Test results

Yesterday was the day I went in to have my bloodwork done to see if there was a reason I haven't gotten pregnant yet. They checked my thyroid again, my CBC, and other stuff I can't remember. While I was there, I asked the nurse if they could do a blood pregnancy test to see if I was pregnant since I was supposed to ovulate last Friday. So, we did. I asked when the results from the labs would be ready and she told me to call this morning. I did. BFN. Nope, not pregnant. And you know, I'm okay. The good news from everything was that all my labs were "within normal range". So, I can only be optimistic that now I've started Clomid, it is just a matter of time before I see a "+" sign. I remember the first month I was on Clomid when we were TTC Preslei and I just didn't "feel" like that was the month and sure enough, it wasn't. The second month, I just knew in the bottom of my heart, I had gotten pregnant. I remember my Mom telling me to try to not get my hopes up and I was like, "I know Mom but I just feel it. I know I am." and low and behold, I was.

While I'm still not going to rule out that I'm NOT pregnant because I don't know if I ovulated or not last week, I'm totally okay that it didn't happen this month. I feel peace about it. I am just VERY thankful that all my labs came back fine and I'm "normal".

Until next time.....

My first blog award :o)

Is it dumb/dorky that I am "excited" to get my first blog award? LOL, yeah, apparently, it doesn't take much to make me feel special.  :o)

I received this from Amanda and I have enjoyed reading her blogs.  I have just started following her and I went blog hopping one day and found her blog while reading someone I saw on Kelly's Korner blog that was from Valdosta, GA (about 45 minutes from here).   I just realized that Amanda is from Flowery Branch, GA and that name sticks in my mind because my high school football team played them in State Championship playoffs one year.  Actually, I think we've played them more than once.  Go Cairo Syrupmakers! HA!

So, here are the rules:

1.  Link back to and thank the person who gave you the award
2.  Share 7 things about yourself
3.  Award 5 stylish blogs you read
4.  Contact them and let them know you've given them the award!


Here are 7 totally random things about myself:

1.  I absolutely HATE HATE HATE the beach.  The feeling of sand makes me want to vomit.  BUT....Preslei LOVES the beach so, I tolerate it.  Before her, I would take a bed sheet and FREAK OUT if sand got on my sheet.  Now, I "waller" (lol, southern term I just threw out there...it means rolling around) in the sand with her because it makes her happy.  Ahhhh the things us parents do to make our kids happy.

2.  Child pageants.......oh. my. GOSH.  Are these parents certified crazy?!?! Now, I don't have as strong of feelings for NORMAL pageants but these "glitz" pageants are just nuts.  Why would you want your 2-10 year old child to look like a porn star? I mean, HELLO!!!!! There are SICK people in this world.  It just appalling to me.  Big Time.  

3.  My family.....I ADORE my family.  I honestly don't know what I would do without them.  Period.

4.  I want to host a show on a local news station and call it "Ambush Makeover".  I absolutely LOVE styling people.  Granted, it doesn't reflect well on my styling capabilities when I could dress myself much better but it is so much easier styling skinny people! I have always said that you can dress cute on a budget.  I would love to just ambush unsuspecting people in a mall or somewhere and give them impromptu makeovers.

5.  I absolutely LOVE to travel but have barely gone anywhere in my adult life.  Biggest places I've been since turning 18 have been the Bahamas (who hasn't been there?!?!) and Alaska.  When we were growing up, my family was like the National Lampoons and we packed up the car and drove all over the US during summer break.  So. much. fun.  I would like to experience all those places again but as an adult.  If I could choose anywhere in the world to go, I would love to go to the UAE.  I just think it would be amazing to experience a completely different culture and they are SO conservative that it would be amazing to visit.

6.    Yeah, the above totally describes me.  Although, I must say, I am VERY fortunate to have a husband that loves cooking and 5/7 nights, he's cooking.  So grateful for that.  I honestly have no idea why I hate cooking but it is SO boring to me! I don't know if it is my self diagnosed A.D.D. that gets in the way (I always laugh at myself about that) or just my incapabilities.  If I cook, its simple stuff like spaghetti, casseroles, crock pot recipes, etc.  I just get impatient with it.  It takes too long to cook.  I actually love baking though.  I love the fact you can whip up desserts, shove them in the oven and just wait for them to bake.  Maybe I should take cooking classes.......

7.  I would love to have 10 kids.  Seriously.  I want to have my own biological kids but I want to adopt as well.  Only time will tell if that happens.


