I am thankful for...

1. The pleasure of having Nadia take two short naps in my arms on our flights. What a wonderful feeling it is to have a sweet baby sleep on your chest. Ah....

2. How good Nadia was when she was in the Snugli while I was at the airports. She never fussed At All and once I had checked in my luggage she grabbed on to one of my fingers with each of her hands. That's another great feeling - to have a sweet tiny hand holding on to one of your fingers.

3. The time we got to spend with Wendy and her family. I wish I got to see my siblings and their children more often, but I am very grateful for the time we do get together especially when the university pays for my trip. :-)

4. The fact that AF came today. Yay! Normally I don't celebrate getting AF. Usually there is almost a feeling of depression associated with that, but in this case I only felt a huge sense of relief. I am having my FSH b/w tomorrow morning at my primary care doctor's office (which is closer than the RE), and Thursday I go back on the bcp. I have an appt with the RE nurse for April 6 to be given my Lupron which I'll start on April 7 and another appt with the RE on April 16 for my baseline b/w and u/s which means I should start the Follistim and Menopur on April 17. PTL that my body cooperated, and hopefully it will continue to cooperate each step of the way!!!

5. The fact that one of Paul's professors is at a conference this week so his MWF classes were cancelled. He stayed home yesterday as he can get more work done w/o spending 3 hours on the road. It was nice to be home with him yesterday until I left for school at 2:45pm.

6. Nadia's good health. I think she inherited Daddy's genes rather than mine in terms of propensity towards illness. PTL! Before I had turned 1 year old I had already been hospitalized for pnumonia, had a few ear infections, etc. To our knowledge she hasn't yet had a fever, cold, infection, etc. What a blessing! She goes to the doctor next week for her 9 month check-up. I don't think she gets any shots this time. Whew...

Home Sweet Home

Here are some pics that I took at the science museum on Saturday.

Yesterday we left Wendy's house about 9am (CST) to drive to O'Hare. I had a little more luggage to juggle as Wendy and Drayton gave us a car seat they aren't using any more as they needed to get a narrower one so they could fit 3 in the back seat of their Corolla. I haven't tried it out yet to see whether we'll put this one in my car or Paul's. It will be very helpful to have each in one of our cars since the plan with the babysitter for the summer and fall is for me to drop her off around 3pm on my way to school and Paul to pick her up around 6pm on his way home. Nadia slept during our drive to the aiport, and then she was awake during our time in the terminal and for the first part of our flight. It was pretty much the same experience as last time in that she cried about 5 minutes total and slept about 35 minutes on the airplane in my arms. I didn't try to warm her bottle or to drink anything myself this time though. Again the banana and puffs were the most successful at entertaining her on the plane. The toy that helped the most was the "See & Say" that I bought her at the Thift store we shopped at in Chicago on Thursday. I might be the first professor to attend a conference and go shopping at a thrift store while at the conference. :-)

It was fun to spend time with Adam & Susie last week. They would usually join in Nadia's naptime/bedtime ritual of reading and singing. Susie often read a few of the books to Nadia, and they helped pick which songs we sang each time. I enjoyed listening to Susie practice her violin and read. I also enjoyed listening to Adam pretend to read. Every book he "reads" starts out the same way. There is one word that changes. If the book is about trucks then he while he looks at the first page he says "One day a truck was born." If the book is about dinosaurs then it's, "One day a dinosaur was born." It's so cute!! He's 25 months old. He also says who the book is by. One of the books Wendy frequently reads them is by Iza Trapani. Well Adam says that every book is "by Pani Iza Trapani." LOL! It's also so sweet to hear how they imitate me and say "Nadia, sweet, sweet, sweet, sweet, sweet Nadia" to their cousin.

