LibertyHerd

A Tale of Two Offices

2011-04-06T17:30:00.002-06:00

The gumball machine has officially been emptied! And let me tell ya, it was certainly a gumball machine since my doctor removed 22 follicles from my ovaries. It's important to note that on my last IVF cycle, they were only able to retrieve 5 follicles...so this was definitely good news AND worth the wait!

As I laid on the gurney looking around the room I couldn't help but notice a stark difference between CCRM and Dr. Thompson's office. I guess this is the difference between a world class office and a mediocre office. This was certainly a night and day experience for both myself and Jim. CCRM felt more like a surgery center whereas Dr. Thompson's office felt like a doctors office. At Dr. Thompson's office I swear I was placed in stirrups, given an IV, and knocked out for retrieval. At CCRM I was completely hooked up to monitors and given IV fluids for an hour prior to retrieval. Than I was wheeled to an OR where retrieval took place. I actually awoke in a full recovery room where I stayed for an additional 2 hours before I was released!

Jim left Denver once again immediately following retrieval and I'll be making the rest of this journey on my own. If my follicles fertilize properly than retrieval should be on Monday, which means I will not be returning to work on Monday as scheduled. I'm not entirely sure how I feel about this, especially considering I'm suppose to be on "vacation".

My estrogen levels continue to spike which means I'm still at a high risk of hyperstimulating. If I continue to hyperstimulate than it's possible that the rest of this cycle could be canceled and we would end up doing a frozen transfer at a later date when my estrogen levels out. Dr. Surrey ensured us that they have a 98% success rate on defrosting embryos. My ovaries are still in some pain and I feel really bloated. This is a direct result of the hyperstimulation so I'm on new medication and a very strict diet to try and combat these symptoms. In the meantime, I plan to spend another relaxing in our hotel room in front of the television.

Good To The Last Drop

2011-04-05T07:27:00.002-06:00

My husband has one job and only one job in this process, to provide a plentiful and robust sample to be used to fertilize my follicles. Obtaining that sample can at times be a little tricky. Since I'm not a guy I don't fully understand the stress and anxiety that he feels when completing this task and something tells me I never will. In my view, this should be an easy and relaxing experience and rather enjoyable. Considering the tests that I had to go through his few minutes in a plastic cup should be a walk in the park. However, according to him, I'm dead wrong on this notion! Instead this is a completely stressful experience filled with dread.

Let me just put something out on the table...in case you've ever wondered, yes the "collection room" is equipped with dirty magazines and a few porn flicks to help speed up the process. I typically accompany Jim for his appointment. In an odd sort of husband and wife way, this is a tradition for the two of us. We each like to feel like we have walked the same experience and been by each others side through the whole process. I often wonder what the office staff thinks when the two of us show up together to do the deed. Not that the two of us really care since we'll never see these people again and it's not like we'll be bumping into them at the grocery store. But can you imagine what some of these staffers have seen working this job?

My job is simple, do a few things to speed him up and make sure that every drop gets into the cup! It's not a pleasant experience when you realize that you've missed...which we've done. I like to call this Good to the Last Drop...obliviously a play on the Folgers commercial, which often plays in my head. As we head into retrieval tomorrow I'm only concerned about Jim. I hope he can perform and I pray that he doesn't miss a drop! Did you know that the highest concentration of sperm is in the first few drops? Now ponder that one for a few hours.

Trigger Time!

2011-04-04T19:38:00.002-06:00

Finally, after waiting almost an extra week I get to do my trigger shot tonight! I'll be wide awake at 1:30am to inject my butt with HCG. I'm really nervous about this particular injection though since it's a muscular injection rather than the sub-q injections that I've been use to. Typically Jim does this injection for me, but since he's not available than that leaves me to do the deed. I sure hope I can reach the pretty little "X" that marks the ideal spot on my butt.

I still have over 20 follicles brewing in the gumball machine with my right ovary doing most of the work. My right ovary has always been a high achiever with over 20 follicles on that side alone. Unfortunately not all of those follicles are of mature size, but about 12 of those follicles will be a good size. My left ovary has been a little lazy and we only have about 15 follicles on that side, 8 of which should be a good size to work with.

Retrieval is scheduled for Wednesday and I'm toying with the idea of leaving Denver for a few days and heading back to New Mexico until transfer. My stay in Denver has cost my wallet much more than I originally anticipated and I think a few days back home will be a welcomed relief to my bank account. Obliviously I'll have to check with the office prior to making this decision, but I was wide awake at 3am debating this one. Not to mention I could use a few extra days with my husband.

Well please pray for me tonight so that I can magically hit the bulls eye on my butt!

Delay After Delay

2011-04-03T14:17:00.003-06:00

Well here I sit with very little progress since my last update. It's been a very emotional week and frankly I'm a wreck and in a deep depression. My estrogen levels continue to be sporadic and the Cetrotide has slowed my follicle growth to a snails pace. I had a few days when my estrogen began to stabilize and Dr. Surrey was comfortable enough to place me back on my primary stimulation drugs in an attempt to try and speed up their growth. Unfortunately after two days I once again began to hyperstimulate and I was pulled off of the medication. Thankfully, I don't feel physically sick this time as I did last week but without the synthetic stimulation my follicles won't grow much on their own. I still have about 12 follicles that they are monitoring closely and those are the follicles that we hope to "harvest" at retrieval. These follicles range anywhere from 14mm to 19mm.

So when is retrieval? I wish I knew, but at this point I have no clue. When I originally left New Mexico, retrieval was tentatively scheduled for Friday April 1st but now they are unable to give me a date. The doctors office continues to monitor me on a daily basis with blood work and ultrasounds but I still haven't been able to do the all important "trigger shot". After I preform the trigger shot than retrieval will be 35 hours later.

Since things have begun to progress slowly, Jim decided to go back to New Mexico. It was a tearful goodbye when he left and I broke down shortly thereafter. I have no idea when and/or if he will be returning to Denver, but he felt compelled to go back to work. I'm hoping he returns for retrieval but we can't say for sure...it all depends on if he can get additional time off from work. We do have a frozen sample at Dr. Surrey's office that we can resort to but a fresh sample is always better.

Currently I feel defeated and I feel like a failure. My ovaries aren't performing well and now my husband isn't here for emotional support. I've retreated to solitude in an attempt to shield myself from the outside world and I'm fearful that my dream is slowly slipping away...one follicle at a time.

Stay tuned.

Hyper Ovaries

2011-03-28T20:49:00.003-06:00

Just when I think things are going well with no complications, my ovaries have decided that the medication regimen I'm on is their new best friend. I wish this was good news, but the fact is my ovaries are in a mild form of hyperstimulation. I guess this means that I have to many gumballs in the machine and frankly my ovaries are freaking out and throwing my estrogen levels in a dangerous tailspin. Thankfully, my doctor is pretty confident that they can control the OHSS and prevent my estrogen from reaching the dangerous 5,000 level (currently my estrogen is over 3,000).

When I awoke this morning not feeling well I just assumed that the medication was kicking my butt. I had my usual ultrasound and blood work this morning and I originally had plans to drive to Fort Collins today but I was so nauseous that I decided to stay in town for the day. Later this afternoon I received a call from Dr. Surrey's office stating that I was beginning to hyperstimulate and that they needed to change my medication. They have since pulled me completely off the Lupron and Gonal-F and started me on a new medication called Cetrotide. The Cetrotide is supposed to prevent an early release of my follicles and help control my estrogen levels. I was given two doses and now I just need to hope and pray that things stabilize in these hyper little ovaries that I have.

A part of me isn't surprised by any of this considering I've always been one to progress at a hurried pace. I actually consider Alabama's "I'm In A Hurry" as my personal theme song for how I live my life. Goodness, maybe I just need to give my little ovaries a small dose of valium to get them to chill out a bit? So, here's hoping that I can magically keep my estrogen low and keep the gumballs in the machine until the proper time comes when they will be emptied.

Stay tuned!

Hello Denver!

