So what have I been doing?

Moving on. Or trying to, at least.

The past month I've been trying harder to find ways to make and invest money. I'm making $20+ a month doing online surveys. Dave and I are starting to talk about investing in real estate. We have some money that would be better put to use in an investment than a bank account. We plan to buy somewhat locally and have a property manager take care of the house. We also know we want to purchase a single family home and not a condo or townhouse. The real estate adventure will probably be in the spring as we want a few more months to save money. Plus we would rather buy a house in warm weather. We are NOT interested in adding another mortgage (incidentally, we are well on our way to paying off our home early!), so we will be putting 100% down.

Hannah is talking more and more and loves her new play kitchen. After Christmas, I'll likely post some pictures from the holidays. We have a busy week planned with trips to my mother-in-law's, father-in-law's, and my grandparents over a two day period.

I still want another baby. The focus on real estate, work, and Hannah are distracting me a bit, but it still feels like an ache in my heart. We are praying that this is our month. Even though the due date would be September 11, 2011. And even though it would mean missing the first two months of the school year. We should know in 2-3 weeks if we expecting a new little one yet.

She finally showed her ugly face

AF did, that is.

And now we can possibly begin the road of TTC again. I've been waiting for this for over a month and now that it's so soon, I'm starting to get scared. Scared that maybe we'll miscarry again or that it will take a long time. I'm trying to trust and pray that God knows best. He knows what to do. ::Sigh:: I always knew about the high risk of miscarriage, but I have now completely lost any naivete about pregnancy. There will always be that fear of spotting or just not feeling right.

Shall we lighten the mood a bit?



We didn't go trick or treating because it was a bit cold that night. Instead we dressed her up and had her look cute by the door!

I think it's time for another Bump break.

I stopped going on that site for about 2 weeks. I went back on and only would go on for about 10 minutes every few days. Fine by me.

Then it increased. Now I'm starting to want to be on it for 1 hour+ each day. Not the best idea. I think it's time to stop again-maybe for at least 3 weeks this time.

Hannah has had such a language explosion! She now says ball, baby, Jesus, Papa, mama, dada, duck ("guck"), and maybe a couple of other words. It is so cute to see her point to Jesus in her Bible stories and say "Jees." Love it!

I am still anxiously awaiting the chance to get pregnant again. The loss doesn't sting as much as it did, but I am looking forward to moving on. I thought I was getting AF today, but I'm 99% sure it was just more bleeding. My hcg levels were are 17 as of yesterday. I was hoping they'd be at zero, but hopefully they will be by next week.

Laziest person ever

That's me.

I swear all I do is spend time on the computer.

Anyways, time for some updates:

Hannah news: She is saying so many more words. It's been a complete word explosion in the last few weeks. She now says ball, baby, papa, Jesus, lunch, and of course mama and dada. She's getting really good at climbing up and down the stairs and she kisses everything. It's so cute!

My miscarriage recovery is going well. My beta hcg levels were at 31,000 when I went to the ER on Sept 25th. As of Thursday, they were at 81. I'm happy with the relatively rapid decline. I'm anxious for AF for get here so we can restart the process of TTC.

Dave and I are also doing well. With him working more morning shifts, we've have some extra time together in the evenings. I think it helps me feel a bit more connected, for which I am grateful.

Rambling

I've had a lot of thoughts and emotions rolling through my head lately, and I'm going to attempt to make a coherent post.

1. I'm not as sad as I thought I would be. Or should be. I feel like I'm mourning a pregnancy that didn't work. I'm sad that our pregnancy wasn't viable, and I wish it didn't happen. But I don't feel like I'm grieving someone's death. Knowing that a baby never developed is really helping me come to terms with this loss.

2. There are things that still make the miscarriage "hit" me, so to speak. Like reading Bill and Guilliana Rancic's story of IVF then miscarriage. I nearly cried reading that article because pregnancy loss sucks enough without having to need fertility treatments to get there in the first place. We are forever grateful and blessed to have high mutual fertility. And a quote I read today nearly made me lose it: "Lord, I would have loved a chance to sit my baby on my lap and tell him about You. I didn't get a chance, so would you sit him on Your lap and tell him about me?" I'm not sure how Biblical it is, but it affected me all the same.

3. I want to get pregnant again. Soon. Right now we plan on waiting for AF to arrive and then going from there. We're trying to weigh doctor's advice with an overwhelming Godly desire to create life again.

I will not be a POAS addict

I won't.

Even though I'm dying to test.

I'm expecting my period to come sometime between yesterday and tomorrow. Obviously, it's not here yet.

However, I'm not going to take a test until I am at least 1 day late. I don't want to waste a test and get a false negative. Now that we're down to a couple days though, the waiting is HARD! I feel much more hopeful this month.

In other news, we are trying to live life on a budget. We never really budgeted before just made vague statements like "let's eat out less" and "let's limit our spending". No concrete plans for our money. Right now we are only in the beginning stages but I'm hoping that September will be a new start. As we move toward Dave being a stay at home dad, we'll need to be sure our finances our in order!

In the end, we want to be good stewards of God's gifts to us. God entrusts us with children and with money, and we ultimately need to be wise with both.

Month 1 failed

I got confirmation that I'm not pregnant. Oddly, I'm not nearly as disappointed as I thought I would be. We had always planned to try for a May 2011 baby. It wasn't until we heard a sermon encouraging us to let God lead our lives, that we thought of moving up the date. We started trying because we couldn't think of a good reason not to. If our second cycle is successful, I will be due April 29, 2011. Not a May baby, but my cycles have been much shorter than in the past. I really hope it works this time. I know it takes the average couple 3-4 cycles, but it happened with Hannah on the first try.

Summer is half over. I've been attempting to plan several lessons for the fall. My hope is to get lots done before I get pregnant. Or at least before the exhaustion and nausea hit. I'm not looking forward to that, but I'm anxious for another pregnancy all the same.

I finally finished reading the Circle series by Ted Dekker. It's such a sad, yet accurate description of human nature. It's also a beautiful representation of God's love and sacrifice. I'll likely write more on it someday, but not tonight. Tonight I will relax a little bit more until Dave gets home.

We're home!

Washington was such a nice trip. Hannah did okay on the first flight. She cried a bit more and slept a bit less than I was hoping for. She did really well on the flight home though! While in WA, we got to visit the local park, go to an indoor bounce house, take a tour of the army base they live on, and go to the Seattle Zoo. It was so nice spending time with my nephew and sister in law. Her husband got back from training the day before we left and it was great to see him too. Especially since it will be 2011 before we see him again!
Here are a couple pictures from our day at the park:




And now for a secret I will only admit on my blog-we have decided to TTC next month! I am so excited! Dave and I knew for a while that we want children close together. I think that often creates a closeness between the siblings. Dave knows this from personal experience of having a brother only 2 years younger than him. We wanted to wait until Hannah turned 1 to give my body a full year to recover. And we're not trying this month since, um, I don't really want a February/March baby. Silly reason-I know! Prayers though for an April (or maybe March since my cycles are crazy) baby!

I am almost done reading the book Green by Ted Dekker. It is part of the Circle series, and it's the first one I've read. I can hardly put it down! It is such an awesome picture of good v. evil and God's love for His children. And sadly, how likely we are to doubt His promises when He is not visible to us.