Paul was amazed last night at how quickly Nadia is crawling these days. I will definitely take a video of her crawling this week. She's been crawling a lot today. She crawls so she can get to something to that she can use to pull herself to a standing position and cruise. She can stand for longer and longer periods of time without holding on to anything. In addition to her "step" she now has a favorite window which is just the right height for her to enjoy. The downside of her crawling and standing is she doesn't enjoy the jump up any more, and I can't leave her in our bathroom/bedroom (with the door closed) with some toys while I get a shower like I have in the past. There was one time when she tried to stand in Chicago but was unsuccesful. She tried to use the letters on their refrigerator to pull herself up, and for some strange reason the magnetic letters just kept falling off! :-)

Since we got home I've done a load of laundry, gone grocery shopping, paid some bills, and returned a few library books that were due tomorrow. I'm teaching tonight so life is really back in the normal swing of things. This past Friday was my last bcp for now. I would appreciate prayers that I will get AF tomorrow or Wednesday. Then I'll have b/w a couple of days later to check my FSH level and then start right back on the pill and then add Lupron to the mix several days after that. The first very important step though is for me to get my first PPAF - as soon as possible!

Hello from Chicago

Wednesday morning Nadia stayed awake most of our drive to the airport (which took about 1hr and 40 min). She did cry some of the time, but it wasn't too bad. She was very alert while the bus took us from long term parking to the terminal and while we were in the terminal. What proved the most helpful in keeping her happy in the terminal and on the plane was food rather than books or toys. She wanted to either stand in my lap or eat a banana (she ate an entire one) or Puffs. She started crying a little on the plane so I walked her up and down the aisle a little which was a challenge as it was a small plane (each row had 2 seats on either side of the aisle). She then cried a little more later, but then fell asleep in my arms and didn't wake up until they lowered the wheels to prepare for landing. She cried about 5 minutes total on the plane so that wasn't bad. The flight was full so there was someone sitting next to me. Thankfully the man has a 5 year old son and was very accepting of having a baby sitting nearby. I learned the hard way not to order a drink. It's impossible to manage a drink with a baby in your lap on an airplane. :-) She probably wouldn't have cried at all except they didn't have a microwave to warm her bottle. They gave me a little cup of hot water when they brought me my cup of ice water (so you can picture me trying to hold a baby as well as two cups of water at the same time while trying to pour hot water into the bottle without spilling any of it). She still didn't want it, but eventually she fell asleep anyhow. Of course I loved having her sleep on me as I haven't experienced that in a few months. :-)

Wendy, Adam,and Susie met us at O'Hare. We stopped for lunch and then Wendy dropped me off at the Westin on the "Magnificent Mile" for my conference. She took Nadia home with her. I took a cab to their home after attending a session that interested me because the speaker is the author of the textbook I use in my class that is meeting Monday nights this semester.

My session went well yesterday. It was a tough day for Nadia as she's just not used to Aunt Wendy and she was really missing her Mommy. I had lunch at the Cheesecake Factory for the first time, which was a treat yesterday. Last night we picked up some deep dish pizza that Chicago is famous for. It wasn't exactly a good day for my diet, LOL. I haven't actually been very diligent in that regard lately - with either diet or exercise. I need to get back in gear as I still haven't hit my pre-pg weight yet.

All the pictures in today's post were taken by Wendy. The 2nd one was taken yesterday during "nursery rhyme time" that my sister does with her kids prior to their afternoon nap each day. Nadia's 1st two naps were very short yesterday, so Nadia got really tired long before it was a reasonable time for her 3rd nap to start. So my sister bundled them up and took them for a walk to try to keep Nadia awake (3rd picture). Today we went to the science museum. Nadia especially enjoyed seeing the chicks; 3 hatched while we were watching (4th picture). The last picture was taken on Wednesday night. Susie had dressed Nadia up in a ballerina tutu and shoes.

I am sure Daddy is glad we are flying home tomorrow! He actually almost cried on Wednesday morning when we left, and I think it's been more than 9 years since I've seen him cry. He was very worried that Nadia would forget him. I'm sure she hasn't forgotten her Dada!!!