I am passing this award to:

Jenny @ A Journey from Hope to Grace

Amanda @ The Layne Family

Emily @ The Journey of Parenthood

Rachel @ Homemade Happenings

Ashlee @ Across the Branch



Hope you enjoyed reading and thanks again Amanda for giving me my first blog award!!! xoxo

Anxious

I am trying so hard to not let this baby making consume my thoughts but it is SO hard not to! I feel like I have been counting down the days until I go have my bloodwork done (which is Thursday) and then when I will be able to take a pregnancy test.  I keep telling myself that there is no way I will get lucky and get pregnant the first month on Clomid but then I wonder if I'm just trying to convince myself that so I won't be sad if I get a BFN.  I can't wait for the day I get a positive test result and be able to carry out my plans of announcing the news.  I can't wait to be able to start buying newborn stuff again.  It is all so exciting. 

Then, I think....."Amanda, STOP being so impatient!" There are SOOO many women that don't even have their first child yet and have been TTC for 5-10 years or those women that have to use IVF and start birth control, shots, egg retrieval and implantation.  I think it is human nature for someone to be impatient for something they yearn for but I have got to learn to leave it to God and just pray about it.  If it is in His will for it to happen, it will happen. 

Side note.....(I swear, I have self diagnosed ADD) but do you ever have those moments where someone says something and you are like, "WOW, I was JUST thinking that!" or along those lines?  That has happened to me more than a few times recently.  Crazy actually.  I have an "internet" friend, Jenny, that I swear, she and I think alike in so many ways, but she and I were discussing baby names a few weeks ago on Facebook and she mentioned a boy's name that I had always liked and it is NOT popular and then she was showing me a pattern for a dress she is wanting to make for her daughter, Bella, and the day or so prior, I was on Zulily.com (love that site) and saw the same pattern and thought that it would be super cute on Preslei.  THEN....(just weird to me) I saw a picture of a girl named Sara's, crib bedding she had custom made and the same night Jenny and I were chatting on FB, I was looking online on ebay for fabric to send to Jenny and saw this particular print and thought to myself how it would make a beautiful crib set and dang if that wasn't the same fabric Sara posted a few days later.  Lastly, one of my very dear friends has learned some upsetting news for her family and we talked this morning and she quoted scripture that she read that eased her mind and it was the same scripture I had read the other day and it eased my mind about this baby making thing.  It's just freaky, lol. 

So, back to the main topic, I am SO ready to get the bloodtests back and to be able to get thru next week so I can take a pregnancy test.  I'm NOT going to get my hopes up because I'm trying to tell myself if I'm not pregnant the 2nd month (took me 2 months on Clomid to get pregnant with Preslei) then I can start "justifying" getting anxious. 

Thankful

I am so thankful Jesus died for US so that we can LIVE.  I have had "Amazing Love" stuck in my head since yesterday so I went to youtube to find a video and found this video and I just cried imaging all the pain and torture that Jesus endured for US.  Because of Him, I am able to live my life and enjoy my family.    Being a parent, I can't imagine how God felt when He sent his only Son to die for our sins.

So it starts.....again.

I feel like I'm being such a bad blogger for not posting as frequent as I should but life is just busy! When I started this blog, I wanted it to be a place where I could discuss anything but mainly keep it focused on Preslei. I didn't want everyone and their brother here in town to know about it (hopefully they don't) because I want this to be my own little journal. Somewhere I can go and just type and let it all out and have people out there that relate to me. There is a weird sense of comfort knowing there are people that are going thru what you are yet aren't from your town that you feel "exposed" (If that makes sense).

I feel like I need to be honest about something and give my reasons behind my "semi-dishonesty".  I blogged some time ago about Keith and I being content with Preslei being an only child for right now.  Well, that isn't the case.  Keith and I have been trying to get pregnant since last summer to no avail.  I feel that in a way, I am trying to tell myself that it is okay we aren't pregnant to not get upset/depressed about it.  We had decided that we would start Clomid again during the summer if nothing happened.  Well, as of yesterday, we are back on Clomid.  As much as it kills me, hurts me, saddens me, etc. that we had to go this route, yet again, I can only be optimistic that we will have our 2nd child in our arms soon.  We, well, I, have only told a very very select few about our journey because I absolutely 100% don't want our families to know.  While yes, support is a GREAT thing, I just don't want them knowing.....yet.  I want to be able to surprise them with the news we are expecting again.  So.....if by chance any of my family is reading this, then DO NOT tell me you know, LOL.  :o) and do NOT tell my Mom! If we get pregnant this month, I have the perfect surprise in mind on the big reveal.

