Foto Friday

I picked the prints and CD up this afternoon from our photo shoot last month! Here are a few of my favorites. I will share some more in the coming days.

Nadia had her first experience with a homeschool co-op today. We left our house at 7:55am to drive to Mifflinburg where she had four hours of classes with 13 other children ages K-3rd grade. There were also classes for the older students. I was hoping there would be other moms to visit with in the nursery, but Ian, Oliver, and I had the nursery to ourselves. We also spent some time outside at the church's small playground. I was able to do some reading on my Kindle while the boys played. She used watercolors in her art class, did science experiments, participated in a Bible class, had a snack, and cut out pictures of mammals from magazine.

After it was done, we spent about 45 minutes in a McDonald's PlayLand before heading to the library for their Peach Party in honor of the Roald Dahl's birthday and the 50th anniversary of the book James and the Giant Peach. We were the only ones who showed up for the party! Miss Mary (the librarian) had fun activities planned. Nadia and Ian enjoyed the craft, eating peaches, and playing games with orange balloons.  Yesterday the ivf nurse called me to say the RE wanted me to come in for an ultrasound today. Previously they had told me I wouldn't need to come back this quickly. I told her that my schedule was very full for tomorrow. I had called on Wednesday, and usually they call me back the same day. I could have easily gone in for an ultrasound on Thursday if they had called me back on Wednesday. I told the nurse that over the past nine years I had done more than 10 medicated cycles with them, and every single time I got the "all clear" report from the day 2 or 3 ultrasound. I asked her if she could ask the doctor if it was really necessary for me to come in today. Thankfully, he agreed to let me skip it. Paul picked up the pills and some additional needles yesterday evening on his way home from work. I am still taking one Lupron injection each morning, and as of today I am also taking one estrogen pill twice a day.

My next appointment is scheduled for the 20th, and Paul will meet me there so we can both sign the consent. If all goes well at that appointment, they'll give me the last prescription (progresterone suppositories) and schedule the embryo transfer. Please keep praying! It would be amazing if this resulted in our fourth child and the pregnancy didn't resemble Oliver's. From a statistical standpoint, one would say the chances are very low, as with Nadia (another single FET) they said we had about a 15% chance. We have had four embryo transfers thus far (nine embryos altogether), and three of those have resulted in births. The only transfer that didn't result in a pregnancy was the first one, which was a three day (embryo) transfer. The other three transfers were all five day (blastocyst) transfers. This upcoming transfer will also be a five day (blastocyst) transfer. Our experience has been very different than most of the patients at this clinic (as seen by their annual statistics). God is in control.

I keep reminding myself of that because part of me keeps wondering why we weren't allowed to transfer three embryos in January 2012, as we had in the past. If that had happened, we wouldn't be doing a FET right now. Although I'm nervous about possibly experiencing another difficult pregnancy, I'm also dreading ending our ttc journey on a sour note with a negative hpt. I have had a good taste in my mouth (so to speak) from our ttc efforts from Nadia's positive (11/07) to Oliver's (1/12), which is not something I've taken for granted after staring at many negative hpts from 2002-2007. Which ever way this turns out, I am looking forward to knowing the end result. As I was sorting through the kids clothes recently, I was wondering if I should hold on to the things Oliver and Nadia have outgrown or not (I am saving Ian's for Oliver). I am very grateful for our three precious children, and I can definitely be content if our family is complete, although I am sure there will still be a little sadness over the loss of this final embryo, if it doesn't result in a pregnancy. This is my very last trip on the ttc emotional rollercoaster. Thank you, Lord. After 11 years, I've had enough.