My Papoose

Yesterday I did a trial run with the Snugli since I hadn't used in a long time. I know she's big enough to have her on my back but I didn't think I'd be able to put her in it by myself which I'll need to be able to do at the airport tomorrow. Plus she likes to be able to look out and see other people which I think will be easier if she's on my front. I asked Paul to take a couple of pics since Tamera had asked for a pic of my new hairdo. Probably there will be more pics with me in them later this week that my sister will have taken in Chicago. The hairstyle is still something I'm getting used to, but I got a LOT of positive feedback on it at work yesterday and today so that's helping me adjust to it. :-)

I think we're ready to go. Nadia keeps waking up earlier and earlier (today it was 5:25am), but tomorrow it will be okay if she wakes up early as we need to be on the road by 6:45am. I am hoping maybe we can get her body on CST and then not adjust her body when we come back to PA? Who knows but it's worth a shot. I think her schedule tomorrow will be totally out of whack though as I imagine she'll sleep en route to the aiport as it's a 90

minute drive to the Harrisburg airport. In 2007 when I flew to Chicago (shortly after my FET), I flew from Baltimore so I could have a nonstop flight to Midway which is the airport closer to my sister's house. This time thought I didn't want to drive as far so the only nonstop option was to O'Hare. Since we're not arriving or leaving at rush hour it should add only 20 minutes to our trip to my sister's house. I am planning to attend one session of the conference tomorrow (at 1pm). I'm looking forward to lunch with my sister and her kids prior to the conference. The speaker I am planning to hear tomorrow is the author of the textbook I am using in my Monday night class this semester. I've never heard her in person; so I'm looking forward to that.

Today is my nephew Joshua's 2nd birthday! Happy bday, Josh!!! It's easy to remember his bday since it's on St. Patrick's Day, and his older brother's bday is on Flag Day. We're looking forward to seeing them in July as it's already been 10 months since we saw them. Josh and Adam are the 2 closest cousins in age to Nadia in terms of those who are older than her, and Nathan and the girl due to be born next month are the two closest in age of those who are younger than her.

Packing and Puffs

Nadia had her first experience in a swing yesterday. She wasn't too sure what to make of it. I think in time she'll love it, but the slide is definitely more popular with her right now than the swing.

I forgot to mention a few days ago that Nadia finally succeeded in feeding herself a puff! She has been feeding herself zwieback toast and such for quite awhile. She eats one piece of toast along with her oatmeal for breakfast (plus 6-8 ounces of milk so that's a BIG meal but of course she's gone 12 hours without eating so she's hungry!). She has been successful at picking up puffs for quite awhile, but she hadn't gotten the idea of letting go once her hand is in her mouth. I was surprised last week when I came back to her highchair to feed her oatmeal as there was a puff in her mouth. Good job, Nadia! I am not saying she's mastered feeding herself small finger foods yet, but at least she's had some success. :-)

Packing proved to be more of a challenge than usual. I wanted to fit everything in one suitcase. Diapers take up a lot of room plus I am bringing gifts for Wendy & Drayton (their bdays are in July) as well as for their girl due to be born next month. I was wondering if there was going to be room for MY clothes, LOL! Thankfully I think I have managed to get it all in. Next I need to pack up her diaper bag which I'll take as my carry on.

Paul is going to spend Wednesday night at a friend's house in State College so he'll save himself one RT commute. I still need to cook up some tuna noodle casserole so he has something to eat the other days he's here and we're not. He doesn't have to go to school tomorrow which is a rare treat. His Tuesday class was cancelled although he'll be busy as he has a big project due in that class by 5pm tomorrow night. It works out well though as I have a meeting at work at 1pm tomorrow so I can actually make it on time for that which normally I can't get to campus that early.

Out with the Old

Over the last few weeks we've said goodbye to a few things such as her gym (she enjoyed it for 8 1/2 months), mobile (she enjoyed looking at it for 7 1/2 months), and her black patent shoes which don't fit any more (size 1). I looked at shoes yesterday, but I didn't know what size to get her. I was going to get her white patent shoes or white sandals since spring is ALMOST here. So she only wore her tights (no shoes) to church this morning.

I also said goodbye to a lot of my hair yesterday. It felt so weird when I shampooed this morning. It felt like there wasn't any hair back there, LOL! It's still a shock to me every time I look in a mirror. I am not sure yet what I think of it yet. I did get a lot of positive feedback at church though which helped. One lady in choir took one look at me and said, "I love it!" which really encouraged me.