2011-03-27T12:45:00.002-06:00

I can not believe the time has finally arrived and I'm now in Denver! Actually, I've been in Denver since Thursday and so far things are progressing well. Jim was here for the first few days but he traveled back to New Mexico yesterday. With Jim's departure I'm a little lonely and I feel like I'm making this journey on my own...sigh! I just need to keep reminding myself that the loneliness is a small price to pay and that I need to keep my head up and move forward.

Anyhow, I've been trucking right along thus far on my injections. My stomach is looking like a war zone, but that's just part of the process. Currently my regimen consists of Lupron, Gonal-F, and Menopur, which are actually different medications than what I used in the past. My ovaries like the medication too and they are responding well. So much so that my doctor has had to back down my meds to slow the growth. I have roughly 20 follicles growing at this point and I recently decided that I'm a human gumball machine. I have 13 follicles on my right ovary and 7 on my left ovary. Only time will tell if all of those follicles will be harvested or not. It's not uncommon for some of those follicles to flat out stop growing to make room for the other follicles. Retrieval/emptying of the gumball machine is tentatively scheduled for Friday and transfer should follow five days later, or at least a 5 day transfer is optimal. All of which will depend on how well the follicles divide after insemination.

I've been going to the doctors office almost daily to have my follicles monitored and blood work performed. The office staff is fantastic and they've been very friendly/supportive to both myself and Jim. I'm still shocked at the number of patients they have, their lobby is always packed. I can't help but think that there is an infertility epidemic in this country. You know there is problem when you're driving on the interstate and you hear a commercial on the radio for a respective infertility office, or see a billboard for an office. And I find myself wondering, is there a problem, or are they desperate for new patients? Anyhow, just a few random thoughts that run through my head.

$18K Baby

2011-02-16T20:43:00.002-07:00

What is the cost of a baby? How much would you pay to have a child of your own? For me that cost is $18,000. Yep, unfortunately today I took out a loan to pay for having this baby. Here I stand at the threshold of the casino with $18,000 in my hand for one shot at creating a life that both Jim and I will be proud of. In a way I’m playing black jack and placing a full bet on red. I worked hard getting myself out of debt and moving away from living paycheck to paycheck, but here I was forced to take out a big fat loan so that Jim and I could realize our dream. That’s a hard bet to swallow and the fact that I have that loan hasn’t been sitting well with me….I’ve even been tempted to pick up a second job to payback that loan. I keep reminding myself that the end result is more important than the cost to obtain that goal, but I’m an accountant at heart and all I see are dollar signs.

It’s not uncommon for infertile women to hope and pray for twins…and I’m no different. Yes, we may be naive about how hard twins or multiples would be in comparison to a singleton. And yes we are fully aware of the risks twins or multiples bring, but I like to call it the two for one special. I certainly don’t want to pay another huge chunk of money to walk this journey a second time.

On a happier note, Jim and I have gotten all of our testing completed and on February 4^th we had another phone consult with the doctor to go over the test results and figure out our game plan. Considering my age, everything looks excellent! In fact, most of my hormone levels are better now than when Jim and I did IVF in 2007. I have no explanation as to why my hormone levels actually improved over a three year period. I would like to think that 6 months of acupuncture helped to bring everything back in balance, but I have no way to prove that fact.

Shortly after our phone consult with Dr. Surrey, we also received our official calendar. I’ll be traveling to Denver on March 24^thwhere I’ll be staying for about two weeks. I’ll start my injections here in New Mexico and I’ll even undergo two ultrasounds in New Mexico before traveling to Denver. However, beginning March 24^th I’ll need to be monitored on a daily basis via blood work and more ultrasounds. Tentatively we are scheduled for retrieval on March 31^st and transfer is tentatively scheduled for April 5^th. Of course, depending on how ripe my ovaries become will determine this timeline.

Today I called the office to place my order for our medication. Which means our medication and supplies should arrive next week. I’ll be doing the injections myself again and since it’s been three years, I’m actually a little nervous. Thankfully, most of my injections will be sub-q and not muscular… I’m sure I’ll quickly become a pro again.

Well that’s the latest from Jim and I, things should be relatively quiet until I start my injections in about two weeks. Take care, and please pray for us!

My Deep Dark Abyss

2011-01-23T09:26:00.007-07:00

I'll be the first to admit that there have been times in my life when I should have been sent away in a straight jacket. Undergoing IVF is certainly no exception. I haven't even started taking any synthetic hormones yet and already I'm unbearable to be around. Since the moment that we walked out of the CCRM clinic, my emotions have been all over the board. I want nothing more to be a mother but can't understand why we have to spend so much money on something that ordinary people get for free, or worse take for granted. Where did I go wrong in my life to deserve this fate? Long ago I stopped attending baby showers and it pains me to no end to see a pregnant women. Even worse, I always seem to get to get the pregnant employees at the office and I often listen to them complain about being pregnant. I want nothing more than to scream at the top of lungs how blessed these women are for the gift that has been bestowed upon them. They still don't listen. My wonderful mother doesn't seem to help this either. She's always been quick to point out a cute baby in my presence and it hurts knowing that I can't give her the blessing of a grandchild.

I hit my all time low in 2008 when a tumor was discovered on my spinal cord between L1 and L2 vertebrae, followed by six weeks of radiation therapy. Just before undergoing the necessary back surgery, I turned to my husband and said, "please write on my tombstone..greatest legacy never achieved." Obliviously my condition wasn't severe enough to bring me to deaths doorstep, but the thought of not having children was enough to kill me. I was afraid that this latest illness would certainly be the end of my fertility. Which of course was my biggest fear heading into our first official appointment at CCRM. After talking to our new Endocrinologist he informed me that the radiation therapy could have thinned the walls of my uterus...making pregnancy extremely dangerous. After undergoing an ultrasound we luckily learned that I had no residual effects from the radiation to my uterus.

I seriously need to pull myself out of this funk before I'm sent to my own private desert island...

Electro Shock Therapy

2011-01-21T20:15:00.003-07:00

It didn't take long for me to become an acupuncture believer! I've been an acupuncture patient for over six months, but it only took a few small treatments for me to become addicted. I would highly recommend the practice, even if you are not trying to conceive. Acupuncture can be used as a way to relieve pain and relieve stress. You might also be surprised to know that acupuncture is very relaxing. It isn't usual for me to leave the office in what can only be described as an acupuncture coma. So much so that I often wonder if it's safe for me to drive. I've seriously gotten into my car and said to myself, "should I be driving?" Luckily, I've always made it home safely.

If you have any fear of needles, it's time to put those fears behind you! The first few times, it's a little disturbing to look down on your stomach and see a handful of needles sticking out of you like a science experiment. I recently had a new spin placed upon me during my last acupuncture appointment. I actually had electro shock therapy on my back. I'm still a little undecided if I liked it or not, but it is necessary at this point. Unfortunately while we were in Denver we learned that the blood flow to my uterus is incorrect. Very incorrect. Apparently the blood is flowing in reverse. Imagine my surprise when our nurse announced that information to me! Seriously, how does that happen? Is there some internal switch that tells your body, "no, I think it's time to flow in the other direction." And on the same token, how do you get it to flow in the proper direction? In case you haven't figured out the answered to that question is...electrco shock therapy. Now imagine my horror as my acupuncturist announced my therapy. I honestly don't know the science behind it, but supposedly the electricity corrects everything in 8 simple treatments.

Here's how the protocol works. Needles are inserted up and down my spine on each side, and also on my upper butt. Finally, needles are inserted in the back of my calves. Then (here's the kicker) they attach jumper cables to some of the needles and turn on the electricity. Okay, so not actual jumper cables...but you get the point. Finally I get to lie there for 1/2 an hour with the electricity turned on. It's not exactly comfortable, but it doesn't really hurt either. Somehow this is all suppose to correct my blood flow issue. I need to have 7 more treatments of this prior to our scheduled transfer. Due to my hectic work schedule, I can only see my acupuncturist once a week (for those of you that don't know, my acupuncturist is in Albuquerque..which is a 2 hour drive each way). If I ever have extra time, I can go twice a week for those treatments and if it was up to me, I would opt for twice a week...but work has me downing at the moment.

