Happy 1st Birthday, Andrew!

Just wanted to share some pictures of my nephew, Andrew's birthday party that was last night.

Andrew with his FAVORITE Aunt (you know it's true, Jen)

The Birthday Boy!

He loved the football!

Yummy cookie cake!

My sweet niece, Ashley

My sister Jenny with her DH, Chris

Trying to get Andrew to take some steps

Baby Tate

Jared and I were able to visit with our friends Nate and Angie, who just had their 2nd baby, a boy, on Monday, the 26th. Her labor and delivery was so fast, she didn't even have time for an epidural.

His name is Tate and he is just a doll. I got to hold him for about 15 minutes and I just fell in love. I can't imagine holding my own baby one day. Ooooh, I can't wait :)

Here is a pic of us holding Tate. My hair looks horrendous and Jared doesn't look too excited. It really is a scary picture but I'll share it anyways. haha

I took my last dose of Clomid yesterday. No bad side effects for me!! YAY! Just some minor hot flashes and night sweats and maybe a couple headaches. 5 more days until my ultrasound to check my follicles. I am so excited :)

I start my new job on Monday. I have a going away lunch with my current team on Friday and then I have a welcome lunch with my new team on Monday. Yummy but not good for the scale.

So glad the weekend is almost here :)

2 down, 3 to go

My first day of Clomid yesterday was not bad at all. I did have a night sweat last night, but big deal. We'll see how the symptoms progress or if they get any worse. I've got 4 more days to find out.

Jared is being so cute about the whole thing. He woke up to go for a run this morning and I was still in bed. Before he left, he came over and put his hand on me and said, "It's almost 7:30. Remember that you have to take your medicine." He reminded me last night as well. He wants to have a baby almost as badly as I do. I love him :)

Yesterday was Jared's dad, Gary's birthday. We went for lunch at The Olive Garden with him and my family. Judy, my MIL is still in Washington with her mom who just had a stroke. I gave Gary a framed picture of our dog, Obi. Gary loves our dogs so much, but he has a special place in his heart for Obi. Jared got Obi before we even met and when he was living at his parent's house, so Gary got to be with Obi from day 1. They have a special bond :)

Obi loves to sit by my feet when I play the piano. I put a blanket on my shiny, black piano bench so Obi wouldn't scratch it and then I put Obi on top of that. I got a few great shots but this one is my favorite:

Operation Clomid

I sure hope this stuff will work for me.

Today is CD 1 of cycle #12. I will be starting Clomid on Saturday, Day 3 and end on Day 7. I called into the nurse line and they will be calling in my prescription for me. I also received the results of my blood test and those came out perfectly normal! YAY! That means that I do not have any indications of PCOS.

My u/s is scheduled for April 3rd (CD 13) at 3:15 pm and they will check the size of my follicle(s). As long as there is 1 that is mature, they will give me a shot of HCG which will induce ovulation and it will be baby making time again.

I fixed the video in my post below so it should be viewable now.

I have been home sick yesterday and today. I am ready to be well again!!

It's here!

My piano came right on time today. In fact, the movers were waiting for us when we got home from work, only a couple minutes though. Well, I am going to try and upload a video. I tried Stac's advice, but photobucket isn't letting me upload the file type that my camcorder saves the video clips as.. need to work on that. But, Youtube let me upload it. Hopefully it works:

The piano really needs a tuning so it sounds a little brassy.

In other news, I am pretty sure AF is a couple days away. My cervix has moved up today and softened. I also noticed a tiny spot of color when I checked up :( Clomid, here we come! If AF comes on Thursday, as expected, then I will start Clomid on Saturday, CD 3.

Symptoms

I am 10 DPO today and not having a lot of real convincing symptoms, but maybe some. There are a couple different things that I have noticed this month that I haven't in the past, but you know how symptoms go.

-I have had sore nips ever since I ovulated. This is one thing that is new, although, in the past 3-4 days, the soreness comes and goes. But they were really sore in the first week after ovulation.

-I noticed a sore throat yesterday morning when I woke up and I still have it today.

-Sunday night was the first night I started getting tired fairly early, but I can get fatigued when I get close to AF so this could go either way.