 

Next on my to do list is to start packing for our trip Wednesday morning! I am looking forward to spending time with Wendy as well as her dh (Drayton), Adam (2) and Susie (almost 5). I'm sure I'll be painting Susie's fingernails, and we will probably go to the science museum where they have a family membership. I also look forward to hearing Susie read. She can read at the 4th grade reading level! If you want to see a recent clip of her sight reading a book at that level, click here; or if you want to see a clip of her reading an easier book with great expression (Bear Snores On), click here. I think Nadia will enjoy having her cousin read to her!

THE Step

The last couple of weeks one of Nadia's favorite things to do is play by the step in between our kitchen and family room. Sometimes she climbs up the step to get to her toybox, but most of the time she just likes to hang out on the family room side of the step.

Another favorite activity is to ride on my shoulders. If she's really upset and nothing else will calm her down, that will do the trick and turn her tears to smiles. I learned a lesson though on Friday that after she's been fed is NOT the time to do that as she spit up quite a bit and most of it landed in my hair. Gross!

Today I was at Walmart for over 2 hours as it took 2 hours for them to change my oil and rotate my tires. While they were working on the car I got a haircut. Boy did I get a haircut. She cut it WAY shorter than I wanted her to. Well maybe I'll like it, but if not hair does grow back, it will take less time to blowdry, and Nadia won't have as much to grab ahold of. So I guess there will be some perks to the shorter hairdo. I guess a 4th benefit is I should be able to go longer until I get it cut again!

Nadia keeps waking up earlier and earlier, and it's not usually at the same time as a train so I am not going by that theory any more. Any suggestions? I don't get her as soon as she wakes up, but even the time I go get her keeps inching up earlier and earlier. I've tried putting her to bed later, but it seems no matter what time I put her to bed - she wakes up prior to 6am. I was hoping to push her wake up time to 7:30am, but right now I'd settle for 6:30 instead of 5:40!

We leave for Chicago on Wednesday morning. I want to start packing tomorrow as I teach on Mondays and Tuesdays. Any tips for traveling with an almost 9 month old? Thankfully the flight is only about 2 1/2 hours, and since we're headed to my sister who has 2 children (and is due to give birth to her 3rd in about one month) she already has strollers, a high chair, car seats, etc. So I should be able to pack pretty light which will be good since I'll be going to the airport myself. I am planning to carry Nadia in the Snugli, and I'm just going to take one suitcase to check-in plus one carry on. Do they let you take a bottle on the airplane or do I need to bring formula powder and an empty bottle to fill up with water and mix on the plane? The trip to Antigua in May will be longer (thankfully also a non-stop flight), but there will be 4 adults traveling with her that time rather than just me.

Yesterday I made some corn for Nadia so now I have four different veggies frozen in cubes in bags in our freezer - peas, carrots, green beans, and corn. She liked the corn. Every week I buy one large tub of either plain yogurt or cottage cheese for her. She eats quite a bit these days! She also loves bananas. Paul and I share some of ours with her when we're eating one. She also eats a lot of puffs, zwieback toast, rice cereal, oatmeal, and unsweetened appleasauce.

Crawling!

Well although she's been mobile for several weeks, it wasn't until yesterday that I felt I could say she is crawling - the "typical" crawl with arms fully extended. Yesterday was the first time I saw her travel forward many times throughout the day. She figured out she needed to lift her hands. :-) Paul hasn't seen it yet, but hopefully he will soon. I've already seen her crawling again today. I'll try to get a video of her crawling in the near future. She still LOVES to stand. I have decided until she gets out of this phase where it seems ALL she wants to do is stand, we are only going to have a couple of baths a week. Bathtime just isn't fun right now since she wants to stand up, and I won't let her stand in the tub.  Today I have a faculty meeting and also an appt with an advisee. Donna will be watching Nadia.

Four Rules

So far there are four things that Nadia hears the word "no" in reference to. Three of them we've been working on for several weeks - not touching Daddy's glasses, not putting her fingers in her mouth when Mommy is feeding her, and not grabbing on to the bars of her gym (she can grab the toys, but if she grabs the bars they collapse and she falls backwards). The new rule is no standing in the tub. I am not sure if she comprehends the word "no" or not yet. Either she doesn't get it yet, or she's pretty stubborn as last night I had to say seemingly 50 million times no standing in the tub. I had to keep putting her back into a sitting or lying down position. This new rule is certainly the one I have said with the sternest voice and face. It's one thing to fall in the living room, but I don't want her falling in the bathtub!

