountain, $130 of doctor's bills and hCG costs, and a 20 minute lesson in how to stab myself effectively in the stomach because of a minor technological malfunction. Fun, and totally typical in the infertility journey that tons of people travel. The good news is that I ovulated, and that our timing may have been good, and I'll know in a week or so if I'm in the family way. Praying, you know.

Here's what just popped into my mind: no one knew about this but the people in this house. That day was stressful and a bit scary (read this link to understand why: Ovarian Hyperstimulation), and no one knew. Because infertility isn't something you talk about, or put on your church's prayer list, or mention to your grandmother or cousin, or sometimes even your best friend. I've been amazed lately to find out the people that we know that struggled or still do struggle with infertility. All by ourselves, usually. I once mentioned to the YaYa Princess that no one makes eye contact in the fertility clinic waiting room. It's kind of weird, actually. So I would encourage you to make yourself open to your friends and family so that if they need to talk they feel comfortable. It can be a cold, lonely journey, and I really wish that everyone had as many outlets as we do. We're blessed with family and friends who are open to hearing about our weird experiences, too much information, and blogs about cervices. Not everyone is this lucky, so please be understanding and gentle to them. Maybe there's someone at work who is grouchy, or seems tired or irritable. They may be dealing with infertility quietly, and need someone to care. You may be able to help someone who is going through such a situation as we faced this cycle. Uncertainty, failure, and anxiety are not fun -- be a help to someone you know!

Now, I'm off to bed. Having spent an entire day dealing with vertigo for some reason, I'm exhausted. Smooches to you all, thanks for listening, and goodnight. Oh, and a shout out to The Bum - we heard about Cooper's little journey away from home, and we'll be keeping you in our thoughts and prayers. I hope he's home soon!! Night, ya'll.

Doctor Update

Hey, everybody! I know it's been awhile since I updated.  I've been trying to promote Baileys Basics like crazy, so I've been over at that blog, trying to get a post up every day or two.  So, if you miss me here please check over there!  In addition, I'm thinking about selling cards, bookplates, etc. online through Etsy, too.   It's something I've done for ages for myself and family, so I might as well start turning a profit, no?  We're big on alternate streams of income around here, and that's one more to add to the river.  I'll keep you posted on how that turns out.

Friday I went to RMSCVA to see Dr. Williams for my ovary check.  This month we used a higher dosage of Clomid (four pills to equal 200 mg daily, if you're a numbers kinda person) because I'm not ovualting "robustly" enough.  I'm not 100% sure how "robustly" I'm supposed to be ovualting. Basically, when they do my ovary check (via internal ultrasound) they can tell me that I ovulated.  The nurse then does a blood draw to check how well I ovulated.  Last month my progesterone levels were too low.  This could result in losing a pregnancy, if I conceived.  Not something I want to deal with, so we need to address the situation.  A higher level of Clomid might do the trick, so they upped it for this past cycle.  

While I was there, I asked Dr. Williams about the possibility that our schedule is just off for testing my progesterone.  The average cycle is 28 days long.  You take Clomid on cycle days (CD) 5-9 and should ovulate around CD 14.  Then you go for an ovary check sometime on CD 21-25.  I'm a consistent CD 20 ovualter, with a 35 day cycle.  Consequently, the appointments on CD 22 or 23 like I've been having just aren't going to cut it.  Since progesterone rises after you ovulate to a peak around a week later and then slack off to induce menses, testing so soon after ovualtion could lead to a deceptively low level.  Usually progesterone defiencies are indicative of a luteal phase defect, but since I'm having a solid 15 day luteal phase before my period, I doubt it.  I think we're just testing too early.  So, this month they tested my progesterone on CD 22, and it was low.  I have a lab order to test again on Thursday of this week (conveniently here in Harrisonburg instead of driving to Charlottesville!) to see if it peaks any higher.  Keep your fingers crossed and keep praying!

Once we get my progesterone levels figured out and I'm Ovulating Robustly, we're going to try Intrauterine Insemination, or IUI.  This should increase our chances of conception dramatically.  We hope. It's expensive, but it beats more months of trial and error.  We'll let you know when that happens!  

After my appointment, I met Little Bro and Sweet Lizzy for a trip to the cutest store in the world and dinner at the best dumpling shop ever.  We had pork dumplings and spicy noodles so good they'd make your tongue beat your brains out.  If you're in Charlottesville, go to the walking mall and hit the tiny little dumpling shop.  Go now, I'm serious.  Then go over to O Suzannah! and buy something awesome. As always, it was great to see the brother and sis in law, and they make a trip to Charlottesville more fun than imaginable.  

