September Happenings

Alisha says: September came and went quickly. Dave was very busy with work as he was teaching so we stuck around town but still managed to do a few fun things.

We went to Dave's family work party with bowling and games.

It is still hot hot hot in Phoenix. 

Skye's cousin turned 2 so we had lunch at the mall and rode the carousel.

Skye likes "helping" with the laundry which means trying to put on various items of clothing

Dave and I actually got to go on a date out to dinner all by ourselves. It was so relaxing and nice to just eat and talk. We went to the patio at the Las Sendas golf club where we got to sit outside, enjoy the view/sunset and listen to some live music.

We tried to escape the heat by heading to Payson. We hiked at the waterwheel and then had a rest at Dave's parents property before playing at the park and returning home.

My dad's birthday is in September so we took this picture and sent it to him.

Were having a......

Alisha says: GIRL!! At our OB appointment a few weeks ago the doctor looked and looked to see what the gender of the baby was and had a hard time getting a good view. After what seemed like forever he said he thought it was a girl but to "not paint any nursery room walls yet" before a double check at my next appointment. We decided to keep it a secret (which drove a few family members crazy) until I had my anatomy scan at 20 weeks where the ultrasound tech got a good view and confirmed that it was indeed a girl. We are very excited!!

Pregnancy Journey

Alisha says: We did IVF to have Skye and had extra embryos left over to grow our family. After Skye turned one I started looking for a fertility clinic here in Phoenix. I found one I liked and we set up a consultation in November 2016 with Dr. Mark Amols at New Directions Fertility Center. We discussed our situation and that we had frozen embryos at a clinic in Seattle. We decided to have our embryos transferred to the clinic in Phoenix and start the process to do a frozen embryo transfer (FET). There is still medication, lots of injections and many trips to the clinic involved but overall the process is much easier than the egg retrieval part. We got set up and did a single embryo transfer in January 2017. I waited impatiently for the first blood draw to measure my hCG levels that would indicate if I was pregnant or not. Unfortunately the test came back negative. We were sad but felt fortunate that we still had several embryos left and set things in motion for another transfer. In March we transferred another single embryo. This time I got a very small hCG level reading but it didn't increase like it should have at the follow up blood test and by the third blood test the level had dropped meaning that the transfer was once again unsuccessful. The emotional roller coaster of this process is a lot to take. I couldn't believe we were going to have to do a third transfer! I really thought we would do the first one and then be happily pregnant. Of course life doesn't always go how we think or plan. We had a meeting with the doctor and we decided to try a little different protocol for the third transfer. On May 19th, 2017 we did a third single embryo transfer. I had my first blood draw 5 days later and got a positive hCG reading of 17! Yay!! This was good news but we would need to do a few more blood draw to make sure the number was raising like it should before celebrating too much. The amount is suppose to double about every 48 hours so two days after my first blood draw I had another one and the number us up to 59, 3 days after the second blood draw it was up to 224 and a fourth and final blood draw came back at 651. This was all very good news and we were so excited! My first ultrasound was on June 8th at 5 weeks 4 days pregnant. It was to early to hear a heartbeat but we got to see a little mass of cells. This was my last appointment at the clinic as you transfer to an ob for the rest of your pregnancy care. We really liked the doctor and had a good experience at the clinic.

I continued to give myself daily progesterone injections until I reached the 12 week mark. After we returned from our summer vacation I had my first appointment at my regular ob office on 7/24 at 12 weeks. It was so fun to see a little baby on the screen! It is crazy how much they develop from a mass of cells to something that resembles a baby in 12 short weeks. Crazy!

My next appointment was at 16 weeks and while Dr. Beck was doing the ultrasound he said he would try to see if he could tell the gender. It took what felt like forever as he couldn't get a good view but after a while he told us that he thought it was a girl but not to paint any nursery walls until our next appointment to confirm the gender. Dave thought it was a girl going into it and I wasn't sure so I was guessing it was a boy but were thrilled at having another daughter and for Skye to have a sister.

At 20 weeks we had our anatomy scan where they do a detailed ultrasound of the baby to make sure everything is good. We were able to confirm that we were having a girl and that she appeared to be healthy.

Twins for a Day

Alisha says: We watched Skye's cousin who is only 6 weeks older than she is for a day. Dave and I decided to be brave and take them to the aquarium at the mall. They were both really good and since they are so close in age and both have a little red in their hair it felt and looked like we had twins. They both had fun looking at the fish and playing in the water at the aquarium and then taking a ride on the carousel afterwards. We had fun playing twins for a day but also realized how much work it would be with two toddlers. Haha

Skye Updates

Alisha says: Skye is 22 months old now. She is finally starting to say a lot more words

Words she can say (that I can think of right now, haha):

Apple

Store

Stop

Mama

Dad

Purple

Heart

Words that she only says the first syllable but we know what she means:

Bike 

Spoon

Butterfly

Night Night

Blanket

Animal noises that she knows:

Cow- Moo

Duck - Quack

Snake - Hiss

Horse- Neigh

Sheep- Baa

She took 5 weeks of Infant Swimming Resource swim lessons which are survival swimming lessons where they teach infants and young children basically how to roll onto their back rest, float, and breath. It was fun to watch her progress from not knowing what to do to floating all by herself. She still needs a lot of practice but I do really like knowing that she has the life saving skill of floating on her back.

