Monday, March 31, 2008

Triple Tagged!

Wow. I've been triple tagged! Here goes.

For Jessie at Love+Love=Marriage and In Loco Parentis:

What is on my bedside table?

The rules -
Reference back to the blog that tagged you. Then post what you’ve got on the table (chair, nightstand, whatever) beside your bed. Leave nothing out. Nothing. Tag 3 other folks.

I must admit my bedside table is not very exciting. I hate clutter. Absolutely hate it. So, my bedside table merely houses the alarm clock, the basal body thermometer, the remote control for the fan, and some sheet spray from the Good Home Company. I also have a book on the bottom shelf, Bees in America. I'm still on my honeybee kick.

For the above meme, I tag Notes from Two Moms, Growing Our Little Bean Part II, and Mommy on the Floor.

For Lizzie at Two Chicks in Pursuit of a Babe:

Make A List of Five Things You Have to Get Done This Week, No Matter How Small

The Rules -
Reference back to the blog that sent you. Make a list of 5 things that you have to get done this week, no matter how small. Tag 2 other people.

My to-do list:
1) Buy tickets for this May's Lake Eden Arts Festival in Black Mountain, North Carolina. (If any of you are in the area, or even if you are not and want to travel, this is a great festival. Join us!)
2) Email the jeweler who made Dana's wedding ring about a chip in one of her sapphires.
3) Buy a membership to the Levine Museum of the New South (one of my very best friend is the director of development and I promised I would before the end of March.)
4) Over seed our lawn.
5) Take a home pregnancy test (or two, or three!)

For this meme I tag Sarah at Mrs. Bluemont's House of Things and In Loco Parentis.

Saturday, March 29, 2008

Still Here, Still Waiting

8 DPO and still waiting. Waiting for the two week wait to conclude. Waiting for any sign prior to the conclusion. I got nothin' so far but I am still cautiously optimistic. Earlier on in this two week wait dare I say that something inside of me that I cannot explain told me a little blastocyst was making its way down my fallopian tubes and preparing itself to settle in for nine months. That same something inside me has been telling me the past two days that this cycle will end with the two week wait and we'll be back to square one just in time for an April IUI. Tomorrow that feeling will probably tell me something entirely different and equally as confusing, corroborated by my less than helpful temperature chart that looks nothing like any of my past cycles.

Monday, March 24, 2008

3 days down, 11 to go

OK, maybe 9 to go, if do a home pregnancy test on Wednesday the 2nd. Friday the 4th is the day the RE will have me in for a blood test if I do not start my cycle. I thought this two week wait was going to be easy because I have been waiting since Friday, February 1st, the day we knew the pregnancy was over. We waited to miscarry. Then we waited for the next cycle to start. Then we waited to ovulate. All the waiting totaled about 7 weeks. I thought surely these two weeks would go by in a flash after all that waiting. Nope. Not in the least. Sigh....

Friday, March 21, 2008

Release!

Swimmers have been released. The IUI went much more smoothly this time than in January and I had very little cramping. Hopefully this is a sign of good things to come. Happy Friday!

Thursday, March 20, 2008

Tomorrow, Tomorrow

Blood work showed progesterone was not high enough to indicate ovulation so we go back tomorrow morning. If numbers look good tomorrow, then the insemination will be tomorrow. I suspected this might be the case as today is CD 14. Prior to the miscarriage, I pretty consistently ovulated on CD 15, or at least no earlier than CD 15. It all works out just fine because I have an acupuncture appointment this evening to help build Qi and move the little egg down the fallopian tubes. Go egg go!

Wednesday, March 19, 2008

Surging!

The smiley face appeared this morning and my excitement is building for our upcoming insemination. Could we be lucky enough to get pregnant again? Two times in a row? And have this one last the full 40 weeks? Seems a lot to ask of the powers that be but I am holding out hope nonetheless. Blood test will be tomorrow at 7 AM and if progesterone levels indicate ovulation, the swimmers will be released around 11 AM. Hooray!

Sunday, March 16, 2008

Meet Tango



Meet our newest addition, a baby mini-lop we call Tango. Isn't Tango the cutest baby bunny you've ever seen?

