Rainsoft & New Beta Numbers

So yesterday we sat down with a Rain Soft representative. This gentleman tested our water for contaminants. Well we live in an old house and our water was super hard and had a lot of things floating around in there. Well we decided that we'd go ahead and sign up for the service. We are getting a big water system that will filter all the hard minerals our of our water. We are also getting an under the sink unit that will also get the pharmaceuticals, bacteria, and viruses out of our drinking water and cooking water...they also installed a drinking water spicket on our sink. And finally they are installing an device that will clean our air...it's being hooked up to our air conditioning system so that the clean air is pumped through our entire house. For signing up with also get 5 years worth of completely organic/natural cleaning supplies. Everything from soap, bar soap, shampoo, dish soap, and all purpose cleaner. Plus since I'm pregnant they are throwing in a year's worth of organic baby cleaning supplies. :) How great is that!? We tasted the water that was filtered yesterday and it tasted so sweet and light...it was amazing! We are so very excited.

On to our second Beta numbers. They were 234 which is a doubling time of 1.49 days. We are so thankful to be pregnant and would love and appreciate a singleton baby, however we are hoping for multiples. Call us crazy but we feel like we are being pulled to parent more than one child. We'll keep you updated.

15DPO

So for a week and a half now I've been sick for the majority of the day. I go between getting so super excited that I'm pregnant to getting scared that it won't stick. I feel like until I see peanut/cashew on a sonogram it's just not going to feel real.
A friend of mine was getting rid of her baby stuff since her little girl just turned 1...so she donated a swing some blankets and towels.
Jess and I actually made a starter baby registry at Babies R Us...since my parents don't live here, it'll be nice for them to be able to plan ahead about what they would like to contribute to the baby. If anyone out there in blogland has old baby stuff they'd like to sell or donate we are open to figuring out shipping or whatever.
Thursday I will be back in the Drs office getting another beta test to make sure that peanut/cashew are still there and still doing fine. :)

Test

POSITIVE BETA!!!!!

It was a positive Beta. So long as little peanut sticks I will be due Feb 1st!!!!!

Digital HPT

So I just took a digital home pregnancy test and it says POSITIVE! Just waiting for the beta numbers tomorrow.

Too anxious to sleep

So my chart looks perfect. Pointing towards pregnancy. But of course those little charts can be so deceiving. I have scheduled a Beta for Thursday and will know one way or another Friday if I am pregnant. Let's keep our fingers crossed that it worked. It is just so devastating to hear, "you're not pregnant". My progesterone levels look awesome. I'm not having any PMS symptoms, but am having some pregnancy symptoms including early nausea. So I guess we will all see Friday. Look for a post around noon Friday telling the results.

Progesterone levels 5 DPO

So the doctor's office just called to tell me my progesterone test results. My test was taken on 5DPO instead of 7DPO because of the weekend. So anyway the results were 32.6. Yep that's higher than last month at 6DPO. So I either ovulated more than once again or my progesterone levels just randomly became freakishly high! :)

California lifts gay marriage ban!

Okay so I'm sure everyone has now heard that California has recently lifted the gay marriage ban. So Jess asked me yesterday if I would like to "for real" marry her when we go to California in August. Of course I said yes. So we looked up the local Justice of the Peace and looked at the marriage license application. We are probably going to apply for a marriage license online in a week or so. We know that not many people will be able to be at the actual picking up of the marriage license, but we are planning on having a reception Labor Day weekend at her parents home here in Kansas. We thought that would be the easiest for the most members of our families and our friends to attend. Just kind of have a get-together where people can bring well wishes and/or wedding gifts. I know that my family is pretty traditional so the wedding gift thing is mostly for the traditional people attending.

On the ttc front... no real symptoms as of yet. My temp is staying high though...keeps rising actually.

CD18

Alright well it's two days after our first insemination and the day after our last insemination. I'm feeling fine, I don't know how you are supposed to feel if you've got a peanut growing inside of you...I'll keep you updated on that.

Donor update, our first choice for a donor disappeared about 3 weeks ago so we went with our second choice for donor. However today our first choice showed back up so if we are not pregnant this cycle we will use him next cycle.

On another type of baby note...our older babies decided to be VERY matchy matchy today. Since today was "twin day" at school Charlotte wore the same outfit as her best friends...and Julia wanted the same outfit. So today I went and got it for her because I'm a push over. And Julia got a new outfit that Charlotte wanted so I got Charlotte that outfit too. Here are some pictures from today's matchy matchy photo shoot..