From the Beginning

2011-01-18T20:46:00.007-07:00

I wasn't sure where to begin in the timeline of this blog and I wasn't sure which topic to tackle first. I have so many ideas flying in my head that I honestly don't think there will be enough space out here to compile everything. So where do I begin? I suppose like everything else, it's best to start from the beginning. Which means in order for you to understand our quest, you must first understand how Jim and I landed on IVF's doorstep.

I'll spare you most of the details from my prior attempts to get pregnant during my first marriage. While I'm sure that my first marriage will creep in here from time to time I'm really not in the mood to discuss it tonight. With that said, I'll start when my life really mattered...when I met Jim. Jim and I decided to start a family pretty much right off the bat. In fact I think we went through some testing and a few IUI's prior to the wedding. I remember thinking that since our relationship started in reverse than it would be perfectly normal to start a family prior to the actual wedding. And so that's what we did...

New Mexico doesn't pride itself on having the greatest medical care and the field of infertility isn't any different. In fact the entire state only has one Endocrinologist....Dr. Thompson resides his practice in Albuquerque. I had been a patient at Dr. Thompson's office prior to meeting Jim, but I was uncomfortable using him again as I was afraid Dr. Thompson would look at us as a cautionary tale. Through the grapevine I had learned that there was a Endocrinologist that practiced at UNM Hospital. Dr. Magarelli splits his practice between Albuquerque and Colorado Springs. Dr. Magarelli is equipped to perform IUI's at his UNM office, but he needs to send his patients to Colorado Springs for those undergoing IVF.

Before I continue, I feel like I need to define a few terms so that all of us are on the same page. IUI translates to intrauterine injection and is commonly refereed to as artificial insemination...as a joke you'll also hear it called turkey basting. During this procedure on the day of ovulation, sperm is collected, washed, and injected back into the woman's uterus. Nature is than allowed to do it's own thing and hopefully eggs will fertilize in their natural environment. IVF translates to in-vitro fertilization and is sometimes still refereed to as test tube babies. In this procedure, a woman's follicles are removed from the ovaries (by way of surgery), sperm is collected, washed, and then both sperm and follicles are allowed to interact in a small petri dish until the sperm penetrates a follicle. Once the follicles are fertilized than the fertilized product is injected/transferred back into the uterus.

Anyway, under Dr. Magarelli's care Jim and I decided to try a few IUI's. Obliviously the IUI's were unsuccessful, but I did get one positive pregnancy test. The pregnancy didn't last long and Jim and I were heartbroken. We met with Dr. Magrelli numerous times while we were at his office and each time we sat down with him, we felt he was more of a used car salesmen than a doctor. He was constantly trying to sell us on IVF and we always felt like new patients as Dr. Magarelli went to great lengths to educate us on how a pregnancy occurs...as if we didn't already know. Needless to say, at some point we decided that Dr. Magarelli wasn't the right fit for us and we should probably make our way to Dr. Thompson's office.

When Jim and I first met with Dr. Thompson I expressed my concerns to him about my prior experiences with his office and he seemed genuinely sympathetic and willing to work with us. We decided to skip the IUI's and go straight to IVF. Our first IVF cycle started out well. I responded well to the prescribed medication and all of the ultrasounds came back normal. On the day of retrieval, 5 follicles were removed and allowed to mingle in the petri dish with the prepared sperm. When I called the next day to inquire about fertilization, the nurse gave no indication that anything was wrong. A few days later when Jim and I arrived for our scheduled transfer, we were told that there was a problem with the fertilization. Typically one sperm enters the follicle and no other sperm are allowed to enter. Unfortunately in my case, I had several sperm that entered each follicle and when this happens the follicle doesn't divide properly and eventually dies off on its own. This event is known as polyspermy, but its unclear if this is "normal" for my follicles. The only way we'll know if this is a normal occurrence is to undergo another round of IVF.

Jim and I had originally planned to wait a few months before undergoing round two of IVF but our lives quickly got hectic. So we decided to put it off a year while we got ourselves more financially stable. During that year I fell ill and had several setbacks in terms of my health. I'll explain my other health problems in a later post. After I had been healthy for a consecutive year we decided to revisit building our family. A co-worker of Jim's told him about a fertility clinic in Denver that they used and I was quickly placed in touch with his wife. After speaking to his wife, I was confident that Denver was where we needed to be.

I contacted the Colorado Center for Reproductive Medicine in October and was informed that we needed to set-up a phone consult with one of the doctors. After filling out a tower of paperwork, we were scheduled for our phone consult the week of Thanksgiving. As usual I was super nervous prior to this phone call because I was afraid that as a result of my prior medical problems we would be rejected. Thankfully we weren't rejected...in fact we were welcomed with open arms. We were also informed that we needed to schedule an appointment in Denver to undergo a "one day workup". I decided to wait until after the holidays before I called CCRM again to schedule the one day workup. At the beginning of January I called the office and was soon scheduled to have our workup on January 14th.

Jim and I traveled to Denver the night before our appointment and we stayed with my aunt and uncle in Lakewood. Both Jim and I were once again super nervous about these appointments...well at least I was nervous. Jim said he was nervous, but I can't imagine why...his test was a walk in the park compared to what I had to go through. Our day started promptly at 7:30am and we were whisked from one appointment to another while we met with nurses, doctors, undergoing tests, blood work, and signing more paperwork. The entire day was information overload...I mean when we first arrived, we were handed a three-ring binder of information. It was good information though and Jim quickly fell in love with them. I've never met office staff so friendly, so compassionate, and so professional. It was clear that the office held high standards for their staff and we appreciated that.

As we stand today, I'm still undergoing some more tests and we're still waiting for results on some prior testing. We have decided to pursue IVF using CCRM and I'm hoping to have all of our test results by our next scheduled appointment on February 4th.

Getting Back Into The Saddle

2011-01-17T19:33:00.003-07:00

Holy cow, it's been almost three years since I last made a post out here! Let me begin by saying why I discontinued my blog. The original blog was started as a way to update friends and family on our quest to build our family. Jim and I underwent one round of IVF that is detailed here in earlier posts. Unfortunately IVF was unsuccessful for us and today we are still on the same quest. When we stopped IVF the blog turned into more of a diary than my ultimate vision, so I discontinued blogging.

Well here we are three years later and Jim and I have decided to take a leap of faith. We are once again going to the IVF casino and we are certain that we will come out a winner! So this blog will again be used so that all of you can pray for us and follow us through this emotional journey. However, due to the sexual content of this journey some of the posts may become graphic so please be advised. With that said welcome to;

A Girlfriends Guide to Infertility, by Margot and Jim Liberty Our Personal Quest to Build the Family of our Dreams

Stay tuned!

Playtime!!!

2008-04-05T08:56:00.003-06:00

Sorry everyone but I really haven't had much to post lately. So, I thought I would share a few pictures of Tundra taken throughout the week during playtime. Jim and I continue to marvel at how big he's getting. Today, I plan on taking both dogs to Overlook Park....by myself. Jimmy and I went last weekend and it was really difficult on me, I was in tremendous pain by the time we returned. Jim plans to spend the day working in the yard so since he's busy I'll try this adventure alone. Anyway, here are the pictures from the week.

Monkey See Monkey Do

2008-03-27T20:33:00.004-06:00

So I know its been a while since my last post, but I've been extremely busy these days. School has been almost overwhelming and work has been filled with drama. So when I get home in the evenings I'm either doing homework or trying to clear my head. Not to mention, now that I'm off crutches I've been doing some chores around the house in the evenings. Anyway, I've got a really cute story to tell all of you about Tundra and Nanook. At the end of this post you'll find some updated pictures...we can't get over how quickly he's growing.

Anyway, when we got Tundra naturally we got him a few toys to chew on as well. My mother had gotten him a toy bone and another plastic toy with a rope through it. For some reason the rope toy has been Tundra's favorite and he really hasn't paid much attention to the toy bone...or at least not at this point.

