Apple Turnovers and NC Knitting

I’ve been to the fertility clinic 5 times in the past 8 days.  I’ve decided to make it a habit to go to a bakery and buy an apple turn over and a small cup of coffee after every blood draw/ultrasound.  After going to a few different ones, I think I’ve found the most delicious apple turnover in Cary, North Carolina: Once in a Blue Moon Bakery.  Seriously, the best I’ve ever eaten.  Sugar Buzz Bakery is a close second. 😉  It’s the little things, right?  And it makes blood draw/ ultrasound day a little less unpleasant.

And how is everything going?

So far so good!  I went in for blood work on Monday and they found my estrogen was just a bit lower than they wanted it (135) so they upped the gonal-f to 100 and left the menopur at 75.  I went back in Tuesday and my estrogen had gone up to 245, which is great.  My ultrasound showed at least 20 follicles all 7mm to 11mm.  Tuesday’s ultrasound was pretty unpleasant as I’m starting to feel my ovaries.  They don’t hurt unless they get pushed on, but it’s not the most comfortable.  And considering my retrieval is at least a week away, I’m assuming it’s only going to get worse.

Today’s ultrasound showed at least 12 follicles (she didn’t count them all) measuring between 8 mm and 13 mm. My estrogen came back at a whopping 753!  That’s a huge jump in just a couple days. 🙂  Starting ganirelix tonight to make sure no ovulating happens before everything gets nice and big.  They like to trigger when most follicles are between 18 mm and 23 mm.  We’re getting there!

Symptom-wise, my headache isn’t as bad as it was over the weekend.  It’s just dull and in the background now.  I am tired and super bloated.  I would love to just sleep for the next week.  I know i was bored pre-IVF, but these days I am so incredibly thankful that I don’t have to do this AND go to work.  You ladies who do both are super women!

I’ve been knitting up a storm for the past few weeks.  Want to see? 🙂

The floor in our new house is very… scratchable… And our dinning room furniture was in desperate need of a makeover… AND the dark furniture and the dark floors needed to be broken up…
Thus.. Chair Socks.  I just love how cute they are.  And they can go right into the washer and dryer. 🙂

I started these before Christmas and finished them up a couple weeks ago.  They were an interesting knit, but I think I’ll do the heels differently next time.

Click for pattern

I made these for my mom’s birthday.  She got them on Monday, just in time to wear them through Illinois’s bitter cold week.

Click for pattern

I made these baby socks out of some left over sock yarn.  I made myself these socks a couple years ago and just love that our baby will have socks that look just like mine. 🙂

Click for pattern

And finally, this baby sweater.  I bought this undyed wool specifically to knit during our IVF.  I knew I’d want to knit something baby related, but didn’t feel like trying to find a gender neutral color that I loved.  After I knit it and a matching hat up, I found I actually really liked the color.  It’s a soft cream color.  I might end up dying it later, but for now it’s going to stay like this.

Click for pattern.

I’m sure more baby knitting and sewing will commence over the next 6 weeks until we know the results of our FET.  It feels hopeful, like I’m putting good vibes out there and preparing for the best possible outcome.  We’ve been joking that if both of our embryos make it, I’ll have to duplicate everything I’ve made so far. 😉

Blood work tomorrow and blood work and ultrasound on Saturday.  More soon! ❤

33: Next…

IUI #5 didn’t work.  The extra cysts and swelling made for a very painful Sunday afternoon.  I’m thankful for the left over Tylenol-3’s I have from my lap.  I knew I saved them for a reason…

I don’t know what comes next.  We’re moving forward with our very last IUI.  I told Dr. B’s nurse that I wanted to decrease the gonal-f from 112.5 to 75 units.  I know I made 5 follicles and 6 follicles the past two cycles, but they’ve been beating the hell out of me in the process.  I’m swollen and sore from the day after my IUI until a couple days after my period starts every month.  Thus far, it hasn’t been worth it.  This past cycle, I may have produced 6 follicles, but only a couple of them actually produced eggs.  So my question for her is: what’s the point?

She’s going to chat with him and let me know when I go in for my baseline ultrasound tomorrow morning.  I’m even less certain than last month that my ovaries are clear of cysts.  I’m actually hoping for a month of birth control.  I feel really run down.  I know I could just take a month off myself, but I don’t want to give the endometriosis any extra opportunity to grow back.  AND I’m afraid if I stop, I’ll never be able to start again.