The reason we started a few months before we originally discussed is because I hadn't had a period since January 28th when I called to make the appointment.  I was SO worried that all my problems had come back.  I made the doctor appointment last Thursday and on Friday, I started my period.  So typical.  Lol.  My original appointment was supposed to be this Thursday but since we were wanting to do Clomid again and I started my period Friday, I wanted to get in sooner so I could start Clomid this month.  (You take Clomid either CD3-7 or CD5-9 and CD5 was yesterday).  I called and explained the situation and I was seen yesterday.  I got total reassurance of our decision to go back to Dr. Morales yesterday.  I was as nervous as a whore in church but as soon as Dana (his nurse) called my name, I felt like I was home again.  I'm telling you, she and Dr. M are absolute GOD-SENDS.  I had also blogged about a year ago that since Keith was working at EMC and we got new insurance because of that, our insurance company no longer deemed my BELOVED OB/GYN "in network".  I switched doctors and I was only semi-impressed.  After praying, talking and praying some more, we decided to go back to Dr. Morales and just pay the out of network costs.  Instead of $500 ded. and 80/20, the out of network costs are $1K ded and a 60/40 split.  Ugh....but, there isn't a price tag for comfort, security and peace of mind. 

Only different thing we are doing this go-around is bloodwork.  When I was on Clomid before Preslei, he just asked me to chart my temps and bam! I got pregnant on the 2nd month of Clomid.  I will have bloodwork done on Thursday, April 28, to check all my levels to see if I've ovulated and to see if anything else is causing me not to get pregnant. 

So.....here I sit.  Anxious, nervous, scared yet excited to be on this journey again. 

Disney World 3-25-2011

Preslei's birthday present from me and Keith was a trip to Disney World! This child has become SO obsessed with the princesses I thought this would be the PERFECT birthday present.  We only live about 4 hours north of Orlando so we took advantage.  Plus, Keith has never been! (Such a deprived man, LOL)  Since we are such a close-knit family, I asked my parents to come.  Of course, I didn't have to twist their arm when I told them I wanted them to be a part of Preslei's first trip to "Cinderwella's Castle" (that is what P calls Disney World).  Since Preslei was NEVER a fan of carousels, I just wanted to do a day trip to get a feel of how she was going to do.  Disney is CRAZY expensive and rather than spend a lot of money and her not like it, we just decided to save a few bucks and try it out.  We left that Friday morning around 6am and got into the actual park around 2pm.  We stopped and found a little bench and ate our sandwiches that we packed and off we went down to Cinderella's castle.  They had just started doing a little show at the castle so we watched that.  After that, I noticed the castmembers taping off sections of the road (a tip I heard from a friend is that when they do that, they are getting ready for a parade and to grab a spot on the curb) so we sat down at a prime spot and waited about 30 minutes for the parade to start.  It was AWESOME.  The cool thing was when we bought our tickets, the lady asked if we were celebrating anything and we said Preslei's birthday so they gave her this Happy Bday button for her to wear and every castmember that passed by told her Happy Birthday.  Now, the cool part is during the parade, Princess Tiana saw Preslei and waved and said "Happy Birthday princess!"  Of course, I cried.  LOL.  After the parade, we walked to where the meet and greet was for the princesses (Cinderella, Aurora & Belle) and it was a 50 minute wait.  We decided to wait (of course) because the main things I wanted Preslei to do while we were there was 1. See Cinderella's castle; 2. Meet the princesses; 3.  Ride the teacups, dumbo and It's a Small World.