-My cervix is still low and rock hard and very closed. Usually by 10 DPO, it starts to move on up and open slightly. There is still lots of day left though, so it could begin to change throughout the day.

I do not have much CM which is probably the main thing that makes me think I am not pg this cycle. Most times, pg ladies will have increased creamy CM, but not always. So only time will tell.

My piano is arriving at home today between 4-6 PM. As promised, I will get some video of me playing. I can't promise it will sound great because the piano will probably be very out of tune. Pianos normally need tuning after a move and it also wasn't very in tune when I played it at the store. The tuner should be out within a week or two.

I got a new...

Piano and a new job!! YAY!

Let's start with the more exciting topic.. my new piano =D I should get it probably on Tuesday of this next week. I am really, really excited. I will have to take some video of me playing and figure out how to post a video on here. I didn't get the piano that I showed in my prior post.. I ended gup getting a Samick 48" upright. Here is the beauty:

About my new job.. I will probably start either March 26th or April 2nd. I'm glad I got out of my current department when I did. I have a feeling that things will start going a little haywire here shortly when everyone is leaving because they feel like their position is being threatened. So, I am happy about my move; although, my shift/hours are really going to stink. I will be salaried now, but the position requires me to stay later in the day, until around 5'ish. I am so used to leaving work at 3:30 or 4 at the latest. I've been spoiled. We'll see though.. there is some flexiblity with that.

Jared's Grandma has shown some improvement, but we are not out of the woods yet. She could use prayers, if you think of her. Her name is Zelma.. here is a picture of us with her and my parents at Christmas time. This is from my FIL's camera:

Piano

I have wanted a real piano since I moved out of my parents house. Jared has finally agreed to buy me one! WOOHOO! We went tonight to look at new pianos and my parents came with us. This is the one that I will most likely get. I apologize that the photo is so poor. I am going to see it again on Thursday and will get a better pic at that time.

My mom found a baby grand that she loved, but she is probably just going to keep her piano that she has now. Here is my mom at the baby grand:

There were a few other pianos there that could work, just have to decide on which one I want and how much we want to pay.

I did see Ted on Sunday and that was alot of fun. He is a bit thinner than I like to see him, but he wasn't underweight by any means.. he is a really hard horse to keep in the winter. Here are some pics of him. I didn't ride because my family was with me. I will go up again soon and get on him though.

Dad, Jen and me

Ted getting a good brushing

After the brushing.. he still looks dirty.

Other news is that Jared's grandma had a stroke today. She survived, but things aren't looking great. My MIL, Judy, is flying out to Tacoma, WA tomorrow. Jared may join her later this week, but that is still left to be determined.

That's all for now.

? DPO

I am pretty sure I O'd yesterday/Saturday but, I am not quite sure. My cervix still has not dropped and closed up. I imagine it will at some point today though. Surely I am not still fertile, if my first +OPK was on Thursday. Usually you will O in the next 48 hours of a +OPK. Either way, we had some great timing and hopefully it will get us our BFP!

Last night we went to a going away party for some friends of ours. I was the designated photographer for the night. It was alot of fun! Even though I took most of the pics, I got a few with me in them.

Me and Jared

Lesley, Tracy and me

(Lesley is getting married in October and Tracy and I are 2 of her Bridesmaids. Hopefully I will be big and pregnant by then!)

Bye Scott, Tracy and Audrey! We will miss you!

Today I am going to see my horse, Ted. Guess he's really not mine anymore, but I can still pretend. I'll head up there after church, as long as it's not raining. I imagine I will bring my saddle so I can hop on him for a bit. It will feel so good to be back in the saddle.

Thank you all for all of your comments and support. I'm so blessed to have such great friends. I know God hears our prayers. I feel very good that Jared and I will get a BFP this month.

+OPK!!!

CD 16 and I got a very very very +OPK! YAY!! This was taken just a few short minutes after I started the test. It really darkened up even more after 10 or 15 minutes. Guess we all know what we'll be doin tonight. hehehe Hopefully making a little Kuntz.

I am so glad the weekend is almost here. Tomorrow, I should be hearing about the job that I interviewed for last week. I am really good friends with a girl that is in that department and although she can't come out and tell me the decision, I am pretty positive that they are offering it to me. So, that's exciting.