We also had to schedule a consultation appointment with Dr. B for the end of October in case this IUI also doesn’t work.  She didn’t tell me what it was for, but I’m assuming he’s going to tell us that if we’re not interested in moving forward with IVF then he can’t help us.  Bummer.

Now how about some pictures?  My posts have been very infertility treatment heavy lately… Say ‘hello’ to WHAT I KNIT THIS SUMMER! 😉

 

I made these for a friend who is pregnant with twin girls via IVF.  She’s almost 36 weeks and I’m so excited!!  The booties are cotton and fleece.  Find the sweater pattern here.

 

This is for our neighbors who just had a baby girl.  We really lucked out in the neighbor department. 🙂  Pattern found here.

And this is for my mom’s best friend’s new grand daughter.  She saw the sweaters I made for the twins and asked if I’d make her a sweater and booties.  I was excited to try this one in green though.  It gives it a much different feel than the pink ones.

Needless to day, a lot of baby knitting going on.  Considering I don’t normally knit in the summer, I feel like a got a surprising amount done.  I haven’t knit anything for myself recently, but I did start a pair of socks on Sunday.  I haven’t finished a pair of socks in over a year and I miss freshly knitted socks on my feet! 🙂

Other than that, not a lot is going on.  I’m working as much as I can because I’m planning on needing a good chunk of savings to adopt a baby…  It’s been nice to be so distracted though, so I can’t complain.

More after tomorrow’s ultrasound.

 

12 Weeks To Go

Not a whole ton going on here currently.  I received my first Lupron injection this past Monday, which means I will be done with it in less than 12 weeks.  It still seems crazy long, but I’m trying to keep nice and busy.

This week, I’ve been working in the garden a lot.  The landscaping was seriously lacking when we moved in last fall, so I’ve been focusing on that and am not planning on having a lovely vegetable garden like I usually do.  BUT, our patio is starting to look pretty beautiful and I’m looking forward to spending lots of time out there this summer.

I also finished finals on Monday.  I got my grades yesterday.  All A’s!!  My first two semesters of graduate school have been the most difficult semesters I’ve ever had.  I began injectable medications and had 3 IUI’s.  I had a miscarriage.  I had a laparoscopy.  I was diagnosed with endometriosis.  But despite all of this, I managed to get all A’s both semesters.  Despite all of this, I still have a 4.0 gpa.  Bragging?  Maybe a little bit.  But I feel so incredibly proud of myself. 🙂

I’m gearing up to start some hardcore twin knitting as well.  A good friend who got pregnant with twins via IVF just found out she’s having 2 girls!  I’m super excited for her and can’t decide what to knit first!  I am loving all of the yarn I picked up today.

Some sad news?  The momma robin from this post hasn’t been to her nest in a week. =(  Two more momma robins are sitting on their nests in our yard, but I’m more than a little sad that this first set is gone.

The Power of Positive Knitting

What have I been doing lately?  Knitting.  Baby knitting.

While buying onesies and miniature socks is one thing, baby knitting is completely different.  Buying ready made clothing can be done on a whim.  It can be done without much effort and time.  Baby knitting, however, requires more time and energy.  A lot more.

My chiropractor recently told me that I need to start being more positive.  She told me that our babies are in “escrow” and that I need to think like my future is going to include them.  I guess it’s the power of positive thinking or something.  Is there anything more positive than knitting a baby sweater and matching booties?  No.  There isn’t.  Unless I started painting the nursery… No.  No, I haven’t…. yet.

I can always replace the buttons if we have a little girl who just doesn’t appreciate centurion soldiers.

An unexpected surprise that is attached to these?  I upload all of my hand knits to my Ravelry account (which is also where you can find both of these patterns). -Side note: if you knit or crochet and aren’t on Ravelry, you’re missing out.  In the description, I explained that these were for our future baby blah blah blah.  Apparently the sweater showed up on a popular page somewhere on Ravelry and I got a few messages from some nice women around the world just to let me know that we’re not alone and that it gets better.