One evening Jim thought it would be a good idea to give Nanook his rawhide (we only give it to him every so often). I was a little hesitant since I wasn't sure how Tundra would react. So, Nanook lays down on the floor and begins to enjoy his bone. Meanwhile, Tundra is staring at him trying to figure out what he's doing and he begins to bark at him. Next thing we knew Tundra runs to grab his toy bone and lays down in front of Nanook and proceeds to imitate his every move. Tundra was holding the bone between his paws just the same way Nanook was and Tundra was chewing on his toy bone the exact same way Nanook was. It was the cutest thing I've ever seen! I actually told Jim that I had no idea that dogs imitate each other....monkey see monkey do.

Ahh, this is our little penthouse boy. He sleeps like this all the time!

Tundra Has Arrived!

2008-03-12T17:50:00.008-06:00

Well after many months of waiting Tundra has finally arrived! All of us are very excited and we really enjoy watching him play and get to know the other animals of the house. So far everyone is getting along really well. Nanook doesn't know what to think of the little guy and he has been growling a little. He hasn't snapped at Tundra, but he's certainly been showing Tundra who is boss. To my surprise, Corki is doing really well. I'm not sure if you guys remember or not, but I was expecting Corki to live on top of the refrigerator for the next several months, but he doesn't to notice Tundra. Sasha is a different story...she's not a happy cat. She's also all of a sudden become skittish of sudden moves. I'm sure she'll get over it, but it may take a few months.

Anyway, I took some pictures of Tundra yesterday during play time so I hope you enjoy the following photos:

These are my two favorite pictures thus far.

Beautiful Banff

2008-03-11T20:41:00.024-06:00

Jim and I had an amazing time in Banff!!! I can't say enough about how beautiful this town is and how much I would love to live there some day. Everything about our weekend was such a dream and even though I was on crutches I still made the most of it. We arrived in Calgary on Thursday and we spent the afternoon driving around just getting to know the town. I was a little disappointed in Calgary, I was expecting it to be similar to Colorado Springs in the sense that Colorado Springs is nestled up against the mountains. Calgary is a little over an hour from the mountains...not nestled up against the mountains. Between Calgary and Banff there is a lot of open space used mainly for farming, but also has rolling hills.

On Friday Jim and I slept in and then we headed up the mountain in a gondola to enjoy the view. It was rather cold on top of the mountain, but the views were amazing! We finished up the day back in Calgary where we watched the Calgary Flames take on the Nashville Predators...the flames lost but Jim thoroughly enjoyed the game and the people. Saturday was spent hanging around Banff and doing some shopping. Yes, even though I was on crutches I was still able to shop! When we woke up on Saturday morning I decided that I wasn't going to let those darn crutches ruin our weekend so I crutched around Banff all day. Of course I took a few pain killers during the course of the day though...to help with the arm pain of course. I even managed to wear Jim out walking around town! Moving on, Sunday was spent in Lake Louise and then back to Calgary to catch our flight home.

I decided during the weekend that Jim and I need to make this an annual trip. He came up with the idea of rotating seasons...summer one year, winter the next. We hope to go again next summer and I'm hoping to take Zach, Sam, Aaron, and Jimmy with us. The entire time we were in Banff I kept thinking to myself how much Zach and Sam would love this town and I can't imagine being there without them. I have numerous pictures to share with you, so sit back and enjoy the show.

Here are a few images from out hotel.

We stayed in a castle in Banff (The Fairmont Banff Springs), so here are a few images of the hotel. I have a better "airel" view later on during this post.

The next two pictures are of a "bus" used to take tourists to the columbian ice fields. We were very intrigued by the sheer size of this thing.

The following pictures were taken during our gondola ride.

This picture was taken on the gondola ride, and you can see our "castle in the woods". Its located in the bottom-center of the photo in case you can't see it.

This is downtown Banff.
Here I am at Lake Louise. Crutching my way to the lake....

This picture is a hockey rink on Lake Louise. The lake was frozen...allowing people full access to walk on water. Which included playing hockey on the lake, ice skating on the lake, and walking from end to the other. This was a completely different concept to me...one that was hard to comprehend.

Here's the ice skating rink that I mentioned above.

Here's Jim standing on the hockey rink.
And finally, here's me standing on the lake...something I've never done before.

Coming Soon!

2008-03-11T11:49:00.002-06:00

Well, I just thought I would let everyone know that I am alive and well. The last few weeks have been extremely hectic for me. Jim and I just returned from Banff, plus Tundra is now home with us. I don't have time for a big post but I promise pictures of Calgary/Banff will be posted soon, as well as, pictures of Tundra.

My Life on Crutches

2008-02-26T19:21:00.002-07:00

Well it's been three weeks since I've been dealing with these dreaded crutches and life has been interesting. I've officially hit my half way mark, which means I have three more weeks to go (and believe me I'm counting down). Although, I realized the other day that I'll probably be using the crutches for more then three weeks. After the six week mark I'll be able to start putting weight on my knee again, but I know it will still take me some time before I build those muscles up again to put my full weight on that leg.

Things have been very interesting the last several weeks. While I feel very useless for the most part and I've put a damper on the last few weeks for Jim and I, I've come across some really wonderful people. Above all I think I'm more sympathetic to people with disabilities since this experience has made me open my eyes to a different side of the world. I've run into many people willing to help me out (strangers included) and yet I've also run into people that have flat out ignored the click-clack of my crutches.

Last week I went to our local bagel shop to find a complete stranger more then willing to help me get my drink, open the door, and walk me to my car. Ironically, I later saw the same gentleman at Dr. Lubowitz's office filling out new patient paperwork. Jim has also been a huge help to me and he's certainly risen to the occasion to pick up the extra slack here at the house. I pretty much can't do anything here at home, so between him and Jimmy they're getting my daily and weekly chores done.

As I type this though, I must say, I've also run into a few people that can't seem to notice that it's difficult for me to open a door and consequently the door has slammed in my face. I also had one woman practically knock me over on my way to class. Which brings me to another point....parking has been a continuous struggle for me. At the credit union we have one available parking spot extremely close to the front door, that's not handicapped. I try very hard to get that spot everyday. For the most part I've done pretty well getting that spot, however, every time I leave the credit union the spot is gone when I return. To make matters worse, it's the same employee taking that spot each time....

Anyway, I just wanted to send everyone a quick update on me. I hope to make another post soon so that I can update everyone on Tundra.

Another Tundra Tease and Other News

2008-02-12T18:55:00.001-07:00

FYI, the spell checker in blogger seems to have kicked the bucket so I appologize...my spelling is horrible.

I think I'll go ahead and start by showing off a few more pictures of Tundra. I recieved these on Monday and he's getting so big and soooo cute! In case I didn't mention it, he comes home on March 10th!

Moving on to other news. I think most of you are unaware, but I had knee surgery last Wednesday. I know this sounds odd, but I made it my New Year's resolution to get my knee fixed. Here's a quick history on my knee...

Jim thought it would be a great idea to hike the Grand Canyon for our honeymoon. Not exactly my idea for a honeymoon but a marriage is about compremising and this was something he really wanted to do. I actually thought I would do really well on this hike and my concern was actaully for Jim. Boy was I wrong! Jim had no problems with this hike...I on the other hand was a wreck. Basically, my knee has never fully healed since that hike and its slowly gotten worse and worse. Not to mention, I also think sliding in softball was a factor to my knee problems.

My knee had gotten so bad that I was unable to walk up or down stairs, I had a hard time walking up any incline, and knew in this condition I wouldn't be able to play softball this year and golf was up in the air. I also still have a few pounds to lose since Jim and I did our IVF stuff, so exercising was difficult. So I figured now would be a great time to get it fixed....I had enough!