Insemination Day-May

OKay so we just got done inseminating. Our donor was really nice and gave us a very well populated sample. We were able to inseminate right away so we're really hoping this is our month. So we are cautiously optimistic. Waiting on my cross hairs on FF to prove that today is perfect timing. My OPK was wayy brighter than the control line so YEA!!!! Well we are off to go see Baby Mama in the theaters and go to dinner. Have a great day!

On tv!

LOL Yeah I know...you're probably thinking who is on tv...what is on tv....well the answer is me...sort of. Our local newspaper here in Kansas City interviewed me today about rising gas prices and our next presidential candidate. www.kansascity.com has it on there under people react to high gas prices. Oh my my my who would have thought me of all people would be asked about hybrid cars and eco friendly living!

So tomorrow is the day we inseminate! We are pretty much just excited for the possibility of getting pregnant at this point. It's not every day that we come in contact with sperm! :)
Starting Monday I'll blog about my 2WW, fun times I know.

Deflated

Yes, yes I know this is my second post today. I'm sure my dad will be thankful he has more to read.

So right now I am struggling with two very fundamental human dynamics....faith and clarity. I was raised in the Christian Church. I feel like the church gave me a great moral basis and provided me with an outlet to deal with those times in my life that were less than ideal. I even have a tatoo on my back that states "For it was then that i carried you." Now that can be taken in a Christian mindset and it can also be take as a parent/friend/wife/human. I found that saying in the Footprints poem. I have been struggling with my practice of faith in a Church. I think that the church provides the structure for children to develop their moral basis, and that is a very positive thing. However, since a few years before "coming out" I have struggled immensely with the Christian church and in the same breath religion as a whole. I have read books upon books about everything from Catholicism to Buddhism and Taoism. I have even recently researched Scientology to the dismay of family and friends I'm sure. What I've found in all of my research is that in no organized religion is my love for my wife honored, by strength as a gay woman admired, and my role as a gay parent fostered. Don't get me wrong, I am not trying to find a religion that makes me feel like I am a perfect person...I'm actually searching for the complete opposite. I'm searching for a faith that admits that I'm imperfect but strives to give me the tools to make myself the best person I can be. I want a lifestyle religion. I have tried going to the Universalist Church but it is so close to the traditional Christian church's beliefs except they leave out a LOT....so I can't follow it wholeheartedly. Each person has their own "walk" and I honor every person's walk and I respect everyone's particular beliefs. So what I found initially about one certain religion met all my expectations in finding a faith for me. It incorporates a belief in a higher power with the empowerment of the human himself/herself. So I called the local local church of this particular faith to ask the wonderful question of "Do you accept homosexual people in your faith?". Their response was of course we do, we accept everyone. So then I started reading the teachings of this particular faith to find out in the teachings it says homosexuality is a perversion and is "extremely dangerous to society" and the homosexual person is actually ill. So now I feel once again like society and the world religions will NEVER accept that I love my wife as naturally as a man loves his wife, it takes a lot of strength to be a gay person in today's society, and it takes a lot of inner clarity and strength to be a gay parent. I'm just feeling deflated and lost.

Sorry for the venting....

Just plug it in...wow

Okay so Jess and I have a nice television in the living room that we have not watched for over a month now, not because we are trying to do without technology but because the sound stopped working. Well Jess had me call the tv repair people today and the woman told me to unplug it and plug it back in and the sound should work. Is she serious!? And yes it did work. If I knew all I had to do was unplug it and then plug it back it I would have done that a month ago...wow!

On the fertility front. We are inseminating Saturday and Sunday. We are super excited but we are also extremely nervous. WHat if it works? What if it doesn't work? What if we get preggo with one baby? What if we get preggo with more than one baby? Are we for sure for sure ready for this? Well the overwhelming thought that both Jess and I have is that we could not be more loving parents and we have a solid relationship so I guess bring on the sperm!

On the Portland front we have decided to relax on the idea for a while. We want to move, and if up to only she and I would move next summer. However it's not just up to us so we will just see how everything goes over the next few years. Either way once Jess' youngest daughter graduates we are planning on moving to a place that is more gay friendly, prettier, and not the midwest! :) Got any suggestions on where, other than Portland meets those criteria plus the criteria of a normal person can afford to live there?

Have a great weekend everyone!