Infertility community, you blow my mind sometimes. I seem to get the messages I need at all the right times. 🙂

Other than this, I’m feeling good.  I’m having just a little bit a residual pain in my right ovary, but I’m guessing that’s not necessarily a bad thing.  I’m going to try to focus on all the school work I have going on over the next couple weeks and see what happens. 🙂

As another side note: I think my chiropractor also said something about not thinking about babies and just letting things happen… but I’m not sure.  I blame it on my selective hearing. 😉

Ps.  I’ve decided to keep the green booties from this post. Because I can.  And they’re so gosh darn cute.

26: Unmedicated Monitoring

I made these last night.  I’ve been eyeballing this pattern for the past 2 years.  I always said the first time I made these would be for my own baby.  I say that about a lot of knit baby things.  Last night, I decided to take some leftover yarn and leftover buttons and see what happened with this pattern.  I love them.  I might save them for our baby.  Or I might give them to the next friend who gets pregnant.  We’ll see how I’m feeling when that happens. Click here for the pattern.

My period started early this morning giving cycle 25 exactly 30 days.  There was enough time to actually get pregnant, I just didn’t.  I’ll call Dr. B’s office in the morning and we’ll start monitoring all over again.  My veins are not looking forward to it.  I bruise far to easily when it comes to blood draws.

We’re seriously considering our third IUI in March or April.  Even if my body is healing.  I want this horrible horrible time to be over.  If that doesn’t work, we’ll save for a fourth and maybe even a fifth.

It snowed here this weekend.  Finally.  We’ve hardly had any snow this winter.  Skill Set and Snow White had never gotten to play in the snow off of their leashes.   Yesterday, we took them to the dog park and let them run and goof off in the snow.  They loved it. 🙂

Done and Done

WELLLLL, the IUI is done.  It’s been just over 24 hours.  Too early to test? Maybe? Yes?  😉

But in all seriousness, thanks so much for the comments yesterday.  I’m feeling cautiously positive.

Jeremy and I got up just before 6 am yesterday morning in order to get to Dr. B’s by 7.  We were both dragging our feet getting ready and ended up running out the door with barely enough time to make the 25 minute drive.  I think we were both a little apprehensive and a lot nervous about what the morning would bring.

After he did his thing, they told us to go to breakfast and be back in an hour or so.  I thought they were a little crazy for thinking we would be able to eat and think about anything other than what was going to get shoved up into my lady parts in an hour, but we actually had a surprisingly nice time at breakfast.  We haven’t had a ton of time lately to just sit and chat.  We’ve had so much company and so much going on with the house, that it was really nice to just have a few minutes to ourselves before things threatened to get crazy again.  I know I also needed the time to finish wrapping my head around what was about to happen.

When we got back to Dr. B’s, they got us right into the room and had me change.  I was expecting something way over the top, but the whole thing was so informal and so relaxed.  I needed that.  I needed them to act like this was normal and ok.  I needed to feel like I wasn’t a failure for having to go through with this.  And they definitely gave me that.

Now.  Things might get a little TMI, but since you’re reading a blog where I frequently talk about my lady parts, I’m going to assume you’re ok with that. 😉
Sooooo, in the speculum went.  Not comfortable when you’re just getting an exam, even more uncomfortable when you know what’s coming next.  Then the catheter.  Ugh.  She warned me before she started that I would probably feel some pressure and maybe a little bit of cramping when she was almost to the top of my uterus.  Almost as soon as she started the cramping was excruciating.  I was going to just go with it, but she decided that there might be something wrong and called another nurse in to do an ultrasound while she inserted the catheter.
They squirted the cold ultrasound gel onto my stomach and immediately found my uterus.  She inserted the catheter again and, like before, the cramping was awful.  The nurse doing the ultrasound told her to stop and pull the catheter back.  She had been hitting the top of my uterus with the catheter.  Multiple times.  Evidently, I have a really short uterus.  Ow.  Ow. Ow.  They told me that shouldn’t have any impact on my ability (or inability) to get pregnant.

BUT, they kept the ultrasound on and turned the screen towards us while the injected the “specimen” 😉 into my uterus.  It was just a blob of white, but it was actually really neat to be able to see that.

I was a little crampy off an on yesterday.  I ended up staying home from class, and am actually really happy I did.  Today, I’m still crampy and have had just a small touch of spotting.  I’m super tired, but that could just be from the excitement and stress.