I have five months before softball begins for the season so I began to search doctors and go through testing. I had an x-ray done that proved that the bones were fine. After the x-ray I was referred to Dr. Lubowitz from Taos (whom is world renowed and the physican for the U.S. Ski Team and was once the physican for the Phillies) who thought there might be meniscus tear...so he ordered an MRI. The MRI came back inconclusive and it didn't appear there was any sort of tear.

After some discussion with Dr. Lubowitz we decided to have the knee scoped out in the hopes that the scopping job would clear the persistent pain. I was told I would be on crutches for 2-3 days max and back to normal activity after a month. So, I go into surgery and when I wake up a few hours later I was told that they found severe cartilage damage. I was also told that they drilled my knee to create bleeding and somehow this generates new cartilage. I'm not 100% sure what they did (I was heavily drugged at this point) but it was something along those lines. What I do remember them saying is I'm not allowed to put any weight on that knee for six weeks...which means crutches for six long weeks. Needless to say, I wasn't entirely thrilled. Although I am glad that it should start to get better soon. There's also a possibility that I might need future treatment.

So, here I am...pretty crippled at the moment trying to go about my daily activities on crutches. The crutches suck! My arms, hands, and wrists, are so sore and it hasn't been a complete week yet. I have no idea how I'm going to manage for six weeks. Oh yeah, Jim and I are going to Ruidoso this weekend to celebrate Valentine's Day and March 6th Jim and I leave to go to Calgary...all of which I get to do on crutches...yuck!

This past weekend was a sad, sad weekend. I'm here crippled and poor Jim had a bad case of broncitis, so neither one of us was much use to the other. Oh, and Jim was kind enough to help me cook dinner Sunday night but he sliced his thumb really bad cutting potatos for me. Poor guy, I know he was trying to be nice and he wanted to help me. He took himself to urgent care on Monday morning to have it looked at (his second trip in less then a week).

So that's about it for us. I'm here at the house unable to really do anything but watch television and get caught up on homework. Jim is feeling better now...although his thumb still hurts. He's also doing a wonderful job of helping me out.

Jimmy's New Bedroom

2008-01-28T20:15:00.000-07:00

Just a quick post for the evening. Jimmy's new bed was delivered on Saturday so now his bedroom project is finally complete! Here are a few pictures of the final work....sorry I took these pictures before we put sheets on the bed. Although, I actually don't have any queen size sheets at the moment but I plan to take care of that one either this weekend or on Friday since we'll be in Albuquerque for a hockey game. Anyway, here are the pictures...

Tundra Tease

2008-01-27T16:44:00.000-07:00

I awoke this morning to find two more cute pictures of Tundra on my email. I'm told that he's growing fast, is healthy and frisky. He's now opened his eyes, which appear blue and I'm not sure if that will change as he gets older or not.

Well he's certainly a boy!

More Tales From The City!

2008-01-27T14:57:00.000-07:00

Okay, I know it's been a few days since my last post and I apologize for the delay in finishing up my New York experience. Anyway, Stefanie and I awoke from our "nap" at 2:30am so we could catch a cab to the Brentwood Station at 3:30am. As usual I called the cab company ahead of time and sure enough our cab was right on time. One problem though....it was once again Mr. Child Molester. I couldn't believe our luck, two cab rides and each one with the same driver! He already freaked me out and here we were dealing with him again.

Anyhow, our train into the city was uneventful. Prior to embarking on this trip Stefanie and I decided it would be really cool if we went to The Today Show...hence the reason why we got up so darn early. We arrived at Rockefeller Center at 5am and we were fourth in line! I was so excited, but we were also so cold. That was probably one of the coldest days I've experienced all year. Anyhow, there was a gentleman outside selling cardboard and markers so Stefanie and I decided to make one of those cheesy signs you see on the show. We couldn't think of what to put on the sign, so we put "Hi Mom". I know it sounds boring but it was 5am and we only had two hours of sleep so we couldn't think clearly at that point.

We had a wonderful time on the show. It was nice to view some of the behind the scenes stuff and Stefanie and I did make it on TV a few times, however, nobody saw us. Jim was suppose to tape it but by the time he woke up in the morning the show was over. Mom didn't tape it and neither did Mark so we were out of luck.

After we were through with the cold weather...and our bodies were numb from the waist down, we decided to warm up at Dean & Decula. Stefanie had some coffee and I had some hot tea. From there we went across the street to the NBC Experience store. On a whim we decided to do the NBC Studio Tour. We were able to see the studios for NBC Nightly News, Conan O'Brien, and we finished the tour in a mock studio where we participated in a mock broadcast and mock weather report.

After Rockefeller Center we hopped on the subway and went to the Empire State Building. At the Empire State Building we went to the 86th floor observation room. I have a hard time with heights and really wasn't able to look over the edge and down. I have no problems looking out, providing I'm not very close to the edge, but I can't look down. It was even colder on the 86th floor then the 1st floor so I think we were only out there for maybe 15 minutes.

I believe after the Empire State Building we made our way to Chinatown and had lunch. We found a really cute place that specialized in dumplings (sorry I can't remember the name) that was packed and the food was awesome!

We sat at the dumpling place for a little while warming up before deciding to go to Ground Zero. You still really can't see anything but they do have the names up, a timeline of events, and plans for a memorial. It's still a rather somber place and unfortunately the mood is ruined when you look around and see protesters. I can't believe it's been over 6 years and people are still protesting that 9/11 was an inside job. I personally think these people need to get over it and move on with their lives...what's done is done, let people mourn in peace!

Here's a picture of St. Paul's Cathedral located near Ground Zero.

Once we were done with Ground Zero we made our way up to SoHo to walk around and see the shops. We went into a few shops but we were both tired and very cold at this point. Finally we made our way to Little Italy. Walter (my business associate) had told me about a fantastic Italian Restaurant called Benito II. All I needed to do was throw around a few names of contacts and we were told that "we would be taken care of". And taken care of we were, Stefanie and I originally had plans to split an appetizer and have a dessert (we had lunch just two hours before and neither of us was really hungry). Instead we got no menus, but we did get lots of food placed in front of us. By the time we walked out we were absolutely stuffed! We also decided that the food was good, but we would have preferred to order from the menu.

Cold, tired, and physically exhausted we made our way back to the subway and back to the train to Long Island. Once again while on the train, I called the same cab company to pick us up at Brentwood. It looked as if we had the same Mr. Child Molester again as a driver but luckily it was someone different. Once back at the hotel Stefanie and I crashed, and we crashed hard! She slept till after 11:30 sometime and I slept till after 10:30....very unprecedented of me.

So that was our trip to New York City! We felt like we saw just about everything in one day...it was almost overwhelming.

Tales From The City!!!

2008-01-23T18:51:00.000-07:00

Okay, I'm finally ready to blog about my trip to New York. Stefanie and I had an amazing time together and we pretty much covered all of Manhattan....in one day. I'll get to that later on during this post.

I was picked up at the airport on Wednesday by my contact at First Empire (remember this was partly a business trip) and Walter took me to a steakhouse called Boulder Creek. I think Boulder Creek might be chain restaurant similar to The Outback. Anyhow, Walter and I got along very well, which made it nice to have someone you can easily converse with. After dinner he took me back to the hotel where we sat at the bar and had a few drinks. While at the bar I quickly remembered that I can drink twice as much alcohol at sea level then I can here in the mountains. Wednesday night I didn't drink much, but later on I did....

I spent all day Thursday at First Empire learning some ALM techniques and learning about bonds. Walter took me to lunch at a Sushi restaurant that was very good. During our lunch break he was kind enough to drive me out to the barrier islands of Long Island. Oddly, we saw about 20 deer while we were on the islands. I see deer just about everyday but apparently Walter isn't use to seeing them so he was a little shocked. After the day was over I waited at the hotel for Walter to tie up some loose ends....actually I waited at the bar and began drinking. By the time Walter made it to the hotel I had already downed two rum and cokes (at record time I must add).

