This morning I still hadn't gotten any texts regarding my cousin's baby - so I sent her a text this morning saying, "Congrats Mama! I heard the baby has arrived - yay! Boy or girl? Name? Love you!! :)" We played phone tag for a little bit as I was getting ready for work this morning and then finally caught each other. I told her that I had a dream that it was a girl and they named her Aubrey. And she said, "Well, it is a girl and her name is Carly!" Carly Lynn was born last night (around 8:30pm Central Time) and weighed 7 lbs 13 oz. Her hubby sent me a text last night - but for whatever reason, I didn't get it. And even though I had to wait a little longer to find out - it was worth the wait since I got to hear the news straight from her. :) I talked to Carly's mama again tonight and it sounds like things are still going well for the new family of 3. They are planning to head home tomorrow. So exciting!
In closing, I'd like to say a prayer of thanks that my friend "OU, Oh Yeah" got some good test results back today. Love you, dear! :)
I'm blogging to you on this rainy and chilly September night - it seems that fall arrived in Ohio on Sunday. After the hot summer, it's kind of nice to have some cooler days. My fellow 79'er cousin is in labor right now in Arkansas as I type - we are all so excited for her and her hubby! She was induced this morning (her actual due date was Sept 1st) and I've been texting with them all day getting updates. The last update I got was that she's getting ready to push! :) My guess is that their baby will be a girl and my husband is thinking it will be a boy. We will find out soon who is right.... I'll keep you posted!
I really can't believe that it is already September! Where has this year gone? :) Work has been getting pretty busy for me lately and of course our social calendar is always quite busy. This weekend we will actually be staying home - which will be nice! I apologize in advance for the long post today - let's see if I can do a quick recap of what's been going on since the middle of August.
Jersey Boys: As part of our Broadway Series package, we went to see Jersey Boys in downtown Columbus. It was a fun date night. My sister recommended this cute Italian restaurant and it was really good! (And prior to that night I didn't think it was possible to eat at an Italian restaurant and not eat any bread, but I proved that it was possible - thanks to my food diary with Elphie.) The show was also really good - we both enjoyed it. They used quite colorful language - kinda like the Jersey Shore, except they didn't use quite as many acronyms. It is a fast-paced show with tons of great music - we definitely recommend it if it comes to your city!
Fun Trip to Pittsburgh: My uncle & aunt that hosted my side of the family for 4th of July) invited us to visit for a weekend. My hubby is a big Reds fan - so the whole trip was inspired by the Pirates/Reds game on Saturday night. We drove over to Pittsburgh on Friday night after work and had a jam-packed Saturday o' fun! Uncle Don cooked us a delicious breakfast of pancakes, bacon, and scrambled eggs. Being the dedicated P90X'er that I am, I did 45 minutes of the yoga workout after breakfast. Once everyone was ready to go we headed down to Station Square and boarded their pontoon boat (The River Roost). The weather could not have been more perfect to be out on the water! After filling up on gas we headed to Sandcastle - which is a waterpark. Traveling by boat is definitely the way to go. :) We got to Sandcastle and headed straight to the wave pool. We enjoyed a delicious lunch of corndogs and shared some "macho nachos." After that, the guys got in line to go down one of the steep slides and I waited with my aunt. As we were waiting for them to go, the waterpark lost power! The music on the overhead speakers stopped and they shut-down all of the water slides. We got some beers at one of the stands - paying cash of course, since their systems were all down. Right as we had decided to leave - the music started back up and we knew that power was restored. Figures! ;) We had fun though and joked about the most expensive wave pool experience ever!
Hosting Book Club: One of my neighbors started a book club this spring. I wasn't able to attend the last book club, but I ended up hosting it in August at my house. For whatever reason they decided to do 2 books - I read one of the two. The book that I read was "Bossypants" by Tina Fey - it was kind of an auto-biography by her. Super easy read and very funny! Being a Saturday Night Live fan - I enjoyed reading about her time there. The other book that I didn't read was called "Nutureshock" and was more of a parenting book. My sister read it though, so I'm sure I can borrow it from her some time. There were probably about 9 ladies that attended - most of them were friends of my neighbor that I didn't really know. I had some wine, a veggie tray, fruit salad, and chips/hummus for them to snack on. I also made some cookies from some cookie dough that I bought from my niece/nephew's school fund-raiser. (Random: I learned that my next-door neighbor is allergic to peanuts - because she ate a cookie thinking it was chocolate chip and had to go home to get some Benadryl because they had peanut butter in them!)