I have decided upon a new rule for Mommy. No taking Nadia shopping until after her 3rd nap (or 2nd nap when she gets down to 2 a day). This doesn't include going to the grocery store since it's only 5 minutes away. As long as I take her there right after she's been fed (she's fed right after she gets up from bed), I can make it there and back without her falling asleep in the car. However any other shopping destination it seems she falls asleep in the car, and even if she sleeps for 5 minutes, her nap schedule is completely messed up. I've tried just taking her straight to her crib, giving her some milk and then taking her to bed, etc. and nothing works. Many tears become involved in nap time which is not normal these days at all. Today she slept about 7 minutes on the way home from the mall. When we got home she was OUT. I closed the garage door, opened her car door, and still she was sleeping. However getting her out of the car seat woke her up, and it took forever to get her back down. I tried letting her play, but she just cried then too. She was really, really tired but was fighting the nap. So I have decided until she is down to one afternoon nap a day, my shopping trips will only be after her last nap. It's just not worth it to goof up her schedule.

Progression

The first 5+ months every time I went to get Nadia from her crib she was lying on her back. Then she switched to sleeping on her belly, and that's the position I'd find her in at the end of a nap. Then she liked to get up on her hands and knees, and I'd find her in the crawling position in bed. Next she learned how to go from her belly to a sitting position. Sometimes I still find her in a sitting position, the sitting picture was taken when I went in to get her after her first nap today. The latest trick is to pull herself up to a standing position. When I went in to her room at 6:40 this am, she was standing fully erect at the end of her crib (the side closest to her red piano).

Standing is by far her favorite activity these days! The downside to all of the standing and cruising is that she's fallen down more than before. It's very hard for Paul to see her fall. Of course I don't like seeing her fall either, but I know it's part of the learning process. Thankfully she hasn't bruised herself yet. She can stand for longer and longer periods of time without holding onto anything. The last photo was taken yesterday. She always seems so excited when she sees all her toys in her toybox!

Yesterday I asked if this time I could be on Menopur instead of Repronex. I had asked 2 years ago, and I can't recall why they gave me an Rx for Repronex, but after experiencing the burning sensation that is common with Repronex, I planned to ask again for Menopur, and she said now they recommend that even though it's a little more expensive due to not as many side effects (which is why I wanted it in 2007). I wish I had Menopur the first time, but I am glad I can have it the 2nd time. My copay is the same either way so it doesn't cost me more.

I have always used hCG to trigger (I've had 9 trigger shots total), and that's still what they prefer to use. However it seems that some doctors are giving women a dose of hCG 6 times higher than what is used in fertility treatments as a weight loss treatment. So there has been a shortage of hCG which means sometimes they use Ovidrel instead. Ovidrel isn't new either, and a "perk" of that one is that it's a subq injection whereas hCG is an intramuscular injection. So that be another change in terms of meds this time around although if the pharmacy has hCG in stock I'll still be given a Rx for that. We didn't discuss dosages with the RE yet, but I am assuming they'll have me do the same as last time which was 150iu of Follistim and 75iu of Menopur each day during the stimming phase.

The last two days were rather hectic between dentist and doctor appointments and teaching. I am glad that today I'm staying home with the exception of choir rehearsal this evening which means I can get caught up on grading today during her naps. I was so tired last night that I went to bed at 8:30pm. Staying home today is also good for Nadia as she only had one nap in her crib yesterday which meant she was very fussy for Paul last night. I think I figured out why her body went forward an hour. She often first wakes up about 5:50am which happens to be when a loud train comes through in the morning. I think the train wakes her up. Thankfully she went back to sleep for a little and then chattered for awhile and didn't get fussy until 6:40, which is when I went to get her. People told me that eventually we'd not even be aware of the sounds from the train. Well we've lived here almost 6 months, and I am still very aware of it, and I think Nadia is also since I have noticed that sometimes when she wakes up in the morning or at naptime is exactly at the same time a noisy train is going by.

Two months from today we'll be in Antigua. I can't wait!!! Also, two months from now I should be in the pupo (pregnant until proven otherwise) stage as the embryo transfer will hopefully be completed one of the first few days of May.