Well, egg rolls are ready to be heated and a salad is calling my name.  The Bum and Cousin Mike are moving to the Great White North (you know, Parkersburg, WV) today, so wish them luck and decent weather for the drive.  We'll visit them in April and have a new camera, so expect pictures!  Happy Tuesdsay, Happy March, and where the heck is Spring?!

Unmotivated

I thought I would take a break from everything extracurricular in order to focus on my house in the month of January. I wanted to make sure that I deep-cleaned, purged, and organized everything in order to start the new year off right. Also, I know that I was spending way too much time on the computer, and needed to get that under control. After all, there really is no reason to check your email more than once (maybe twice?) a day. I had such a push before Christmas to get the shop in order that I needed a break from that, too. Basically, I just needed to get centered again.

So how did it go? Lousy. We still have Christmas decorations in our spare room, waiting for their trip to the attic. Merle got sick as a dog (ironic, is it not?) and has left his vomitty little mark on every floor in the house. Which means that we need to clean the carpets from top to bottom. We're working on installing shelves in our closet to maximize our unused space, but found that what we want and what Lowe's has are two drastically different things. So back to the drawing board on that one. And since I need the Christmas decorations put away and the closets ready for storage before I can start all that deep-cleaning, purging, and organizing...you see my problem.

And then, it snowed. And iced. I only had two representatives of the Munchkin Coalition here yesterday for daycare, and they left early. So I should have used that time to accomplish a lot, right? And today, so far I only have two kiddos in-house (hence the chance to blog), so I should do even more today, right? Yeah...no. I have never, in the history of the world, accomplished anything on a Snow Day. Ever. And apparently my streak will continue. I did manage to watch four episodes of Heroes on Netflix yesterday, and anticipate about three more tonight, but that hardly counts as work, does it? Granted, I've been working on crochetting washclothes for my shop, and filling an order for some for the Bum's shop, but that's just busywork while I watch....

But you know what? I've caught up on a lot of the sleep we missed over Christmas, what with Brian's crazy schedule. And I've learned that sometimes having fun, playing a game, watching some Heroes, or whatever is necessary. Brian is off this week, and we've enjoyed spending 24 hours a day together. That's one thing I love about our marriage -- we can spend an entire week together and not get tired of each other. At all. We could be happily snowed in in the middle of nowhere for a month and still want to be together for the following month. That's a blessing right there. So we've done a little bit of nothing, and enjoyed it. Sure, we're making plans to get a ladder up to the attic, and we're re-measuring and re-thinking our closet plans. And Brian brought home a huge (HUGE!) bottle of solution for the carpet cleaner yesterday in hopes of actually making the carpet puke-free. We're planning a trip to see the West Virginia Fam this weekend, weather permitting. So I guess it hasn't been a completely wasted bit of time, right? Sure, I still need to wash the floor in the laundry room, make drapes for the family room, and put my kitchen cabinets on a diet. But it'll get done before the year's up.....

2009 is finally upon us

Hello, everybody. I know it's been nearly a month.

Here's a bullet list of what we've been up to:

• Thanksgiving with my parents.
  
• Black Friday for Brian.
  
• Preparing for Christmas, which included crochetting many, many scarves, stamping tags, baking cookies, making candy, and trying to keep most of our Christmas gifts low key and handmadeif possible.
  
• Going to the doctor and finding that I had ovulated this cycle (yay!). Then waiting while my body began to do weird things. Breaking my promise to be rational and not get my hopes up.
• Christmas Eve with my mom's family.
  
• Christmas Day with Mama, Daddy, Little Bro, and Sweet Lizzy.
  
• Brian's parents here from December 26-29. It was great to visit with them! We missed his sisters, though. AnchorGirl and CopGuy live so far away it's ridiculous, and Nurse Baileys was sick as a dog. And had bowl game tickets. A WVU game while you have the flu is still a WVU game, people.
  
• Hill Christmas on December 26th. Brian's parents went along, and it was a ton of fun.
• A very laid back few days of work.
• New Year's Eve with some family, playing Apples to Apples (which I will be buying!).
• New Year's Day spent sewing and being lazy.
• One last Friday of easy work.

What we have to look forward to:

• Inventory for Brian at work. Yuck!
  
• A cool experience taking a class together next weekend (details will come eventually).
  
• Christmas with The Bum and the Yaya Princess.
  
• A recital for my piano students in February.

