Summer time

It's been a busy summer so far and it's FLYING by! I know I've been a very bad blogger lately, but keeping up with Boo has been hard. This kid is too funny, very social and way to smart!

So quickly to get caught up....

I'm in the 2WW....both happy face and frown, if you know what I mean. I'm using progesterone cream, we'll see if that helps.

I'm going to Nashville next week for a school conference. I'm looking forward to it and dreading it at the same time. You know how those work thing are, right?

Mr turns 37 the day after I get back, so I have to get on the ball for his gifts! I'm planning some surprises for him, let's see if I can make them work.

We closed on the house tuesday! WOOOO HOOOO! We actually got more that we thought as we owed less than we had calculated on it. YAY! So we're paying things off and the moving forward to more treatment (IVF). We'll just have to see how things work out.

I'm also helping out a little with a benefit for a family we know. The Pruitts' son Parker was diagosed with histiocytosis in March. There will be a trivia night to help them out the with tremendous costs of treatment. I'm helping to get donations for a silent auction. If you would like to donate, please let me know. If you are local and would like to come out and have a fun night for a good cause, check the link and sign up!

More later....swim lessons, dinner and shopping for new shoes (not for me, darn it) calls!


****Edited to add***

Parker was diagnosed with Langerhans Cell Histiocytosis. It is a rare blood disorder that mimics cancer and produces too many white blood cells. It affects organs in the body. Parker's skin, lungs and other organs have been affected. He's currently undergoing a series of chemotherapy to treat the disease. If the histiocytosis gets under control, he has a 60% chance of recovery. It is anticipated that he'll undergo chemo for a year. He is now 6m old and nearing the end of the first 12 weeks of treatment. He is doing well, but the mounting hospital bills and insurance is taking a financial toll on the family. That is why a fundraiser has been set up.

Let's Catch Up, Shall We?

Let's see...

School is OVER! WOOOO! For the first time in a long time (over 4 years), I am neither taking a class or teaching this summer. Boo is pretty happy about this as is Mr. I am enjoying being home and being busy. Mr thinks this is great as the house is clean, lunch and dinner are ready when he gets here and the laundry is done. (Something unheard of in this house)

Boo asks me every morning, "It's just me and you today right?" *melt* We are keeping busy at Tot Lot, story time and the gym. Boo is crazy riding his bike all over. He asks me all the time "I'm a BMXer, right Mom?" He's getting there, that's for sure!

The weather here has finally cleared up. It's 75-80 and sunny! We are not affected directly by the flooding, but it's bad here. Thank Goodness the rain stopped. It was dicey last Thursday night. We had water in the basement because our sump couldn't keep up with the rain! Pretty nasty stuff, but it seems we are out of the woods for now.

As for TTC stuff....of course AF showed up promptly (booooo) so on to another month. Sigh....

BUT in other news!! WE SOLD THE OTHER HOUSE! Although it's not enought to go straight to IVF, we'll come out okay and not be paying that extra 750 a month! We close on it July 1st, whew~ good stuff....hopefully by the end of the summer we'll have financial stuff figured out to get going again. Yay for a bit of hope huh?

Well, enough for now...how about a pic or two? (arg...can anyone explain how to place pics where I want them???)

UGH I suck!

It's been an incredibly busy week....the end of school, trainings, entertaining a large group.

AND the blocked blogger from school last week! Can you imagine!!

Anyway, tomorrow and saturday are my days to get caught up with NaComLeavMo. I suck right now, so my apologies.

I promise a new post and LOTS of comments in the next few days.

Show and Tell

So my husband and I have had one of those weekends...you know, the kind where no matter what, you end up bickering and arguing even though you don't want to, over little stupid things even.

So in order to remind myself that Mr. is a good guy, I am choosing this as my "show and tell" this week.

This picture is from Valentine's day two years ago. I forgot to take a picture this year, but this is one of our traditions now. Those are M&M's in my favorite colors (of the time) surrounding my gift. This last year, he wrote out LOVE with dark chocolate peanut M&M's...the V being a heart filled with truffles. See, he does love me and can be romantic at times. One year for V day, he bought me a candle and then surrounded it with CD's of my favorite 80's tunes in the shape of a flower.

He's a good man, I need to remember that when we bicker!

Well, you can tell he's the youngest....

Yesterday was "graduation" from New Blues for Boo. It was cute and fun. The two classes performed several songs. After each one, Boo would ask loudly "did you see that Dad? Did you like it?" Everyone laughed.


As usual, he didn't sit very still. He was loud. He's three and a half.