A burst of energy...or maybe bordem

Alright so I know everyone is just dying to know what I did today...or not, but I figured I'd share anyway.
Our oldest daughter is having two of her friends spend the night tonight so her dad is dropping her off early this evening so that she can get ready for her little sleep over. Sounds innocent enough, except that I was raised in the south which means that our house needs to be spotless in order to have company over. So I spent the day doing the dishes (not my chore but my eldest child is going to pay me back another time), doing laundry, and ripping the carpet out of the girls bedroom. Yep that's right you didn't read it wrong...I ripped all of the carpet, pad, staples, and nails out of the girls room. There are some pretty nice hardwood floors underneath and Jess and I wanted to see what kind of shape they were in. Turns out they are not in bad shape at all. I cleaned the room, made their beds, waxed the floor, and rolled up all the carpet for the nice refuse people to take away on Tuesday morning. Tomorrow Jess and our little one are going to weed, get leaves out of the flower beds, and put mulch down, the oldest is going to work on a Titanic project for school due Tuesday and I am going to rip the carpet up in the girls bathroom and the front room. Sounds like fun doesn't it! :)
As far as our new healthy eating goes, I've lost 3 pounds and Jess has lost 4 pounds. We recently found some new items that are less than 120 calories a piece so they are helping us stay on our diet. I also made a really yummy soup last night. It had organic chicken stock, dried kidney beans, dried great northern beans, dried split peas, celery, brussel sprouts, carrots, and garlic in it. 190 calories for a 2 cup serving and it ended up making 8 2 cup servings...and I probably spent about 10$ on the entire recipe...and bonus I still have beans, peas, garlic, carrots, brussel sprouts, and celery left over. Jess likes it too so that's also a plus.
So I'm going to pose a question out to blogland.... When is the best/most ideal time to inseminate? We keep getting mixed information. We are planning on inseminating the day before ovulation this month which is in like 6 days. If you can help, we'd love the advice.

New babies...mixed emotions

So last night one of my friend's went into labor and had her first child. She arrived at the hospital at 9:45 pm and Winter Grace was born at a little after 11:00 pm. Winter is SO cute and my friend is SO happy. I got to see her this morning...yep less than 12 hours old. She has such cute little facial expressions and just wanted to sleep the entire time my friend was trying to breast feed. We talked about the birth and she asked about how my journey on getting pregnant was going. I didn't get to hold Winter because Grandma showed up at the same time I did, but my friend said I can definitely hold her on Sunday when Jess and I bring her lunch. :) What an exciting and miraculous day! I mean seriously, less than a year ago my friend was dreaming about being a mother and today she is one. I am so very happy for her and so excited to watch Winter grow up. However, it does make me a little sad. I know that feeling is really normal but I feel horrible for feeling sad. I want to be a mom so badly. I've dreamed of being pregnant and holding my babies for as long as I can remember. I know that the biggest obstacle in our pregnancy journey is getting sperm, enough sperm, inexpensive sperm, and attempting to inseminate more than one time during my fertile window. All that aside it looks like on Clomid my cycles are great, my LP is a good length, and I am definitely ovulating. I just wish it wasn't such a difficult process to get sperm. Blah...enough ranting and raving. I am truly happy that my friend is a mother now...something she's wanted for a while now too.

Nothing much going on...

There isn't a whole lot going on right now in the world of Jess and I. We are trying to get the girls' summer schedule. Mannn those kids are going to be in a lot of activities and camps. We are even thinking about putting the 6-year old in a hip hop dance class. :) That should be cute to at least watch her do.
I'm on my third day of Clomid. Last night I didn't get as dizzy as I did the night before. We shall see how I feel tonight. If I wasn't so hopeful that this would help me get pregnant, I would never ever come near Clomid.
I went to Home Depot today and got some veggie and melon seeds with a watering pale. I also found a push mower that I like. It's only $150. It's non electric, non gas powered. It's just one of those old school push mowers. I mean how much more eco friendly can you get than using human power only. Jess and I have also decided to start a compost pile to save on waste and to help create a natural fertilizer.
And on the last note...I got out of class two hours early tonight because tornadoes rushed through the area. Sirens were going off all the way home and so Jess and I ended up sitting in the bathroom (which is the only non outside wall room). Luckily no one that we know has been hurt so far.
Insemination count down is 9 days away!
7DPO blood test will be May 19th and potential pregnancy test will be May 22nd-May 24th