And, here's a sampling of what I plan to enjoy this weekend since I'm

officially Not Pregnant this month:

Well, there you have it. A very busy month. I'm hoping to write on a more regular basis this year, but I also hope to get my house In Order and Clean. You may see me organizing closets like a mad woman in the coming weeks. Stand back! Or come help.....

Update-shmupdate

Yeah, it's been a while.  Life around here has been crazy-nuts busy.  If you know us, then you already know that the Christmas season around here is completely insane.  Since Brian works in retail, he pretty much ceases to sleep from the first of November through the second week in January.  It's horrible, really.  Since he doesn't get home until around 11 PM, I end up staying up to see him a bit before bed (read:  until midnight or 12:30).  Then I'm up at 6:45.....I'm exhausted. Of course, it could be worse; I could be Brian.  In the midst of all this no-sleep-all-work-all-the-time nuttiness, he managed to catch the cold that the Munchkin Coalition brought in last week.  And then promptly ended up with a respiratory infection and NO voice.  Not just scratchy: gone.  So, it's been a long couple of weeks.  

In case you've been following along, we're not pregnant. Which I'm actually cool with.  It's not my fault this time!! It's just chance now. We're doing everything right, the meds are working, I ovualted (did I mention that?), and we just have to pray that everything ends up right.  And that I can live with -- all I asked for was the same chance as anyone else. I do so love a level playing field.

The Baileys Basics shop has been busy, too.  Stop by and show some love if you get a chance.  The blog address for that is baileysbasics.blogspot.com, so you can follow along with what's going on.  

We're getting ready for Christmas around here, of course.  We're trying to have a laid back, low-key Christmas with lots of handmade gifts and downsizing.  So, that adds to my To Do list, as you can imagine.  Which reminds me: I should be crocheting.  Gotta go!

Thursday Night

I think this is going to be a bullet-point blog. I am not terribly wordy or creative today....

I love the new season of ER.

I hate that it will be the last season, though.

I learned tonight that I shouldn't rest my head on the sewing machine because it will catch my hair.

I discovered that making eight drawstring bags at once makes my brain hurt. One at a time from now on.

I have a doctor's appointment tomorrow. I hope I ovulated.

I think I ovulated. But I thought that last month and was wrong.

Sweet Sister Sarah called me today. I miss her.

We'll see Little Bro and Sweet Lizzy tomorrow night, and I am excited.

The gearshift of my car came off in my hand tonight.

My car is officially a beater, as of 6:15 PM.

I was insulted this week. Many people came to my defense, but it still hurts.

Brian is working way too much, but it's necessary.

I am really excited about the Yaya Princess' new house.

I thought Thanksgiving was this coming Thursday. I nearly cried when I found out I was wrong.

Much like the YP, I am addicted to Facebook as well.

There is a new Hill in the world. I think that makes over 80 in our family at last count.

Tiny and Merle are actively watching television with Brian. Wolves fascinate them, apparently.

I am sooooo tired. Goodnight.

I'm a horrible blogger....

Every day I go through about 10 blogs, checking in to see what everyone has been up to, the progress Nie is making by reading CJane's blog (please click! Or donate!  And pray!), and basically keep in touch with people.  There is a blog that I have been following for quite some time that hasn't been updated in nearly a month. Rather than being annoyed that I don't have new posts to read, I'm very worried about this lady.  What has happened in her life to keep her from updated her friends and family that read her blog?  She has a chronically ill daughter; has she taken a turn for the worse? What's going on with this sweet family!?!  

Then, it hit me.  I haven't updated in ages.  What if other people feel that way about my blog (I hope, I hope)?  So, I promise I will be better about updating.  I would love to write daily and keep people in the loop, so to speak.  But days have a tendency to run away from me around here.  Four "vicarious kids", a husband with a 60 hour work week, a house to clean and two jobs will do that to ya.  But I don't want other people to have to worry about whether or not we're okay!

We are, for the record, just fine.  We've made it into (and nearly through!) the fall.  We had a great Halloween party Friday night and enjoyed having lots of people here.  We're basically doing great!  We are too busy and need some free time to hang out together, but that's just par for us. If I haven't told you yet, I failed my second round of Clomid last month, so we've upped the dose again this month.  I've nearly finished it, so we'll see what happens in about 12 days or so when I go for the ultrasound.  I'm hopeful, but still realistic.  

