Snow and stuff

It's been a crazy few days here in greater Boston. We got hit pretty bad with the big snow storm and lost power at 10pm on Saturday night! We had one tree and several other limbs down, mostly from our over grown lilacs. Boo!

As of 8 this morning, still no power. We had to borrow some space in our friend's chest freezer as well as bug them for a hot meal and a shower last night. We're sleeping in long under wear under multiple comforters! Crazy!

Right now, we're visit hubby's grandfather. I'm really hoping we have power when we get home!

Anyway, just wanted to check in with a quick hello. (since phone blogging leaves a bit to be desired!)

Hope everyone in the northeast survived the storm better than we did!




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Sex vs. Sanity

Part of blogging is writing stuff out so it can get out of your head, and you can stop thinking or obsessing over it, right? OK, so here goes. This is sort of an awkward topic. We talk so much about the inner workins of reproduction here, but it's not often people get specific about their sex life. But I have to get it out of my head, so I can move on with my day.

When I woke up this morning, I though to myself, "what am I going to be happy about today?" (I've been reading myself some Dr. Domar...) The first thought that crossed my mind was that it's Friday and I'm getting my new phone! 

And then I remembered my evening, and I got a little sad.

Hubby and I gave the natural cycle thing a go last night. It was day 13 after all, and my ovaries certainly feel like they are up to something. That's great, you all might think. Sex with your husband. This is what people do. Well, it had been since before we started stimming for the last IVF, so about two months. And since then, Hubby went back on antidepressants. He came off in July after an allergic reaction to a new one that he has switched to to try to avoid weight gain, and sexual side effects. And let me tell you, the few times that we managed to get it on between then and now were magical. Everything worked like it was supposed to for the fist time in nine months. Well, for him anyway. I'm another story, but we'll save that for another day...maybe. 

Last night, not so much. Although, he didn't take his little blue pill for assistance this time, because we didn't really plan that far in advance. I really hope it will make a difference. But I don't have very high hopes, because it didn't solve the problem with the three other types of antidepressants he's been on in the last year. But, this one is new. So, there is reason to hope, right? 

It's so frustrating, because while we are waiting for second opinions, I would like to be able to try naturally, since we have no reason to believe that it can't work. But then, not knowing if the sex itself is actually going to work adds another layer of stress, and makes me that much more desperate to get back to cycling. 

Cause, he's never had a problem with the plastic cup. Wow, that makes me feel really great as a woman. Anyway!

Don't get me wrong, any kind of intimacy is great, and much needed, regardless of the outcome. But it does just make me a little bit sad that nothing seems to work right for us. We just can't seem to make a baby, no matter how we try. And would would have thought that even getting the sperm into my hooha would be the issue! 

It's a struggle for me, because Hubby is doing so much better on this new medication. It's really great to see him dealing with extreme work stress still being able to laugh at the end of the day. Because, he's been crazed at work for going on five months now. It's a hard pace to keep. And some people just have a chemical imbalance and need a little bit of help. I have needed help myself. So I understand. I want him to be a happy person. 

I just wish it didn't seem to have to be a choice between sex and sanity. 

We'll give that little blue pill a try in a few days and hope for a better result. 

OK, now I can move on and think about all the strange questions I will ask Siri when I get home. She has some interesting answers is you ask her about the meaning of life.

PS - I love you Babe! I don't know if you're still reading this. I hope you understand that there are some things I just need to get out. xoxo

Good Things

...another random post brought to you by The Chronicles of Violetta Margarita

Good Thing #1: All of you ladies out there who are fighting the good fight with me, winning the good fight, encouraging me to keep fighting, and reminding me that I am not alone in the fight, you are all awesome!

Good Thing #2: We have a very tiny one car garage which serves multiple functions from parking my car (thankfully a tiny PT Cruiser named Lil' Paulie), to trash, snow blower, lawn mower, shop, etc. It's been so full of projects all summer, that I wasn't sure I'd ever be able to park my car in there again. Over the weekend while my mom and I were working on the office, Hubby spent some time in the garage. Tuesday night, he brought out all the trash when he got home. Wednesday morning, we left for for work through the garage, and I was surprised to find Lil' Paulie in there to great me! Hubby is good at surprising me!

Good Thing #3: I had dinner with a friend from my Resolve peer group last night. I was about about two weeks behind her in this last cycle. It was her first, which ended in a blighted ovum....her fifth miscarriage (no, this is not good, it's just the background). What's good is spending three hours talking freely with someone who understands.

