I'm not lost...I promise!

Sorry for the absence lately.  This past year was pretty crazy, so I'll do the super short version:

I allowed our church intern to stay at my house over the summer.  Long story short, I won't do it again.  It was probably the worst 3 months ever, and she wasn't the most respectful person to share a place with either.

The missions trip was fun.  We had issues with one of the junior high kids, but I think it was mainly because it was his first time away from the parents and he thought he could get away with murder.  Yeah, not so much.

DH's deployment went be super fast and he came home late September.  He had almost the entire month of October off which was really nice.  We had a ton of fun just spending time together.

Because DH got back later than we had hoped, our IVF got pushed to January.  We spent a lot of time getting all of our IF testing redone and all the records sent to the IVF office.  Thank goodness I have an amazing GYN and a nurse to work with!  They were such a huge help!

So now, January. We started our IVF cycle January 11 with a baseline ultrasound, labs, and stops at the pharmacy and medical supply offices.  Over the following few days, we had a med class/orientation, and then we got started!  Five days later, we had another ultrasound and I was stimming super-fast, so they added a different med to help block my pituitary gland so I wouldn't O on my own.  Five days of appointments, ultrasounds, and lab work later, I was ready to trigger.  Retrieval was 2 days later and went really well.  They got 16 eggs and 13 of them fertilized.  Transfer was scheduled for 3 days later, and we were so excited!  Transfer day came and the doc met with us pre-transfer.  All of our embies were 7-10 cells and grades A/B (mostly A's).  We were pretty happy.  However, the doc said unless we were super okay with the possibility of twins, he said we could wait and do a 5dt.

After much debating, we decided to up our chances a little and wait a couple more days and transfer 1 blastocyst.  Saturday was T-day and everything went super smoothly.  They gave us an ultrasound pic of the embryo in my uterus too (our baby's first picture!).  The next day, we found out we had 11 embryos make it to cryo!  So now it's officially a waiting game.  We go in for Beta #1 on Feb 8, so I'm really hoping these next few days go by super fast.

Aside from that, I'm really not liking my job and seriously thinking about quitting shortly.  There's a lot of non-communication that is happening and super high unrealistic expectations for a single person and it's way too much stress for the amount of the paychecks that I receive.  Come to find out, it's an on-going problem for the church office.  One of the previous employees had the same problems that I'm facing now.  I've been looking elsewhere but haven't found much that's catching my eye.

I've also decided I want to go back to school for something that would be a little more useful while we're in the military.  I'm waiting to hear back on my application, but in the meantime, I've been researching and applying for scholarships and grants.  I'm hoping that I can do the college thing and have very little to no out-of-pocket expense on our part.

It's Friday! It's Friday! *happy dance*

'Tis Friday!  Yippee!!

Last Friday, my GI office called me to let me know that the abdominal ultrasound they had me do came back normal (surprise...surprise...).  After a very confusing convo with the nurse (she was confusing...what she said and what she was trying to mean were 2 different things), I found out I had to schedule yet another follow-up appt with the NP.  I have that appt on Monday, so we'll see what she says.  I have a feeling she'll leave me with "You have IBS" and ship me out the door.

Wednesday, I started working part-time at our church.  I'm basically a gopher/odds and ends kinda person for awhile until I get more comfortable with things there and learn how they do stuff.  So far it's been pretty slack.  The pay isn't quite what I was expecting, but at least we'll be having a little extra income coming in, and I'll be somewhat busy while Hubby is gone.

Has anyone else not filed their taxes yet?  The wonderful military screwed up a W-2 for Hubby, so we are still waiting for that to be changed.  I basically have the forms all filled out - I just need that one W-2 so I can finish them up and ship them off.  From what I can tell, we should be getting almost enough to cover our IVF cycle!!  woo-hoo!!

Speaking of which, I received another call from the IVF office.  The nurse/coordinator had a few questions for me and wanted to let me know that they'd be sending me a packet of info for the August cycle/rotation.  However, after talking with her, we unfortunately had to move Hubby and I into the January 2011 rotation.  Hubby will get back a few weeks too late for us to do the August round.  I'm a little bummed about it, but at least we'll still have somewhat of a date to look forward to!