Well, I am so excited that I am having another "early" ovulation. And I am glad that I am prepared for it this month, unlike last month. We'll be using the Instead cup and Preseed tonight. Please Lord, let conception take place this month!

Ok, I gotta go get ready for bed aka.. BD!!!

Our appointment!

Our appointment went pretty well today.

The Dr. came into his office where we were waiting and first just introduced himself. He was a very nice man with quite a sense of humor. He made us feel very comfortable and we talked very openly with him.

He first started asking about our background and what tests we've had so far. At that point, I handed him a printout that I had done up that detailed each of my cycles and also Jared's semen analysis results. I went on to tell him about my progesterone level that was checked and also my HSG. Right away, he could see some issues with my cycle. Namely, my late ovulation pattern and my short luteal phases. I was so excited that he recognized this because those were the same things that I was concerned about. He also commented on my knowledge of my cycle and fertility issues and asked me "Now, why do you need me?" haha. funny.

He was not too impressed with Jared's semen analysis and said that while it is within a "normal" range, it is closer to the bottom of that range and combined with my cycle problems, he could see why we have been having some issues with TTC.

So, what we are going to do is this:
I need to have some blood drawn so we can do some more tests. The Dr. wants to check a couple different hormone levels to see if it may indicate PCOS. I might have 1 or 2 possible symptoms of this disorder but, maybe not. Hopefully we can rule that out but, if not.. I think it is still workable. I will probably get my blood drawn early next week.

Next step is to call the nurse line as soon as my next period starts (please Lord, let me be pregnant this month). If my period does come again, I am going to start Clomid. I will start out at 50MG on days 3-7. I will visit the Dr. again on days 13 or 14 and have an ultrasound to check out the size of my eggs. If there is one (or more) that is mature, they will give me an HCG shot to induce ovulation. We will be instructed to have intercourse that night since I will be ovulating and then we wait.

We will go through 2 cycles of this. If we are still not pg after 2 Clomid cycles, he wants to move us onto IUI's.

That's all that we talked about so far today and I think that is enough. haha. Both Jared and I feel really good about this though and are ready to do whatever it takes.

Another thing we discussed is that I had some mid-cycle spotting yesterday on CD 13. I have never had this before. I came home from work and noticed some pink but, it was gone by bed time and I haven't seen anything since. The Dr. said that it could be 1 of 2 things. Some women experience mid-cycle spotting before ovulation because the hormone estrogen dips and that could cause a small amount of spotting. Another reason could mean that my uterine lining quality is poor and that it is already starting to shed. Since I haven't noticed any more spotting, I doubt that it is my uterine lining but, who knows. I hope that I am just getting ready to ovulate. I have been having somewhat fertile signs by my CM and CP but my OPKs are still really faint. I haven't taken an OPK yet tonight but, I will in about another hour or so.

Well, that's all for now. I am having good thoughts that we will be preggers in the next few months :) Keep those prayers coming!

Jared fixed the car!

A few posts back, I wrote about how we backed into a snow plow truck that was behind our driveway. Well, we finally got the car fixed! Jared bought the new trunk lid and replaced the damaged one. He did a fantastic job! I am very proud of him :)

The smashed trunk:

The new trunk:

We have been searching for a new (used) truck and we found one that was a few hours away in Hutchison, KS. Jared talked with the car salesman a couple times today and decided that it was "the one" so we put a deposit down and made arrangements to drive down and pick it up tomorrow.

I was really excited about making the trip because a friend of mine from Babycenter, Staci, lived near Hutchison and I was so excited to get to meet her and her family! We set everything up with them so we could meet for lunch and be able to visit. Then tonight, as I was getting ready for bed and watching TV, Jared pulled a carfax on the truck, just to be sure we knew what we were getting. We were so dissapointed when it showed that it had been reposessed and also been in a collision with an animal. Uggh. Needless to say, we are not going to get it after all. (sorry Staci) :(

But, we will continue to search for another truck as we want to get a little bit cheaper one and also, since we don't have horses anymore, I don't need such a big truck to haul a trailer around.

Hopefully Stac and I can meet one of these days too.