Dinner was spent at an Italian restaurant just a few blocks from the hotel called Mario's. This was a five star Italian restaurant and my first "real" Italian restaurant experience. Here we ate some yummy bread, seafood bisque, caeser salad, stuffed portobello mushrooms, lump crab with angel hair pasta, and tiramisu. Oh, did I mention we also drank wine??? I had four glasses of wine during this meal. Needless to say, I was feeling very good by the time we left, at which point we ran into the owner's wife of First Empire and Walter couldn't remember her name. After dinner we went back to the hotel and I downed yet two more rum and cokes.

The real fun began on Friday when Stefanie and I were able to meet at Penn Station. I spent most of the day relaxing in the hotel room to pass the time before catching a cab to the Brentwood Train Station. I was instructed to catch a train at Brentwood that would take me into Penn Station where I would meet up with Stef (who was coming in on Amtrak). This was the first time I have ever made that type of adventure on my own and I must say I was pretty proud of myself. It was a pretty uneventful trip, the cab driver was nice and I didn't have to deal with weird people on the train. Once I located Stef through the maze of people we decided to make our way to Times Square. Stef was really wanting to see Times Square at night so we could experience the lights. We wondered around Times Square for a few hours going in and out of some of the shops, when we eventually landed at Planet Hollywood for dinner.

Below are some pictures I took while at Times Square.

Okay, I had to take a picture of this weird guy on Times Square trying to make money...I couldn't resist.
After we had seen enough in Times Square we boarded the train again to go back to Long Island. Once we got into Brentwood Station we had another cab ride to our hotel. The was our first experience with "Mr. Child Molester" and his little hooker friend....notice I said first experience. For some reason the cab driver reminded me of someone you would see on a flyer with a missing child...so I nicknamed him "Mr. Child Molester".

Stefanie and I went to bed at 12:30am only to wake up at 2:30am on Saturday morning to begin our day in the city. Yes we only had two hours of sleep...we were actually calling it a mere nap rather than sleep. So, I think I'll leave all of you at this point and I'll explain tomorrow night why we got up so darn early and a few more tales of Mr. Child Molester.

It's A Boy!!!

2008-01-22T21:39:00.000-07:00

Also while I was in New York I received word that our little Tundra entered this world on January 12th. Jim, Jimmy, and myself are all so excited that he has finally arrived. Tundra will come home to us on March 10th...which is the day after Jim and I return from Calgary. So, as I get pictures I'll be sure to pass them on. With that said, I have two photos to share with everyone...

I can't get over how tiny he is. In this picture Tundra has yet to even open his eyes..which by the way the mask around the eyes should fade and I don't think he's really as brown as he looks in the photo.

Tomorrow night I hope to make a post about my trip to New York. I'm guessing it will be a late post and I can guarantee it will be long, so stay tuned!

Final Painting Project

2008-01-22T20:46:00.000-07:00

Okay, I have several things that I need to talk about but I don't want to bore everyone with one big post, so I'll break this down in three posts. So, I'll start by following up on our painting project that Jim and I have been working hard on (well mostly Jim).

Before I left for New York I decided to leave work early one day so that I could contribute to the room before leaving. I felt bad that Jim would be stuck doing the majority of the room on his own. Anyway, I was able to get the ceiling done, the entire closet, and Jim and I managed to get the room masked so that the walls could be painted.

It's hard to believe that on this wall there use to be some sizable holes and a light fixture. Jim did an awesome job at covering up the holes and sanding the wall.

Jim finished the room while I was gone and he said it was much harder than he anticipated but it turned out great...I really like it. Since Jim and I have slowly been painting the entire house we've also been replacing the outlets. I just couldn't see putting old dingy outlet covers on freshly painted walls. The new outlets covers give the room a nice fresh pristine look.

Here's another look at the same wall with all of the holes after it was painted. You can also see the new light switch that Jim installed.

And finally here's a look at the ceiling fan that Jim and Zech worked hard on to install. They had to crawl through the attic to get it installed and I think they would both agree that whomever designed our attic needs to be shot. It's the worst attic I've ever seen.

Jimmy's new bed should be arriving this weekend so when it comes in and we get it setup I'll take a few more photos.

Painting Day 1

2008-01-13T18:27:00.000-07:00

Well Jim and I started working on Jimmy's bedroom today. We didn't get as much done as I would have liked but we did get quite a bit done. We at least got all of the holes filled in, sanded, and re-textured, plus a coat of primer was completed. The primer was Jim's idea since we are painting over original paint from 1972.

So I must tell all of you that one wall in this room was peach (yes ugly, nothing matches with peach) and the remaining walls were this greyish white. I didn't realize how bad it was until I got a good look at it. At which point I had to ask myself; why the hell didn't we paint this sooner. Anyhow, the room already looks better with just the coat of primer. I'm thinking about leaving work a little early tomorrow afternoon so I can at least paint the ceiling. It looks like Jim will be doing most of the work by himself while I'm in New York (I leave Wednesday) and I feel really bad that he's having to do this by himself. So me leaving work early is a small price to pay in order to help him out.

Here are a few pictures that I look today of our work.

In the following picture you can see three pink squares on the wall. These were actually holes created by the previous owners when they decided to put track lighting in the room (we have no idea what they were thinking). We hid those holes when we hung my metal coca-cola signs over them. Anyhow the pink was the spackling that we used...it was really cool because it would go on pink and it would turn white as it dried.

And here's Jim sanding those pink patches after they dried.

New Link!

2008-01-11T18:32:00.000-07:00

I just got done adding a new link to the site. If you scroll down the page on the right hand side you'll find a link titled 'Margot's Travels'. My sister Stefanie introduced me to this cool link for http://www.travbuddy.com/ and all of the areas that are shaded in green are countries/states that I've traveled to. I thought it was really cute, so I decided to add it to the site. I'll try to figure out a way later to update it as I travel to new destinations. According to the map, I've traveled only 5% of the world. If you would like to view the map in a larger form all you need to do is just click on the little plus symbol and it will get larger. You can also hold down your mouse and drag across it...pretty cool!

Anyway, Jim and I are about to start a rather busy weekend. We'll be going to Albuquerque tomorrow afternoon and spending the night down there celebrating a friends birthday. It will be a fun couples weekend for the four of us complete with dinner at Black Angus (yummy!) and of course a little drinking...and maybe some hot tubbing. We hope to come back early on Sunday so we can get a move on painting Jimmy's new bedroom. However, I highly doubt we'll get it complete on Sunday since I'm not sure how many coats of paint it may take, not to mention, we have some holes to cover up from the previous owners. While I'm looking forward to the end result of this project...I'm not looking forward to actually doing it. I'll start taking pictures on Sunday of progress, so keep your eyes out.

Let The Maddness Begin

2008-01-06T15:28:00.000-07:00

Well work has begun on Jimmy's new bedroom. In case you didn't know Jimmy will be swapping rooms with the office. The office is much bigger then his current bedroom and this is a move that Jim has been wanting to do for awhile now. So, him and Zech have been busy in the attic trying to install a ceiling fan. I was really wanting Jimmy to have a ceiling fan in his room since we have no air conditioner and I don't want the poor kid to roast. Once we get the fan installed then the room is free for Jim and I to paint.

A few months back Jim and I decided to invest in a new bed for Jimmy. He's been using my Mother's old bed since he's been with us and I felt the need to get him his own bed. A furniture store in Albuquerque was running a good sale so I decided to jump on it. We got him a queen size bed with drawers underneath (similar to a water bed). The drawers underneath serve two purposes; 1) we don't need to also get him a dresser to put his cloths in, saving us room; and 2) we don't have to worry about him putting junk under his bed.

Jimmy's bed is scheduled to be delivered January 26th so we really don't have a lot of time. Next weekend is going to be a busy weekend and it looks like we will only have Sunday to work on his room. The following weekend I'll be in New York and the bed will be delivered the weekend after that. At this point I think we may end up working in his room during the week. The room is only about half packed and I think the painting may take us two days. Jim may also end up working by himself while I'm in New York, in which case I'll feel very bad if he ends up painting by himself.

So that's our project for the next few weeks. I'll take pictures as the project progress's...at this point the room is just a disaster so no need to take pictures of clutter.

