Our Cards!

Without further ado - our Christmas cards!

Stationery card

View the entire collection of cards.

Christmas Cards!

Can I just say how much I LOVE Christmas? I have always been one to be really excited about the holidays (pretty much from Halloween through the New Year) ever since I was a little kid, but I have to say that this year is probably the most excited I've been in a long, long time. Five of the past six Christmases have been marked by sadness, emptiness, and longing for a child. And then last Christmas, I was mommy to a one-month old, so while I do remember bits and pieces of it, it more or less passed in a sleepless blur.

But not this year! This year, we will have a one-year-old who loves to play with paper and boxes and can really pick up on the emotions (excitement!) of others, particularly Mommy & Daddy! Although I've already started listening to Christmas music with Hadley, we're most excited to start decorating the house, watching Christmas movies and cartoons, and making our own Christmas traditions.

I'm also really excited that we'll be sending out photo Christmas cards again this year! I've already started scouring through our recent pics (and we even purposely took a couple photos while we were on our vacation) to find the perfect ones for our cards! I’ve been browsing the cards on Shutterfly and there are so many options, my head is spinning! I think these two are my favorites, but we will probably want to put in one family pic and one or two of Hadley, so maybe something like this or this or this would be better! I'm also planning on making photo calendars for Christmas gifts, too! ☺

And now onto the fun stuff! Because I have such great readers & took the time to share about my great experience with Shutterfly, they have sent me 3 codes to give away to my readers, good for 25 free photo cards! (Shipping may still apply, but I know it is very affordable!) If you would like to enter, simply leave a comment below telling me your favorite thing about Christmas (favorite song, movie, cookie, food, memory, tradition, etc! Anything!). I will use a random number generator to select three winners on November 28th! Good luck!

15 weeks!

I know, I know...it seems SO unfair that Haddy got a post almost every week in-utero from 4 weeks on through her birth...I feel like I'm short-changing this baby. I HAVE been writing down notes, etc, but I just honestly don't have the time during the day (or the energy at night!) to type them up! I'm going to try and do a re-cap (complete with all the pics that I've taken of the belly progression & our ultrasounds when G scans them in) of the 1st trimester - I can't believe we're quickly approaching the halfway mark...we will know the gender in just over 5 weeks! HOLY MOLY!

On September 7th, Gregg was home from school (on what would have been his 2nd day back for the year) due to flooding. I was on my online infertility board while Haddy was sleeping, asking my friends about how long it took for their cycles to regulate after giving birth, since it had been about 8 weeks since I had last seen mine! They all told me that I needed to go out and "take a test" to which I laughed - I mean seriously? We tried for 5 years before we finally got our miracle baby & they were trying to tell me that I was pg now? When we weren't even trying? When the chances were less than they had ever been in all of the 5 years prior to this? I didn't want to spend the money on the test, but I had heard of using an ovulation predictor test strip as a pg test. I went upstairs and peed on the stick, only for two lines to pop up immediately. That meant one of two things...either I was pg or ovulating. I was still in disbelief & I told the girls that it would have to wait until Friday (this was a Wednesday) when I could get to the dollar store to buy a test. Well...they were having none of that and told me that if I didn't go march myself out to the drug store and buy a test, they were going to start a pg test fund for me! LOL! Ok, ok, twist my arm! So I went out and bought a test & came home and took it. Well...the test line used so much of the dye that there was barely anything left for the control line! We were pregnant!

After several days of major freaking out on my part (worrying about how I could possibly handle two babies when Haddy still wasn't sleeping through the night, etc), I got used to the idea and definitely started getting very excited.

On September 9th, they squeezed me in to the doctor's office for the initial consultation & bloodwork. I had them run a few extra checks for my thyroid & progesterone levels, since those are things I've had issues with in the past, once I've gotten pregnant...but everything came back fine!

On September 15th, we went for our initial ultrasound. We didn't really know what to expect since we didn't know for sure how far along I was (we thought 8 weeks), but the dr's office was great. They had me listed as "high risk" until we got that first appointment and could see/hear the heartbeat. I ended up measuring about 6.5 weeks & we could see & hear a strong little heartbeat inside! It was all so surreal - how could this be happening? to us? and so soon?

At the end of September (the 18th & 30th respectively, I believe), we shared the good news with Gregg's family and then with mine! Everyone was as shocked as we were! We shared the news by putting Hadley in a bib that said, "I'm the BIG sister!" I think we confused everyone a little bit, but once they caught on, they were overjoyed for us!

The day before leaving for Disney, on October 19th, we went to the Maternal Fetal Medicine Unit for our Level I ultrasound. We got some great pics of the baby & once again it hit us how surreal this whole experience was!

As for how I'm feeling, things are going well. The first few weeks were really rough. I don't think they were any worse than the last time around, but to be dealing with nausea & extreme fatigue while simultaneously chasing around a VERY active little one - well let's just say it was tough. I slept during all of Hadley's naps from about 8-12 weeks - I was seriously wiped out (which could have also had something to do with the fact that I was still nursing until just two days ago!). I definitely don't remember feeling so tired last time. I still do take a nap during at least one of Haddy's naps now, but the EXTREME fatigue (like seriously wanting to fall asleep while playing with Haddy) has passed for now.

The nausea was really bad during that same time period (8-12 weeks). I not-so-fondly recall gagging over changing dirty diapers & the smell of Hadley's baby food. I am SO glad that phase is behind me!

Now that I'm in the second trimester, I'm starting to feel better & a bit more like my old self again! Hadley has been a sweetheart & will kiss Mommy's belly anytime we ask her to! I don't think she gets it at all, but it's still so darn cute!

We've got exactly 5 weeks to go until we find out if BS#2 is a boy or a girl! We can't wait!

Pics to be added later!