In other news,  I'm working my tail off getting the shop ready for Christmas, and Brian is working his butt off for the Bargain Basement Retail Chain.  We need to start Christmas shopping, too.  We'll be starting on our Operation Christmas Child box this week, finally.  If you're looking for a great thing to do, this is it!  I cannot tell you the joy that we get out of this mission each year.  They do great things, and need your help.  Hurry -- those boxes have a long way to travel before Christmas!  However, I think it's a horrid sign of the time that the economy has gotten so bad that we (and lots of others) have had to cut back to only doing one box this year.  Christmas will be small but meaningful at the Baileys household this year!  I hate that that has to effect our charitable contributions, but it does.  

I haven't approached politics at all on my blog, I know.  And I won't now.  But please, above all else, if you choose to vote make sure you cast an informed vote.  Seek out non-partisan news, unbiased d facts, and don't trust the things you read in your email.  And while you're at it, read this book.  I'll cover more on it when I finish it!

Okay, I have to get to bed.  I'm sorry to keep you all hanging for so long, and hope that you're still with me.  Have a great week!

October 7, 2008: Our Second Anniversary

Um, where have two years gone?! Somehow, Brian and I have been married two full years now, and it feels like our wedding was last week. Does anyone have an explaination about this? We talked about it last night, and he feels the same, thankfully. It's hard to believe that in two years, we've both changed jobs, we bought a house, started trying to start a family, and watched two of our siblings get married (which makes us very, very old). And that's just the huge things; it's been a busy two years!

Tonight we both get off work early, so we'll be enjoying dinner out somewhere (any suggestions?). Saturday we have weather-permitting plans to go to Skyline Drive for our newly-annual picnic-for-our-anniversary. Last year was a wonderful time, and I hope we can repeat it. So, for my readers: how long have you been married, and what's the best part?

Meanwhile, I visited Dr. Williams again for bloodwork results. Yep, it's PCOS. Good deal. Better the devil I know then the devil(S!) I don't. He gave me this month's Clomid (doubled the dose; I see a trend!) and asked me to exercise four times a week, minimum. So my fat butt walked 3/4 mile last night (fast!). It was very nice to get back out and get moving, I have to say. I had the shocking realization that even though I used to go for a 30 minute walk nearly daily, that was...Four. Years. Ago. Holy cats; forget two years - where have the last four gone?!?!

Other than all that, we had a trip to West Virginia and a few thousand family gatherings in the past few weeks. I didn't take a single picture, so you'll have to take my word on it that it was fun! In addition, I have lots of great new things going on in the ol' shops, so check em out. Here are linkies:

Baileys Basics Etsy Shop

Baileys Basics Shop Handmade Shop

Baileys Basics Blog

Okay, off to accomplish something! Have a great day!

Seriously, it's the 15th already?!

So, where has September gone?! And what have I been doing with it? It's been busy, I can tell you that. No time has gone to waste, rest assured. We celebrated my birthday for about a week straight, which I personally think is a wonderful idea. We started to see Little Bro and Sweet Lizzy a little more often, as they have emerged from Newlywedville for a peek around. The Godson started running, and not just because his mama is chasing him with a bar of soap for that mouth. Allie and Matt got all hitched up, but that happened before September. But we're still recovering. I've had laid back weeks at work, thanks to parents that are taking late vacations.

This past week, I fall cleaned Baileys Castle. Which includes way too many bathrooms, just for the record. Brian was a huge help, and we even steamed all the carpets and put goodies up on the attic. The house looks amazing, I have to say. I do so love a clean house, complete with vacuum tracks and shiny fixtures in the bathrooms. This led up to a Pampered Chef kitchen show this weekend, and the Hill Reunion yesterday. So, needless to say, I'm exhausted, sore, and content in my clean abode.

So, why haven't I written about any of this, or posted any pictures? Because something much, much bigger has been looming in my mind. Namely, that tomorrow is our appointment with the Fertility Gurus. I am absolutely terrified. I'm not sure why; it's probably just a "get to know you" appointment, and nothing great and powerful will be revealed. But I'm scared nonetheless. Scared of what we might hear, scared that there will be some hideously concrete finding about our lack of fertility, scared that Brian is going to run screaming away when he hears that dreaded number of my weight, equally scared we will both run screaming away when we hear the cost of this little endeavor. I do not give up control easily, so this is obviously a big, horrid deal for me. Appointments dealing with our fertility so far have been horribly emotional. We've decided to counteract this by having dinner with Bro and Liz afterwards, since they live remarkably near our Gurus. I am sooooo looking forward to that, so I'm ignoring what happens at 2:00.

So, forgive me if I haven't been the blogger extrodinaire as of late (or ever?). I hereby promise to do better. I'll certainly keep you updated after tomorrow's appointment, too.

If it's not too much to ask, please pray for us tomorrow. We really covet them, and know you'll be there with us!