Happy New Year!

2008-01-01T20:05:00.000-07:00

Happy New Year All!!!

Well, to ring in the new year I decided to change the look of my site. I pretty much decided new year, new start, new look...so you'll have to let me know what you think. In reality though, I was getting bored with the old site and was really wanting to make a change. For the last several months I had been researching blog templates and I came across a site called http://www.templatesflow.com/ that had some awesome templates...I was really excited! However, my excitement was shot down when I was told templatesflow wasn't compatible with blogger...bummer. Anyhow, in the meantime I changed to this template already provided by blogger. Please let me know what you think...it's kind of manly for me though.

Anyhow, happy new year to each of you! Jim and I are really looking forward to 2008 and we're very excited to put 2007 in the rear view mirror. In a nutshell 2007 was a pretty tough year for the two of us on a personal basis and we're happy to move on.

I made no New Year's resolutions this year, although I'm going to work hard on a new diet that is suppose to be beneficial with women suffering from endometriosis. Speaking of endometriosis, I'm not sure if I ever updated everyone on the mysterious pain on my right side that has been plaguing me for the last year...

I had exploratory surgery on November 27th to remove scar tissue buildup as a result of my appendix being removed in 2005. Well, they didn't find any scar tissue buildup but they did find endometriosis. I was shocked! Well I was sort of shocked, deep down I had always thought I had endometriosis as I knew I displayed all of the classic symptoms. However, on two other occasions I had surgery to look for endometriosis but nothing was ever found...leaving all of us baffled. The last look was when I had my appendix removed and the local OBGYN sat in on the surgery to look for endometriosis. Oh, did I mention each time I had this surgery it was done by the same doctor? This kind of made me wonder about her competence as a surgeon to miss endometriosis not once, but twice. I should mention that the surgery done on November 27th was preformed by a new OBGYN (Dr. Van Eeckhout) that Dr. Thompson (my infertility doc fro those of you that have forgotten) had referred me to. Needless to say, I have a lot respect for Dr. Van Eeckhout since she decided to take a chance on me and look hard for the source of my pain.

So, when the endometriosis was found a little birdy had told me that there is a rather strong link between endometriosis and blood sugar levels. I was also told that you can control and become symptom free by making drastic changes to your diet. Unfortunately, this means I must exclude the following from my diet:

1) Wheat - this includes breads, cakes and pasta products, all based on wheat refined and concentrated carbohydrates
2) Sugar, in whatever form, including honey
3) Alcohol
4) Caffeine which is found in tea, coffee, soft drinks and chocolate
5) Dairy produce including all milk and cheese
6) Fried food, margarine and hydrogenated fats
7) Soy products and soy protein - tamari can be used in small amounts
8) Tinned and frozen packaged foods as little as possible
9) Additives and preservatives

Sounds scary doesn't it? Especially considering how much of a sweet tooth I have and how much chocolate is my best friend. I just can't imagine a life without chocolate. Anyhow, I came across a cookbook on the web containing recipes that I can have, so I'm patiently waiting for that cookbook to come in. I'm kind of curious to see what the effects will be. However, I'm really going to miss cooking the foods I dearly love. I'll keep y'all updated on the progress of the diet once I begin...give me a week or so.

So back to the new year. Jim and I have some exciting travel plans coming up in 2008. I'll be going to Long Island January 16th to visit the credit unions brokerage firm that we use for federal security investments. Stefanie will be taking the train up to Long Island on the 18th, so we'll have a few days in the city just the two of us. I think I was ten the last time I spent any time in New York and I hardly remember it, so I'm pretty excited.

For Valentine's Day Jim and I will be going to Ruidoso for the weekend. Last summer I was playing golf and I managed to win a free nights stay at The Inn Of The Mountain Gods which I decided to redeem for a romantic Valentine's Day getaway. Two year ago (or at least I think it was two years ago) The Inn Of The Mountain Gods was remodeled and it's absolutely beautiful now! The entrance is nothing but breathtaking and the entire place is ahh-inspiring.

In March Jim and I will be spending time in Banff (see previous post) and finally in July Jim, Jimmy, and I will be heading back to Canada to place his father in his final resting place. While I'm sure this trip will be a somber one for Jim, I'm pretty excited since we decided to make this trip during my birthday (which also happens to be Canada Day), and our wedding anniversary.

Wow, what a busy year we have ahead of us. I'll try my best to keep everyone updated with our lives and I'll keep trying to post some photos of our travels. I would really like to get a recent picture of the three of us, so once I get that I'll be sure to share.

May God bless all of you in the new year!

With lots of love,
The LibertyHerd

Look Out Banff Here We Come!

2007-12-27T10:51:00.000-07:00

I'm happy to announce that our trip to Calgary/Banff is now official. I'm so excited I can hardly contain myself right now...I really need out of this town as I feel like I'm suffocating. I'm also excited to drive around Calgary so that Jim and I can get to know the town, which will help Jim and I on our decision to move there or not.

We decided to stay in Banff rather then Calgary for this trip. I hear Banff is gorgeous and I'm excited to be staying in the heart of the Canadian Rockies. Jim and I will be staying at the Fairmont Banff Springs...I got a great deal on this world class hotel. Not to mention, who wouldn't want to stay in a castle....wow! At this point, the only activity that Jim and I have planned is to go to a hockey game where we'll be watching the Calgary Flames take on the Nashville Predators. Jim seems to think this will be an exciting game and it will be my second NHL game to watch in person. Here's a picture I found on the web taken of The Fairmont. I plan on taking numerous pictures when I'm there as you can tell the place is awesome! I just thought I would tease everyone a bit.

The Fairmont Banff Springs after a recent snow storm.

Merry Christmas/Happy Boxing Day

2007-12-26T18:36:00.000-07:00

Merry Christmas Everyone!

Well I can't believe Christmas is now past us and I'm beginning to think ahead into the new year. Jim and I had a great day yesterday...pretty quiet, but still good. I cooked dinner Christmas Eve (Mexican...yum) and then Mom, Jim, and myself drove to Los Alamos to look at some Christmas lights followed by midnight mass. We were all pretty disappointed by the Christmas lights this year...it really was a let down. Our favorite spot to drive is Los Pueblos on Barranca Mesa where all of the residents line the sidewalks and their driveways with luminaries, your suppose to drive down the road with you headlights off. This is one of the more prominent areas in Los Alamos and typically also has really good light displays. Not this year...the lights were kind of blah. We were thinking since it was pretty late then most families had already turn their lights off...or at least we can only hope. As usual we also saw our share of Griswold homes which gave each of us a nice laugh. I would swear one house in the Denver Steel area had every imaginable inflatable Christmas decoration displayed in their front yard. Keep in mind, that the lawns in the Denver Steel area are very small...which made this look very tacky (sorry I didn't take any pictures of this).

We returned home from midnight mass just after 1am and Jim and I stayed awake drinking wine in front of the fireplace for about an hour. We went to bed just after 2am and got up at 7am to start cooking breakfast. After breakfast we opened our gifts and relaxed a bit before cooking dinner. I should have started dinner much sooner because I didn't realize the turkey I was about to cook was 23lbs and would take 7 hours to cook! Needless to say, we didn't sit down to eat dinner until 8pm. It was very tasty though, and well worth the 7 hour wait. Thank god mother was here, otherwise it would have been much later. For the most part her and I cooked everything together which made the entire process less stressful. Since it was just the three of us this year I didn't need to stress out about food being ready at certain time or making sure everyone was happy and comfortable. I have to admit, this was the least stressful Christmas I've had in memory...

Anyhow, I did take some pictures during the course of the day that I'll share with everyone.

I had to embarrass Nanook and take this picture of him with the antlers on. I think he looks cute, but judging by the look on his face...he's not very happy with me.

Here's the before photo. Our family room was overrun with gifts. Yes, I still have those ugly Motel 6 curtains that I'm hoping to replace them shortly.

Here's Momma laughing about gods know what getting ready to open a gift from Stefanie.