Most of the book club was just us all mingling and chatting - but we did have some formal book club conversation as well. My neighbor that started the book club led the discussion. Now all of the other ladies (except me and my IVF buddy) had kids - so you can imagine there were a few times when the "Nutureshock" conversation got a little tense. My favorite part (sarcasm warning) was when one of the ladies asked, "Does everybody here have 2 kids?" and then everyone went around the circle saying how many kids they had. "Two!" "Two!" "One!" "Two!" Lovely, huh? My poor IVF buddy had to say "none" - but I think I was heading back to my seat from somewhere and managed to dodge that bullet.
A lot of the ladies have preschool age kids - so my sister was talking to them about preschool. After my sister said which preschool she had picked for my nephew, the lady responded with "Oh, we looked there, too." My sister didn't pry - thinking that there was probably some reason why they didn't pick it. But the lady continued to offer up that she didn't like it because the classrooms were so small. :) Just kind of an odd thing to share - something I would've kept to myself. (In my sister's defense, even though the classrooms are small - they do have 2 teachers for 12 kids, which is the best teacher-student ratio they found.) It was fun to host though and nice to meet the new ladies that I didn't know. Next month we are reading "The Help" - which I've heard lots of good things about. I bought it from Amazon and already started reading it on my Kindle. :)
I'll Love You...Till I Croak
Happy 6th Anniversary to Us! On August 27, 2011 - my hubby and I celebrated 6 years of holy matrimony. Since we have been traveling around lately (and since our best man was going to be in-town), we decided to stay home for our anniversary weekend. On our anniversary eve, we went out to dinner and went to see "Crazy Stupid Love." It was really good and quite funny. On our actual anniversary, we woke up and watched the DVD of our wedding and reception. It was funny to look back - we hadn't watched it in awhile. I'm thinking that maybe we should watch it each year. Later that morning we went to get a couples massage at a spa close to where I work (with a Living Social deal that I purchased). It was very relaxing! After our massages, we headed down to watch our 3rd grade nephew's very first pee-wee football game. He looked so cute in his football uniform. His team lost that day - but they did win their game this past weekend. We'll have to catch another game this season! That night we went to a cookout at our best man's twin brother & sister-in-law's house. Their birthday was on the 29th - so it was kind of a birthday cookout for them with family and friends. Happy 33rd to Chad & Nate! :) Our best man's sister-in-law, who is also a good friend of ours, even made us a little anniversary brownie dessert in our honor - so sweet of her! Our newlywed friends that got married back in May came down for the cookout and stayed with us. It was nice to catch up with them and to see everyone else that was at the cookout. What a fun jam-packed anniversary - kinda fitting for us I guess! Oh, and how cute are me and my hubby? We got each other the same anniversary card - see photo above - hee, hee! :)
Onesie for Baby Reyen - aka "the boy" :)
Labor Day Weekend: This past weekend we went to my hubby's hometown for a weekend full of family fun! Sissy and her hubby were up for the weekend - so good to see them. Friday night we helped my in-laws put their garage back together. They just had their garage floors painted that week, so we were helping put everything back in. Saturday we finished the garage clean-up and I ran some errands with the girls while the boys golfed. I took our niece, Chloe, out to get decorations and some last-minute items for the baby shower. That night was the baby shower for Sissy & JR - we found out earlier in the week that they are having a BOY!! She's only 5 months and is super teeny tiny to begin with - so she's barely showing, but I can see a bump on her. The shower was pretty laid-back - nothing too formal. We all ate and then whoever wanted to was able to decorate a onesie or bib for the baby. One of my other sister-in-laws made the onesie above for the baby - too cute. The mommy and daddy-to-be opened gifts and everyone just kinda hung out as long as they wanted. Sissy doesn't really like to be in the spotlight - so it was perfect for her. They got lots of nice stuff and quite a few children's books to start up a little library for their little guy.