Every year, I always plant a flower garden.  This year (of course) will be no different.  I've already started redoing the flower beds to get them prepped.  Also this year, I decided to start the flowers indoors using seeds instead of purchasing the plants from a store.  Last year, we spent near $100 on just a few plants.  This year we'll need more to fill the flower beds, so I decided to get on the ball and start them early as well as save us some money!!  Well, I already have little plants poking through the dirt in their cups.  I'm excited to know that we'll actually get some flowers from this.  I'm always cautious about starting plants from seeds because I don't want to spend all that time planting them and then have nothing come up for whatever reason.  It's always a gamble, but so far it's paying off for us!  Yay!!

That's my week in a nutshell.   See, I told ya it wouldn't be 2 months between posts!!  haha

2 months?!?!?!?!?

Wow...I didn't realize it had been nearly 2 months since I last posted on here!  What a horrible blogger I've been!  In my defense, it has been a pretty crazy 2 months.  I'll do the super short update version: 

• We've settled in to the new house.  It took me awhile to find places to put things.
• Hubby was away at training for 2 weeks, then home for about 5.  He's now officially deployed overseas and his six month timeline has now started.
• I was offered a part-time position at our church (completely unexpected), but had also just applied for a position in the county coroner's office.  Since my degree would actually be used in a coroner's office, I held out hope that I'd get that job.  Nearly a month after the job closed, I finally got ahold of someone and found out that the position was filled.  (Notice how I contacted them?  I didn't hear a dang thing from them after I received a notice that they got my application.) I have yet to get any actual notification from the office.
• I'm thinking super-baby-fever has hit my friends here.  A couple of them are now officially TTC and some of them will probably be shortly.  Oh how I wish I could be in that situation as well...
• I've kept losing weight, which isn't a good thing.  The doctors can't seem to figure out why or what's wrong with me.  I had a colonoscopy done which came back normal (I could have told them it would).  The pre-colonoscopy labwork revealed that my Lipase levels are elevated.  (Lipase is an enzyme produced by the pancreas.)  My number came back nearly 80 units higher than the cut-off.  So, the doc wants me to have a CT scan done, but my NP decided that I'm too young to be exposed to so much radiation and instead ordered an ultrasound for me.  I have a feeling I'll end up having to do the CT scan anyways.  
• Last week I received a call from the IVF clinic in TX.  They asked if I had done the Clomid Chal.lenge Te.st which I have.  Apparently, the doctor has stashed my records somewhere and the IVF coordinator and nurses haven't seen them yet.  Anyways...they informed me that they had an opening in the April rotation and asked if I were interested.  We were so close!!  Hubby had just left the week before which meant no April IVF round for us.  I was a little bummed.  But I think it will be for the better though.  When Hubby gets back, we'll be a little more financially prepared for everything.  The only downside is that if he's not back by a certain time, our currently scheduled slot in the August rotation will be moved.  Which means we won't be able to start IVF until January 2011.
• Once again, I've decided to load my summer with more yardwork.  The flower beds at the house are horrendous so I've taken it upon myself to basically strip everything out of them, and start new with nearly everything.  
• I've also decided to join our youth group on a missions trip this summer to Mississippi.  From what I've learned, I'll be the only adult female going which could be a good thing or a bad thing.  I've been asked to plan the meals (no problem), but I also have a feeling that I'll get pushed into stereotypical "female" roles while we're there.  We'll be doing construction work and also VBS amidst other things.  Personally, I'm more of a hands-on dig-in and get dirty type person.  I'm not a VBS teacher kinda girl.  Not to mention that there will be an opportunity to go deep-sea fishing.  I don't think I'll be able to do that though because it overlaps with the same time that the kids will be given the chance to take a boat ride to an island/state park.  As much fun as the latter sounds, I'd rather be on a boat catching some crazy fish!  We'll see what happens though.  The trip isn't until July so things may change.

That's a shorter version of the past 8 weeks. I haven't completely vanished, just been a little busy.  Plus with the gorgeous weather we've had, who would want to be inside all the time?  :) 

Until next time...(which will be shorter than 2 months!)