I took Skill to the dog park earlier and we were both exhausted after walking the island for half an hour.  I’m going to focus on napping and making his winter coat and hat for the rest of the day.  I saw this picture before we got him and decided I HAVE to figure out the knitting pattern for this hat.
Her site is in Swedish, but even with after using google translate on the whole page, I didn’t see anything for the actual pattern.   Soooo, Skill and I are going to figure it out ourselves.  And it’s going to be adorable! 🙂
Other than that, we’re taking the weekend easy. It will be our first relaxed weekend since we’ve moved in.  Jeremy is cleaning the garage and I might bake something delicious.

Prometrium starts on Monday.  Does it make anyone else dizzy?  I’m going to start taking it at bedtime, because last month I looked like I was drunk 20 minutes after every pill… 😉

Pink Vinaigrette.

I’m still hanging in there for now.  I had a nice chat with my doctor on Friday.  Apparently the on-call doctor misread my ultrasound and I have a bunch of smaller cysts that equal the size of a golf ball.  This makes me feel much better.  She doesn’t want to add any medications to my body right now since technically I could still be pregnant.  We’ll chat again about how to proceed once my period starts.  She wants me to take at least a month off from the clomid.  It’s really bothering her that I’m getting cysts on the lowest dose.  I’m honestly not too broken up about a taking a break.  Clomid is kicking my butt big time.
Jeremy and I decided that it will be a break from temping and ovulation sticks as well.  We’ll still try, but it’s going to be far more relaxed than it’s been in a long time.

I’ve been taking it easy for the past few days.  I’ve had a lot of pain in my lower abdomen, a lot of nausea, my boobs are killing me, and I’m hungry constantly.   Part of me is looking forward to my period starting because I know I’ll feel a lot better.
BUT, in the meantime, I’ve been catching up on some knitting.  I really burned out after Christmas knitting, so most of my projects have been sitting in my knitting basket in my office for the past 6 months.

I finished these socks on Saturday.  I used the Plymouth Yarn Stiletto that I found at the Chicago Yarn Crawl last fall.  I started these just before Christmas and I’ve dragged them around the country with us recently trying to tempt myself into finishing them.  It just took some time on the couch. 😉
 I’m working on some stranded color work socks right now.  It’s going so much fast than I remember it.  I had to retrain my fingers to knit English and Continental at the same time.  Out of control. 😉  They’ll be really pretty when they’re finished.

Finally, the hot, humid weather we’ve been having seems to have worked wonders for my garden…
My tomatoes and tomatillos are getting really big and strong and my zucchini plants have a TON of flowers on them.

I let the chive plants flower this year…
Once they were past their prime, I chopped the whole plant down so that it will flower again.  I’m freezing the leaves and I decided to try to make a chive vinaigrette with the flowers.
The vinegar is supposed to turn from clear…
To pink…
To pinky-lavender.
The lettuce is almost big enough to pick.  I think we’ll try this pretty pink vinaigrette once we can use our own lettuce. 🙂

Petal Quilt

While I should be packing for our Texas trip, I thought I’d take some pictures of my new quilt instead. 😉

I started working on it in January after I got a nice intro to quilting book for Christmas. I’ve been knitting for a long time, and I wanted to start working with a another medium.  I’ve been working on it off and on since then.

In hindsight, I realized what a bad idea it was to start with appliques as my first quilt.  Not fun if you don’t know what you’re doing.

Bella likes to “help” with things like this. 😉

Through a lot of trial and error, I learned how to use my free motion quilting foot.  You can totally tell where I started on this quilt and where I ended up.  By the end of the 24th square, I had definitely gotten the hang of it. 🙂

I also ordered personalized quilt tags.  They’ve got my initials on the front and a mustache on the back.  Why a mustache?  Because mustaches are funny. 😉

4 1/2 months later and it’s finished.  It has a lot of mistakes, but I made the entire thing myself.  I’m really proud of it.  I also really like the pattern.  I think I’ll make it again in a couple years when I’m a little better at it. 😉

And of course, Bella is on hand to quality control.  It’s Bella approved. 😉

Off to pack for Texas.  We leave tomorrow night.  I’ll probably post again when we get there. 🙂

Urology, Socks, and Books.