Wednesday, March 12, 2008

The Break Down

I have this Golden Rule I abide by when running road races. Never wear the race T-Shirt, not even to sleep in, unless I've accomplished the goal and finished the race. I suppose I have always felt it will jinx me in some less-than-positive way. And so I pledged with all things baby - do not buy a thing until we've accomplished our goal and we're pregnant, very pregnant. We did not break my unspoken rule, even for the brief month I was pregnant in January.

We broke down last night while working at our one night a week part time gig. I came across this onesie at our store, and we bought it. Sweat Peas are my very favorite flower and practically from the day we met, Dana has called me Sweet Pea. We couldn't resist. Sigh. I hope we have not jinxed ourselves....

Monday, March 10, 2008

Here We Go Again

Here we are. CD 4. Waiting again. There is way too much waiting in this game we play. I've been waiting for CD1 since February 1st, the day the RE told us I would miscarry. CD1 seemed it would never arrive and of course it did not arrive on time. To be expected after such an event I suppose. Now we wait for the day to start OPK testing. And then we wait for the positive. And then for the results of the blood test. And then for the IUI. And then the two week wait. So much damn waiting.

Saturday, March 8, 2008

A Tribute To Our BUN

I have been mulling this post in my head for a long while, unsure of where to start or exactly what to write. As I was in the grocery store this afternoon, I passed our BUN's favorite staples - kale, parsley, cilantro, apples. Tearing up, I realized I would never find the exact words to pay tribute to the BUN. There is no happy ending to this story, but plenty of happy and love up to the very end.

I will begin with the tragic end so I can move on to and finish with what is to be remembered about our little guy. Week before last Dana and I headed to New Orleans; I had a work seminar to attend. As is our regular practice, we brought our two dogs and the BUN to my mother for safe keeping while we were away. Shortly after my plane landed on Wednesday morning I called my mother, not to check in, but just to call. She answered the phone in a groggy voice and I assumed I woke her from sleep. Within seconds I realized what I sensed in her voice was not tiredness, but sadness. "The BUN died last night" she said. I was in shock. He wasn't old. He wasn't sick. "What happened?"

A little background....When the BUN visits and stays with my mother he lived cage free in her over-sized bathroom. He was litter trained and absolutely loved the freedom so life was good. Except for the pack of dogs that have longed to get in the bathroom for the past years. The bathroom door is kept closed religiously.

But not that night. My mother was in the bathroom, cleaning the BUN's litter and left a crack in the door. In an instant the lab mix nosed her way into the bathroom and in less than a few seconds had the BUN in her mouth. The little guy died of shock as is common in rabbits when they are severely stressed. Their little hearts already beats 130 to 350 times a minute so it takes very little to send them into a state from which the heart will not recover.

So here is a tribute to our BUN and all the wonderful years we spent with him. While he often chewed our carpet, the baseboards, the laptop charger cord, the sheet rock in the garage, and various other household items, he provided us with much entertainment through his antics and his larger than life personality. He loved us with all of his little bunny heart and we loved him. My fondest memories are burying my face in his soft fur while he let me nuzzle with him for minutes on end. And it will probably be a long, long, long time before I can walk through the produce at the grocery store without thoughts of the BUN hopping through my head.

Wednesday, March 5, 2008

My First Tagging

Thank you j. k-c. for tagging me. I am now no longer a tagging virgin.

Here are the rules:
1. Grab the nearest book of 123 pages or more
2. Turn to page 123
3. Find the first five sentences and write them down
4. Invite five friends to do the same

OK, so I am a bit of a dork and my latest interest is the colony collapse disorder phenomena whereby honeybees are disappearing from their hives for unexplained reasons. They aren't dying in the hives, just flat out disappearing. This is really quite scary once one realizes just how important the honeybee is to our food sources. I digress.... This has sparked my interest in the amazing honeybee and so right now I am reading Sweetness and Light, The Mysterious History of the Honeybee by Hattie Ellis which is on my bedside stand.

There are only four sentences on page 123 because the majority of the page is taken up by a sketch of the directions below. The following words describe how to track down a honeybee in 18th Century America and was formulated by Paul Dudley in 1721:

"His book, an account of a method found in New England for discovering where the bees hive in the woods in order to get their honey, advises putting honey on a plate or trencher and releasing a bee that has been caught foraging. Mark the line it takes on a piece of paper. Then go to another spot not too far away, and release another bee. The two angles marked together will help the hunter find the direction of the tree."

It seems most of you have already been tagged since I am late in the game here so sadly, I am failing on my duty to tag others. Oh well....