Good Thing #4: My iPhone 4S was nearly delivered to my house today. Well, they tried, and I wasn't there, which means that I should be able to pick it up tomorrow at my local Fed.Ex store! I'm so excited because my old one is dying a slow death and wants desperately to retire.

So Ladies, how about you? Tell me something that's good with you...

Random Shit in My Head

in bullet form:

• I moved to my new spot at work a few weeks ago. It's got much better sunlight, but is in a much quieter part of the building. Even though I do have stuff to occupy my day now, the quiet is not helping me to stay focused. So, I'm listening to my iPod, which I don't often do. It's filled with U2 and Peter Gabriel. (Have I dated myself horribly?) There is something so soothing about Bono's melancholy voice and the Edge's haunting guitar riffs. And don't get me started on "In Your Eyes" by my man. It has been my favorite song for over half of my life. Hearing it was good for me today. (and of course, who does't love the Lloyd Dobler image it brings to mind). 
• It's cycle day 11 and I'm already getting impatient to be doing something again. Our WTF appointment is still over a week away. Our second opinion is a week after that. I had to reschedule it due to work travel. I feel a bit guilty over having the second opinion scheduled. Like I'm cheating or something. I know this is the right thing to do, but I can't help it. I'm really curious to meet the doctor who doesn't believe in unexplained IF, but I'm skeptical as well about switching from a hospital to a clinic which feels a little more salesy. Of course, just because I have a consultation doesn't mean I have to cycle there. Anyway, like I said, I'm getting anxious to do something. Well, it is day 11. Maybe it's a good day to do my husband. That would be doing something. And no one has told us that it wouldn't work, right?!
• Resolve of New England is sponsoring a blog contest, due this Friday. Infertility is...500 words or less. They will be announcing the winners at their conference the following weekend, which I am attending. I kind of want to enter. But, they want real names, and I'm not sure I want my real identity associated with this blog in anyway, shape or form. As important as advocacy is, I've written about so incredibly personal stuff in this space. I'm thinking of entering with a pseudonym and then just not admitting it's me at the conference should I be one of the winners. (though I highly doubt that would happen). 
• I can feel my ovaries starting to get in the game today. Along with that, I'm feeling a twingy feeling in my lower back, in what I imagine to be my kidney area. Some how this doesn't surprise me. I'm ready "The Infertility Cure." According to the quiz, I am deficient in both my Kidney Yin and my Kidney Yang. Is this possible? Shouldn't those cancel each other out? 
• Sometimes I'm sad and lonely and I write a post just so I will have an excuse to check my email for comments so I can pretend I have real friends. 
• I'm feeling at a weird place with blogs right now. I started this almost 11 months ago. When I started, I didn't read anyone who was already knocked up. So, this means that all the people who got their BFPs in the first month or so of my blogging career are about to pop, if they haven't already. It's been one thing (mostly hopeful) to read pregnancy blogs, but I am not sure how I feel about newborn blogs right now. In addition to that, I feel like everyone (well, ok, I know not everyone, but like 90% at least) of the bloggers I've been reading who were cycling recently have gotten their  BFPs. I feel like I'm being left behind, over and over again. (yes, I know, there are a handful of you who I've gotten to know and love who are still fighting the good fight, and yes, I know that a BFP doesn't mean that the fight is over in any sense, but I'm just feeling like there's not enough of you to keep my reader full of posts I can relate to right now. The baby boom is coming, and I need some company. Does this sound incredibly selfish or what? I'm in a weird state right now. Did I mention that? Maybe I need to jump on the ICLW list and look for some new blogs for my reader.)
• We had a great visit with my mom this weekend. It took some teeth pulling on her part, but she got Hubby and me to agree on a solution for our office. We went to I.kea on Saturday and spend much of the weekend assembling furniture and organizing. I will tell you more about it when I deal with the photos. It was really good to see my mom. There were some moments that I actually forgot I was sad, that I actually felt light, that I actually laughed. I guess it is possible!
• I've often been accused of telling long and rambling stories that take a while to reach their conclusion. I think this is enough bullet points for today!

PS - I'm not saying I don't want to keep reading all the BFP blogs, I'm just saying that they are dominating my reader right now (which really is a good thing for all of you!) so I'm just lacking in truly relatable reading material at the moment, so I'm feeling lonely, yet again. 

Battery Backup

My power went out last week. I was forced to switch to battery backup to make sure that my light didn't go completely out. But, the batteries are starting to fail. I'm afraid my light is dimming. I need to find a way to recharge the battery until I can get the power to go back on for good because I don't want to be in the dark. I am so sick of the dark.