37th Sellman Family Reunion: Sept 2011
On Sunday their parents host a family reunion for Granny's side of the family. She's one of 6 and the only one left of her siblings. So the reunion is for all of my hubby's dad's cousins and their descendants. We updated the family tree and I shared the new reunion scrapbook that I started making this year. My goal was to get it all done in time for the reunion, but I just didn't get it done. The reunions started back in 1974, but I'm only up through 1985 in the scrapbook.
There is always plenty of food at the reunion and lots of photos being taken by yours truly. This was the first year that the weather didn't cooperate. Every year we've been lucky to have beautiful weather - but this year it kind of sprinkled off/on throughout the reunion. We still had a good time though! And the past two years, we've had the paramedics called which was a little scary. The same cousin, Juanita (that is in her mid-80's), has passed out the past two years. After last year the doctor thought it was a mixture of wine and chocolate. When it happened again this year - we thought maybe the excitement of the reunion along with the wine and chocolate could've caused it. Both times she was okay and alert before the paramedics arrived. We will be hoping for no paramedics next year! The big group photo was taken right after the paramedics left. Luckily, Juanita is a good sport - because as everyone was saying "Cheese!" for the photo - someone yelled out "Wine & Chocolate" and everyone laughed. It was fun to see everybody and meet the new babies that have joined the family since the last reunion... 3 new girls: Abby who is almost 9 months, Evie who is almost 6 months, and little Gabby that is almost 3 months! Next year we will have Sissy's baby boy to introduce to the gang. :)
Getting closer!! :)
Basement Update: We've also made quite a bit of progress on our basement since the middle of August. And by "we" - I mean, my hubby and the guy that we hired to do our trim/doors. We now have speakers installed and all of the trim installed in the main room, bathroom, and workout room. We have doors hanging with doorknobs and small cabinet-like doors over the fuse box. Tonight we were working on painting the trim and doorways. We will need to take the doors down to paint them and do a second coat on the trim of the doorways as well. Our trim guy is going to come out next week to finish up the last few access panels. He's been doing a great job! Tonight we went to Home Depot to check out carpet. We have a couple options picked out that we like and are having someone come out on Saturday to measure. We will most likely place our order on Monday and then get the carpet installed within a couple of weeks. So exciting!! After we get the carpet installed - then we get to go shopping for a new TV and furniture! I'm so proud of my hubby and all of the work he's put into our basement. I know it's going to be a great living space that we will use throughout the years!
Arkansas Baby Update: Based on some posts by the baby's uncles on Facebook congratulating the new parents - it appears that the baby has arrived. But I haven't gotten any texts with an official update or the baby's sex or name. I just texted my cousin (brother of the new mama), "Has he or she arrived yet? :)" and he just responded with "Yes!" So now I know the baby has arrived just as I suspected...... I just texted the new daddy - we'll see if I get more information from him! So happy for my 79'er and her tall boy and their new son or daughter!!
Today was also my nephew's first day of preschool and it sounds like he had a great morning there. He's growing up so fast - such a little cutie. In closing, I'd like to ask everyone to keep PBR in their thoughts and prayers - we love you lots!!
My husband and I got married in 2005 and tried to start our family back in January 2008. We started our 1st round of in-vitro in December 2010 - which is when this blog was started. Despite a near perfect cycle, it resulted in a negative pregnancy test in February 2011. We were fortunate to get 6 extra embryos from that cycle that were frozen. In March 2011 we started a Frozen Embryo Transfer cycle. Despite another great cycle (on paper), all 6 of our frozen embryos had to be thawed to get 2 good ones for transfer - which failed to result in a pregnancy. In 2012, we took the first half of the year off and then tried a couple rounds of IUI with and without fertility shots - still no baby. In 2013, we did our 2nd round of in-vitro with my sister offering to be our gestational carrier. We ended up transferring 2 embryos into each of us and were blessed to welcome 4 babies in October 2013.