I’m so nervous about tomorrow.  We have an appointment with the urologist at 8:40 am.  I’m nervous about meeting someone new and letting him into this intimate situation, about what he’ll have to tell us, and I am terrified about what he won’t be able to tell us, that after everything we’ll still be in the dark.  I don’t like not having a plan.  At the very least, I’m hoping we leave his office with some kind of plan in mind.

I’m trying to focus on other things though.

I’ve been occupying myself today with finishing Jeremy’s Christmas socks:

Don't you love my fluffy prop? 😉

They were mostly done, I just needed to add the heels.

I’ve also spent the past couple days reading.  I finished Dawn by Octavia Butler.  She’s the author of my all time favorite novel, Kindred, so I thought I would give her Xenogenesis series a try.  Would I recommend  it?  Welllll… Do you like really out there sci-fi?  No?  Don’t even think about picking it up then.  I’m going to read the next to books in the series because I want to know what happens, but I’m really on the fence as to whether or not I liked it or just thought it was weird.  I’ll keep you updated.

I’m also 3/4 of the way through Mighty Be Our Powers by Leymah Gbowee.  It’s a memoir about the Liberian War and how Gbowee’s women’s groups helped bring peace to the country.  I don’t normally care for memoirs, but this book is extremely well written.  She really brings you into the story and has you both rooting for her and crying with her.  I’d highly recommend it.  It helps me keep my problems in perspective.

I’m nervous and scared.  I’m both dreading and welcoming tomorrow.  It’s a means to an end, the beginning of the end… etc…  It’s going to get the ball we’ve been avoiding rolling.  Whether we like or not, the ball is going to start rolling.

 

Sewing Summer…

I don’t knit in the summer.  I don’t like the way the needles feel in my fingers if there’s any humidity in the air.  I don’t like the feeling of wool or wool blends or acrylics, or fibers of any kind really, when it’s warm out.

But this summer, I found that I really needed to do something.  I was doing a lot of sewing for the store and for our craft shows.  I decided to take my sewing a little farther and start making things for myself.  It was almost all trial and error as I’d never actually made myself something really useful before with a sewing machine.  Once I got my new Brother CS-6000i machine, I really had no excuses…

Don't mind my poor picture quality... 😉

I made these skirts to wear for our first and last mall craft show.  The pattern is really forgiving and really versatile.  It’s a good base if you want to design something farther.  The pattern is Lil Blue Boo’s Twirl Skirt.

Next, I spent the summer perfecting Lil Blue

The birds just fit. Just go with it.

Boo’s Tunic Top pattern.  I made a few different variations as I learned what I needed to do to make them fit me comfortably.  I made the arm holes longer (to better fit my obvious man-shoulders? 😉 ), I made the stomach and hips smaller (for my disproportionately large chest? I wish 😉 ), and finally, I cut them shorter than the pattern called for because they were way too short to wear as a dress (I’ll own my longer than average legs) and I wanted to wear them with shorts.

Each one of them incorporate some kind of old, unworn article of clothing.  I’m really enjoying be able to reuse something that just isn’t working for me any more.  I think I lived in these for a good chunk of the summer.
This pattern made me realize how much I want a serger. (Did you get that, oh husband of mine?  **Early Christmas/Birthday present?**)  I don’t love the way my machine sews with jersey.  It’s doable, but a serger would look awesome.  Overall, however, I’m happy with how they turned out.

After that, I decided a dress form would make my life easier if I were going to continue to make clothing here and there.  But spending hundreds of dollars on a dress form that still wouldn’t match my body?  No thanks.  Jeremy helped me use Prudent Baby’s duct tape dress form tutorial.  I’m not going to lie, if you’re at all claustrophobic like I am, this whole process is going to bother you.  I could get out of that duct tape fast enough.  No pictures of that process for you though… It wasn’t pretty…
Anywho, my dress form turned out really great.  I think she needs a little tummy tuck still, but she’s technically the right size.  🙂

Finally, I wanted something warm and comfy now that it’s starting to get cooler out.  I found this pattern from 1984 on ebay for $2 and got the thicker jersey fabric on sale.  I’ll make some more modifications on it the next time I make one, but I’m really happy with how comfortable and decent it looks. 🙂

There have been a few other things that I’ve been working on, but we’ll save those for later.  I’m really glad that I’m finally learning some useful sewing skills.  I really enjoy it and often it’s quicker than knitting, so it offers some quicker gratification. 😉