I lost it a little bit last night over trying to come up with a backup solution for my laptop. I've already lost one hard drive, which wasn't a complete disaster because I had been backing up regularly. But my system got all messed up because my drive started to die. And now we're having network and file size issues with our replacement solution. So, last night I decided to purchase one of those online backup systems, so I wouldn't have to worry about plugging in a drive, or having it die on me.

And I couldn't get the software to connect. Something about a firewall or some such ridiculousness. Why can't anything be simple?

Hubby had gotten home late from work while I was in the middle of this process. He was watching TV, and I went into the office to plug into the router in case the wireless was an issue.

I lost it. I started sobbing. He finally came in to help me. I've had to hold it together to get through the fashion show, and work. And he's been so busy with work, working late and on weekends, I've just been on my own to deal with everything. What triggered the need for the new backup plan last night was coming home and finding that my computer was overheated, and wouldn't wake up. I had to force shut it down. I had this fear of loosing my whole life which lives on that damn machine. And it was just one power surge too much for my battery backup.

We sill haven't resolved the issue, but we have a lot of tech geek friends who use the same system (Crash Plan - any experience?) with a mac, so we're hoping they can help. I want to get this solved without having to spend hundreds of dollars on yet another drive that will only eventually die on me.

My mom is coming this weekend. I'm hoping her visit will do a lot for my battery. One of our missions to to reorganize our disaster of an office. It's also my craft space.An inviting space in which to work should help me stay inspired. We all know how much good being crafty and creative has done for me recently. I need to keep it up. I need to charge my battery. I need to brighten my light. I need to be done with the dark.

The Fashion Show

Because, as I think I said, or at least I thought a lot in my head this weekend, in grief and sadness, life still carries on, I thought I would take a few minutes to share with you the fashion show from Thursday night.

If you've missed me talking about it before, it is the annual fund raiser for IIDA NE (the New England Chapter of the International Interior Design Association). Interior Design firms team up with industry sponsors to create fashions from industry materials such as upholstery fabrics, carpets, tiles, rubber flooring, etc. The list is pretty much endless. Every year, there is a theme to the show. This year was...

For our entry, we chose to pay tribute to fashion icon, Alexander McQueen. 

Each entry gets to pose behind a shadow screen before taking to the runway. 

They have two other screens at the sides of the stage that show love video feeds. 

You might remember these paint brushes from my earlier post about the fashion show. We turned them into a necklace, and also cut the bristles off to add trim to the head piece.

The dresses were made out of canvass drop clothes, and the underskirts were made from a woven plastic material used for outdoor furniture. 

Our second dress had a hat made from paint can lids, and a necklace made from paint can handles. (hard to see here). 

The real tribute to McQueen came from the performance art part of our entry. We had two more people ambush the end of the runway with pant spray guns, and paint the model. See our inspiration here.  Ironically, we were blatantly and admittedly ripping him off, and we won for Most Original! But, I can totally feel fine about it when I review the ideas in the other entries (which I will show you soon). 

I have a video of the painting part, but I can't seem to upload it. Maybe some other time. 

That's me in the middle, with the models and the painters. Aren't the painters creepy? I was so nervous about the live painting thing the whole time. I didn't want to do it. But, I guess now I'm glad I didn't fight it too hard!

So, what did other people do? Well, the entry that won for Best Use of Materials did a Beatles theme:

Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds

Yellow Submarine

Strawberry Fields

Octopus's Garden

The team that won for Best Interpretation of Theme did a space theme made from leather and tile.

 

The team that won for Best Construction did Alice in Wonderland: 

 

But they weren't the only ones...

 

There was also a lot of Andy Warhol:

The team that won Best in Show definitely deserved it. They always do great stuff (as much as I hate to admit it, cause sometimes it feels like they always win something just because of who they are). Anyway, they did a religion mixed with corporate America theme, which they called Magical Kingdom Come. It earned a standing ovation, something I have never seen before in my 8 years of attending the show. 

This is a really tall guy, on really tall shoes. When he models, he often likes to make an impact by revealing something feminine. He always creates a sight to be seen, that's for sure.

So, if you've managed to make it this far, you must think the fashion show is as cool as I do. There were 22 entries, and I took over 100 pictures, so I focused on the winners and tried to give you just a taste of this crazy event. I hope you enjoyed my little walk down the runway. 

PS, if you click on any of the photos, you should be able to see a larger version.

For the Angels

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