It's Been a While

Yeah, I suck at keeping up with this blogging thing. Nothing you haven't all heard before. Ah, well, here are some random updates:

First, I had day 3 labs drawn yesterday. No results yet. But I had them drawn. That's pretty huge, for me, at least. It's a step. After thinking for SO.DAMN.LONG. I'm actually doing something. Oh yeah, and I started taking prenatal vitamins and DHA a few weeks ago. So there's that.

I finally decided it couldn't hurt to take the vitamins whether I eventually ended up T42 or not. And while I'd originally tentatively planned to start trying.... ahem... NOW (well, April, even), now I'm thinking I want to wait til early fall, or maybe August, depending on timing, but I'll get to that. So then I decided I wanted to get a feel for where my fertility stands, as of now, and then decide if I need to jump the gun and try immediately or if I feel like I can wait a few more months.

Why do I want to wait til fall? Well, a couple of reasons. Mainly, I'm just not quite ready to try. Just not ready to jump in with both feet with this thing. It worked so quickly last time, that there's always the possibility it'll be that easy for me the second time, too (and I'm NOT complaining!!). I also think I probably have a few hoops I'll have to jump through when I finally get my act together to call the midwives office and see what I need to do before they'll do an IUI. I likely need some additional bloodwork or something; I certainly needed to have a million things tested last time before they'd touch me with a catheter full of sperm.

And also, Jordyn and I have a trip planned for the first week in September. We're renting a beach house with four of her donor sibling families!!! Three of which are ones we've already met (last September at Sesame Place; did I ever end up blogging about that trip??), and one new one we haven't met yet. I'm SO excited!

And I just don't want to take the chance that I'd be in my first trimester - exhausted, nauseous, and miserable - during the trip. What a way to ruin a vacation! Except for the fact that if I'm not pregnant, I'm very likely going to get my period on the first day or two of the trip (they've been very regular) so that won't be fun, either. If I'm ready to start trying, the only way I'd try in August is if I'd be in my two week wait on the trip (which isn't likely to work out timing-wise). That way, even if I were pregnant, it would be early enough that I wouldn't be exhausted, nauseous, and miserable yet, and the trip would probably help at least somewhat distract me from the wait. I'm not a drinker, so I don't care about not being able to drink. And one of the other moms is currently pregnant with twins (very early though), so I wouldn't be the only one not drinking, anyway.

Otherwise, and as timing will likely work out, my current tentative plan is to (unfortunately probably have my period on the trip and then) get home from the trip and try in mid-September.

It kind of feels good to have a more realistic and set plan, rather than just thinking and thinking and thinking ad nauseum. When I got my period on Monday and called my doctor and got the orders put in for the day 3 labs, I was so excited. I couldn't wait to get to the office on Wednesday and have my blood drawn. Realizing how happy and excited I was to be taking this (even small) step made me kind of think this is what I should be doing. Hopefully I'm right about that!

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In other news, Jordyn is doing great! She's 2.75 as of today - officially a preschooler and not a toddler anymore! Crazy! She'll move from "Sprouts" up to the preschool room at her school in September, right after we get back from the beach trip. She's still big - wearing some 3T but a lot of 4T and a few 5T clothes. She talks a blue streak. She's silly, and fun, and funny, and has an amazing personality! She loves vegetables, and I absolutely can't believe the things I sometimes say to her at meals - "Jordyn, eat some more pasta, and then I'll give you more squash" - it's so backwards! She never, ever climbs out of her bed when she wakes up - in the morning or occasionally in the middle of the night - she calls for me. She never lost that routine of calling for me like she had to when she was in the crib!

She's still not potty trained. She could do it if she wanted to; she has pretty much all the readiness signs except for interest. She'll sit on the potty sometimes - when she chooses to - but nothing ever happens. I just say, "maybe next time". My plan is for sometime this summer, if she's still not trained by then, to tell her, "Oops, we're all out of diapers! Mommy forgot to buy more! Let's put you in underwear today!". Something tells me that's all it'll take. I think it's just too convenient for her to have a diaper on.

She loves to read books. If she's awake in the morning when I shower (she usually isn't on work/school days, but is on other days), she goes into the little tent she has in her room, sits on the bean bag chair that's in it, and reads books. And she'll sit on the couch and read books. And on my bed and read them... Usually, though, she doesn't just read books. She conducts "circle time", complete with a song at the beginning, "Everybody come sit down, come sit down, come sit down, everybody come sit down for circle time". And she pretends other kids are there and talks to them, i.e. "Ellie, did you like that book? [pause] You did? Good!".

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We went to NYC a few weeks ago, just Jordyn and I. We went to Times Square and rode on the ferris wheel in Toys R Us. We went to the Bronx Zoo with our pseudo-cousin S and his mom A. We spent a couple of hours at Central Park hanging out with one of Jordyn's donor sib families (we me them first at Sesame Place in September and also saw them when we were in NYC over Thanksgiving). They live pretty close to the city in Pennsylvania, and drove in to see us and one of the mom's sister. We had dinner with our uncle D. We had brunch with S's other mom B, A, S, B's nephew A and his girlfriend, and Jordyn saw her first movie (first movie at all and also her first movie in a movie theatre).

It was (get this) The Sound of Music. It was the 50th anniversary of the movie's release, so it was being shown on the big screen for one weekend only. It's one of S's favorite movies (very random movie for an 8-year-old boy to be into, huh?), so we took a chance and went with him and B. Jordyn did great, especially considering it's almost three hours long! The first half of the movie, she watched for a few minutes, and then mostly stood up with her back to the screen (there was a lot of leg room), ate popcorn, and barely looked at the screen. We were going to maybe leave at the (very short) intermission, but instead, I stood on the side of the theatre where I could still see and hear the movie but I wasn't in anyone's way, told her to put her head on my shoulder and rest, and rocked her. She was asleep pretty quickly; the movie had started at 2:00, which is right around when she usually naps. Once she was really out, I was able to sit down with her with the armrest between us raised, with her lying on her seat and her head in my lap. She stayed asleep for the rest of the movie. Success!

After the movie, we ended up walking from Times Square (42nd St) all the way up to 97th St before eating dinner and then heading back to the apartment at about 95th St. Jordyn didn't ask to get out of her stroller until 88th St, which is the only way this was possible! It didn't even feel like that much of a walk. We were on Broadway a lot of the time, then Columbus, but we cut over to Central Park at one point, because all Jordyn wanted to do was see pigeons. I couldn't decide what was more ridiculous - that we were in NYC and the only thing she wanted to do was see pigeons, or the fact that I couldn't find any! Seriously, I couldn't find any pigeons for the longest time, I'm sure only because I was looking for them! We walked 10 blocks in Central Park and I kid you not, we did not see ONE pigeon! We finally found a few on Amsterdam, I think, and then the next day near the apartment.

B is one of the executive producers of the Late Show with David Letterman. So, on Monday, I was able to see a taping of the show, which I was really excited about, especially since the show is ending when Letterman retires in a couple weeks. I'd seen one taping before, years ago, but I knew this would be the last chance I'd have to see it again. The guests were John Travolta, Amy Schumer, and (musical guest) The Waterboys. A and S (when he got home from school) babysat Jordyn, and since we'd spent so much time with them already over the weekend, that went really well. It was a fun trip, and I'm glad we went.