So, when we walked into the building to get in line, my Mom went and sat in a window sill and I noticed she was really tired.  I asked if everything was okay and she said, "I'm just really hot".  It was SCORCHING hot that day for it to be the end of March.  It felt like the middle of July.  So next thing I notice was my Mom and Dad walking out and she said she just needed to get some air.  I was worried but I wasn't freaking out at this point.  I look outside and my Mom is sitting on a ledge with her head in her hands hunched over.  I tell Keith to stay in line and I'll be back.  By the time I get to her, she starts slipping and says she needs to sit down.  Scariest thing EVER.  I just sit on the ground and take my Mom and lay her down and put her head in my lap while my Dad is trying to get some help.  It was so frantic because I felt so helpless.  I just started pouring water over her head and some castmembers got me a large cup of ice water and napkins so I put watered down napkins on her forehead, the back of her neck and on her wrists.  The paramedics came about 10 minutes later and her vitals were fine and she started coming back around.  Preslei and Keith had came back outside and Preslei was just standing there like a deer in headlights so I just said that "Nonna is laying down because she is really sleepy and that she was fine.  Just needed a nap."  So, we put her in wheelchair and off to the First Aid station we went.  The paramedics said that it was a combination of the heat, Mom only having Diet Cokes to drink that day and a pain pill she took earlier that made her almost pass out.  The First Aid station had a little rooms and Mom wanted to rest.  Instinctively, I wanted to stay with her but she insisted that we go ahead and take Preslei to do other stuff.  Keith and I decided to take her to ride the teacups and Dumbo.  It seriously took us 2 hours to ride 2 rides.  Crazy.  After Dumbo, we went back to the First Aid station and Mom was awake and she and Dad were waiting on us.  We decided that we had enough for one day but wanted to wait for the princesses again so we put Mom back in the wheelchair and we waited in line.  Preslei slept the entire wait time and we finally met the princesses.  It was just amazing.  They really take their time with the kids and talk to them and hug and kiss them.  It was awesome. 

Unfortunately, Keith left my cell phone in the car and I forgot to charge the battery for the camera so we didn't get our own pictures of Preslei and the princesses except for one of her and Belle.  Now, we have to buy the pictures ($15 each!!) to have our memories. 

We are definitely going back but we are going to go back during winter and during the "dead" time, which according to the nurse at First Aid, is the 2nd week of January.  This was our learning experience.  :)

3-19-11 Preslei's movie premiere party

Still can't believe that we celebrated Preslei's THIRD birthday!!! AHHHH!!!!

Since Preslei absolutely LOVES movies, we decided the best thing to do was to have a "movie premiere" party at our local theatre.  We live in a super small rural Southern town in Georgia and our movie theatre has a very old, retro vibe about it. 

I asked all the kids to come dressed as their favorite movie characters and it was the cutest thing EVER! They watched "The Little Mermaid" and we served pizza, drinks, popcorn and for the cake, I made popcorn cupcakes! 

We had an amazing time and feel so blessed to be able to celebrate Preslei's birthday with amazing friends and family.

 (Since I pinned my cupcakes on Pinterest, if you want to know how to make them, just leave a comment and I will reply!)

WHY?!?!

I want to scream at the top of my lungs and ask God "WHY?!?! Why Lord are you not preventing such awful tragedies from happening to undeserving people?!"

I. JUST. DON'T. UNDERSTAND.

I sit here with a very heavy heart yet again for friends of mine that just welcomed their 3rd daughter, Hollyn Joanna, into the world on Thursday, March 31, 2011, only to have her life taken away just 2 short days later.  Eric & Victoria Walden are two of the most amazing parents and people.  They were high school sweethearts and married soon after and Eric enlisted in the Navy.  Victoria has always been one of those Moms you want to be like.  Eric has always been one of those guys that would give you the shirt off his back.  He is the most kind-hearted person and no matter where you are, if he sees you, he will give you the biggest hug and ask how you are doing.  They are just those type of people.  Victoria is always smiling and they ALWAYS have their daughters, Aubrey and Kenleigh, with them.  So for something like this to happen to them, I just don't understand.  At all.  How can a precious, healthy baby be taken away from them so soon?  This family has been thru SO SO much already.  Hollyn was named after Eric's best friend that was killed some time ago (not sure how or when) and Eric's nephew was killed in a TRAGIC train accident several months ago and now this.  It just isn't fair. 

The hardest part for me to grasp is why do people who are crappy parents, addicts, etc. always get everything they want.  People that you encounter that treat their children like an inconvenience or a bother shouldn't even be allowed to have children.  I know you're supposed to say "things happen for a reason" but dang it, they shouldn't.  What kind of reason is there for these tragedies? It seems the older I get and as time progresses, the more prevalent these things are.  I know that we aren't put here on this Earth to understand the hows and whys but it is human nature to want answers.

As I have said before, I have read about and met some of the bravest women I know for being able to "overcome" their own losses and tragedies and I can only pray to the Lord above that Eric and Victoria will find some peace and comfort. 

The righteous perish, and no one takes it to heart; the devout are taken away, and no one understands that the righteous are taken away to be spared from evil.  Isaiah 57:1