His teachers though told us, five or six times. "Well, he's the youngest. You can tell." They also told us that he's kind, generous, funny and sweet. But what I heard over and over was "you can tell he's the youngest."

I'm a little upset over it. I KNOW he's the youngest. But get over it! The class was for 3 year olds. He turned 3 in September.

This of course caused a blow up for Mr. and I. It took it as proof that we should go with my plan....Pre-K next year at L.des and then Kdg prep the year after. With my plan, he'll be turning 6 when he starts Kdg. Mr is against it. His argument is that Boo is starting to read words now. I get that. I am a teacher dear.

Everyone (and I do ask everyone) that I won't regret not sending him but that I may regret sending him early. I do NOT want him to be "that kid." The one who isn't able to behave, who is constantly in trouble. The damage from that label (which has been applied already it seems) is much bigger in my eyes than having him be "too smart" for his class. I'm much rather having him in T.A.G than be in the office b.c of problems.

I can tell he's the youngest, but he's also bright and funny and he holds my heart.

Only child

Mr. is an only child, sort of.

Up until a little over 3 years ago, he thought he was an only child.

Mr.'s mother and father were divorced. His mother got very sick the summer I was pregnant with Boo. I spent much of the summer in New Mexico taking care of her. She died one week after Boo was born, my birthday and the first day we were able to hold Boo. She never met Boo.

Mr.'s father came to visit us when Boo was 6 months old. He was sick at the time, over the previous summer, he came to find that his thymus cancer had returned. Several days before Boo was born, he suffered a massive heart attack. We didn't find this out until the night Boo was born. (for more on this story....)

He stayed with us for a week. The morning of the last day here, I was getting ready for school. Mr. had already taken Boo to the sitter. FIL came to me and told me that he didn't know if he should tell Mr. as it wasn't the right time, but he wanted me to know and decide when to tell Mr. something important.

He told me that when he met MIL, she was pregnant. She gave birth to a baby boy about 3 years before Mr. was born. She gave him up for adoption. FIL was telling me this because although he had promised MIL, he felt Mr. had the right to know that he had a half brother out there somewhere. I told him that I wouldn't tell Mr. right away and I'd let him know when I thought Mr. should know.

Of course I went to school that day, thought it over and decided that I couldn't keep a secret like that from my husband. I told him when he got home. He had just put FIL on a plane back to St. Simons. He was upset, understandably so...he said he'd always wished for a brother. He also was worried that the reason FIL told me this was so that someone would know.

Later that year, Mr. finally talked with FIL about it. I remember Mr. taking notes while on the phone with FIL. (Mr. only talks on speakerphone, don't ask....) This was early December. FIL gave as many details as he could remember.

FIL passed away December 29th.

Mr. is an only child. He thinks sometimes that he would like to find this brother, but is sort of afraid to. What he wants, he doesnt' have. He wants someone that can tell him what he was like as a child. He wants someone to remember the good times and bad times with him. His grandfather passed away a few weeks after FIL. His grandmother is 85 and not doing particularly well.

Mr. doesn't want Boo to have to go through this. Boo shouldn't have to decide to stop life support by himself. He shouldn't have to balance taking care of parents on opposite sides of the country. He wants there to be someone here for Boo after we are gone. My parents in over 75. They won't be here to support Boo when he's our age.

We don't want Boo to be an only child.

Why hello there...

I'm loving Nacomleavmo , a lot. It's nice to know that someone is actually reading this.

So here's a brief synopsis of me....

I'm Linda. I've been married to Mr. for almost 5 years (eek!) Yes, we met online (aww) We have one son, Boo. He was born early at 31 weeks due to a rare condition called Vasa Previa . I am a 7th grade reading teacher who is working towards her master's in Reading. I am also a knitter and cook.

My mother took DES while pregnant with me. While we only tried 7 months to get pg with Boo, we've been trying to add to our family since winter '06.

We consulted with an RE in winter '07. After 4 failed clomid/IUI cycles and being diagnosed as "unexplained" we decided to participate in an egg cryopreservation trial. We barely made the cutoff for age, but decided to go for it and save our insurance in case it failed.

My eggs were retrieved for the trial and 6 were frozen (unfertilized) the day before I turned 36, the end of September. Two weeks later, we found out that our IF insurance would be cancelled by Mr.'s company November 1st. (yeah, good decision to wait and use insurance later huh?)
After several setbacks, the eggs were thawed in March. Three fertilized and all looked great when they were transfered. But alas, none implanted.

We are now trying to get the money together to do a fresh IVF cycle and trying it on our own.

So that's me in a nutshell....

Welcome....