She is getting more and more active and loves to climb on things. She had three tips in a two day time span that resulted in a bruise on her forehead. One of them we were sitting in the backyard by the pool (not swimming, we were all in regular clothes) Skye was exploring around and found a stick that she wanted to stick in the pool. Just as I said "She's going to end up wet", she tipped right in head first onto the first step. She was okay and we all ended up a bit wet.

We have gone to a few kid events. There is a kids club at the mall once a week and while she likes it we haven't had much success staying the whole time as she stresses me out at it. She likes to climb on the stage, take other kids drinks/snacks, take off, lay on the floor. She is just being a toddler and it is cute when she dances around in the front. We have also tried a little dance/music class that once she really liked and the second time she wanted to leave the whole time so we will see. She does really like to go to open gym where she just gets to run around a big gymnastics studio. We have had several play dates with Lola and have been to Urban Jungle and the Idea Children's Museum. 

She loves to ride the carousel.

Rolling on the floor is becoming a thing she does frequently. This was during a walk around the neighborhood.

Laying on the floor at kids club

Her hair is getting long enough for me to try some cute things. It is also curly.

Dancing around at dance class, this was the first time we went and she liked it.

Playing in the backyard

A huge scorpion I saw on my bike ride out to water users. Gross!

Lake Powell

Alisha says: Dave was headed off to Atlanta for a work conference so Skye and I decided to join my family for a short trip to Lake Powell. I debated going because it would mean a five hour drive with just Skye but ultimately the lake sounded much more fun than staying home so off we went. We got there in the evening and camped out in the parking lot because it was too late to launch. Skye and I slept pretty good in the back of the honda while everyone else slept in the boat. The next morning we launched early in the morning under overcast skies. I was a little worried that Skye would hate having to wear her life jacket all the time but she did really well and liked being on the boat. We drove around and some people fished for a bit before we looked around for a place to set up camp. We found a spot where the kids could swim and had some nice sand and got settled in. Skye loved playing in the water and sand with Brody and Elsie. Brody was really good to help watch Skye and take care of her, he has a really cute caring personality. That night Skye and I had a tent set up on the beach and everyone else was sleeping in the boat. We settled in and slept good until 11:00 pm when the wind started blowing a lot and there was a bunch of thunder and lightning. Then came the rain which turned into a serious downpour. The sides of the tent were totally caved in from the wind and the rain fly was flapping all around and not really doing its job so rain was coming in the tent. I thought the tent was going to bust and at one point I was laying on my back with my arms and feet outstretched holding out the sides of the tent. Luckily we were on some little blow up rafts because the floor of the tent was getting really soggy so I moved all our stuff onto the rafts and tucked one blanket under some other stuff so that it might stay dry because once the rain stopped the blanket we were using was not going to be very useful. I debated on if we should stay in the tent or make a run for the boat but I knew they were dealing with the same situation there and that it would be really crowded and if we left the tent would definitely blow away so I decided we should just stay put. Skye was somehow still sleeping. It was scary but I also knew that we would be okay although nothing I ever want to experience again. The main storm lasted a little over an hour and then things calmed down a little. My dad came out to check on us and told me that they were all wet but okay also. Another smaller but still wet and windy storm came though a little later. In the morning we all told our crazy stories from the night and even had a little laugh about it. We tried to dry things out a little before packing up camp and heading towards the dam and power intake area to do some fishing. Fishing was kind of a bust as they only caught one small catfish but it was just fun to be out on the water and I love just cruising along for a boat ride. There were afternoon storms in the forecast so when it started getting cloudy we headed for the boat dock. Skye was tired out from the trip and did much better on the drive home. Although it was a short trip I was still glad that we went. I loved being on the lake with my family, it reminded me of all our trips when I was a kid.

Post Vacation Summer

Alisha says: After being on the road for 5+ weeks it was a bit of an adjustment being home. Skye especially had a hard time the first week as she went from being out and about with both mom and dad around all the time to staying inside a lot with just mom around. Phoenix was still super hot so our daily activity is swimming in the afternoon, Dave got Skye a little sprinkler splash pad that he set up right next to the pool and she likes to go back and forth between the two. We did get some good monsoons that filled the neighborhood with some great puddles that she loved playing in. It was good to get back on our real mountain and road bikes for some rides.