Here's Jim opening up his gift from me...a log splitter. Can't you tell he loves it??

And finally here's Jim testing out that log splitter by making kindling for the fireplace.

Some Christmas Fun

2007-12-22T20:29:00.000-07:00

What a wonderful day Jim and I had together. It's the weekend before Christmas and since Jim and I are done with our Christmas shopping we decided to spend the day together. Jim thought it would be nice to spend the day in Santa Fe ice skating at the Chavez Center and I've been wanting to check out the new movie theater in Santa Fe. So, we spent a few hours at the ice rink and then went and saw 'I Am Legend'...it was kind of a weird movie but since Will Smith was in it I knew it had to be good.

Here's a picture I took of Jim today at the rink...I really like this picture.

Speaking of movies, we have a new movie being filmed right here in Los Alamos. The movie is titled 'Brothers' and I have no clue what it's about, but we have some pretty big stars in town. Apparently Natalie Portman, Jake Gyllenhaal and Tobey Maguire are here in Los Alamos. It's been a long time since we've had movie stars in town so it's pretty exciting.

Anyway, Christmas is just around the corner and now that I'm done with my shopping I can breath a sigh of relief. Although, I still haven't done my Christmas cards so if I don't get them done and in the mail by Monday I think I'll give up. It looks like Christmas will just be Jim, Mom, and myself so it should be pretty quiet. I'll cook Mexican for Christmas Eve and I'll cook a turkey Christmas Day. As usual I'll be attending midnight mass the night before and I hope to have time to drive around Los Alamos to look at all of the Christmas lights around town. All in all I'm really looking forward to Christmas and the easy week to come.

I have a few pictures to share with everyone today. This first picture was taken earlier in the week of Sasha and Corki sleeping on our bed.

The following pictures are of Corki playing with his Christmas present from my sister. She decided to make all of the animals catnip logs and she was kind enough to send one to Corki and Sasha. Corki loves his log but Sasha isn't impressed...I'm guessing there's not enough parts to interest Sasha. Anyhow, I did manage to take a few good shots of Corki playing with his log (thanks Stef).

Busy, Busy, Busy

2007-12-15T20:04:00.000-07:00

Well as usual my life continues to be busy. This is the first weekend in a long time that I haven't had to worry about homework. So, this post is going to be pretty lengthy as I try to catch you up (I hope I don't forget anything). First, let me tell you a little about the site. In case you haven't noticed, I've made a few subtle changes. I updated the family photo so that the site could have a holiday feel (don't get excited, that was last years photo). I've also included a site counter at the very bottom of the page, newsflash at the top of the page, a link to sign our guestbook (yes, please sign it when you get a chance), a link detailing information about "The Secret", and I've also included my favorite poem; Invictus. You should also start to see google ads somewhere on the site beginning any day now. Jim decided to add his own blog so if you want to read what's going on in his head, or read about his seemingly endless hockey stories you can do so at http://www.atomicmapleleaf.blogspot.com/. Or, you can access his site by utilizing my LibertyLinks at the right. While I was in the process of making all of these changes, I managed to lose my LibertyTracks map, which had to be cleared and reset in order to get the map back on the site. Anyway, I've gotten kind of bored with the actual page so I've been researching some other blog templates to give the site a "face lift". I'm hoping to have the entire site revamped after the first of the year...I can't wait to see the final product!

So like I said, this is the first weekend in a while that I'm not stressing out about homework. Last Monday I took my final so I'm now officially on my winter break. Classes will begin again on January 22 and I've already registered for the next semester. Apparently I'm closer to completing my degree then I thought...I just have English and Math left. I think if I bust my butt then I should be able to graduate in May 2009. After I graduate I have no idea what I plan on doing. I'm pretty positive this will be the end of accounting but I'm still really interested in reproductive research. However, I also know I can't pursue reproductive research here in Los Alamos. Which brings me to my next topic...

It's no secret that Jim and I hope to leave Los Alamos once Jimmy turns 18. We haven't officially decided where we would like to move to but we've been talking about either North Carolina or moving to Canada. For those of you that don't know, Jim is originally from Toronto and he would love to move back to Canada. Earlier this year we spent time in Toronto but I wasn't particularly impressed, then one of us mentioned Calgary. I was intrigued and quickly became interested in Calgary after doing numerous internet searches. I also immediately felt a sense of urgency to go to Calgary to check it out for myself. So, Jim and I are in the process of booking a trip to the Calgary/Banff area to take a look around. The trip is scheduled for the first weekend in March and I am beyond excited. We'll be staying in Banff but also spending time in Calgary and I think I'm more excited about Banff then anything else. Banff just seems like such a beautiful mountain town that I know I'm going to enjoy.

In other news I've been trying to get ready for Christmas. I started to get into the holiday spirit once the weather turned cold and the snow rolled in. Since then, I've been on a roll and I've gotten about half of my shopping done. I hope to finish my shopping by the end of next week. Today I wrapped what gifts I do have and I hope to bake my holiday cookies tomorrow. I still have my Christmas cards though...I haven't even started but I suspect they will not take me long.

Neither Jim or I really have any plans for Christmas day. In fact, Christmas will just consist of Jim, my Mom, and myself. This is the first year in memory that I really haven't had any plans. I normally don't even work during Christmas, but since we're not doing anything I decided to work. Honestly, I'm kind of bummed...what a boring Christmas...no traveling, no family, no nothing..ugh.

After Christmas Jim and I will be working hard on Jimmy's bedroom. We decided to switch his bedroom and with the office, which will give him a bigger room. But before we move him, we decided to do some mild remodeling...nothing major, just some paint, a ceiling fan, new blinds and a new bed. I really think it will look nice once we are done. I'll be sure to take before and after photos for your viewing pleasure.

I have a few other topics that I thought I would update everyone on but I think I'll do it during the week. This way I don't bore you with a never ending post.

And The Winning Name Is...

2007-12-01T20:11:00.000-07:00

Well after much debate Jim and I finally decided on a name for our new little puppy. We decided on Tundra for the call name and the AKC registered name will be El Norte Tundra del Jemez...providing my translation is correct. I'll have a friend at work check the translation for me but in English it would be, The Northern Tundra of the Jemez. I can't believe how excited we are for this puppy and he's not even born yet.

Anyway, it's Saturday night and so far Jim and I have had a wonderful weekend (we don't have Jimmy this weekend so its been really quiet). We got up early and went to Albuquerque to try and find a new bed for Jimmy. We found a great bed and I hope that Jimmy really likes it. We also went to Lowe's and I picked out some paint for his bedroom. I'm pretty sure I grabbed five different choices and slowly I'll eliminate a few of them and I might be daring enough to allow Jimmy to have the final choice. I'll be done with school December 10th and Jim and I will be spending the next several weekends getting everything cleaned up. I would like to start painting shortly after Christmas and his bed should be delivered either the second or third week of January.

I'll be going into work tomorrow morning and I hope to spend the rest of the day baking some cookies. Jim will spend most of tomorrow working on some computers (I think he has four to do). So that's pretty our weekend....

A Little Bit of This, A Little Bit of That

2007-11-28T17:04:00.000-07:00

So I thought I would take a few minutes to give everyone a few updates. I guess I'll begin by telling everyone that I had surgery yesterday morning to try and find the source of my pain. A few months ago I met a wonderful OBGYN who thought my pain could be caused by scar tissue that formed after my appendix was removed. I decided to allow her to go inside to take a peak and remove whatever she finds. I went into this surgery anticipating the removal of this scar tissue, but what they found kind of shocked me. My OBGYN didn't find any scar tissue from my appendix, but she did find endometriosis. I was shocked because on two other occasions I've been check for endometriosis (including the day I had my appendix removed) and nothing was found. So now I'm kind of curious to know how long it has been there. I don't have any other information as to what else could have been found, but I should know more when I return to her office for my follow-up. What an odd turn of events....

In other news, Jim and I found out that the dog is pregnant. No, not our dog, but the dog that's carrying our puppy. We're still very excited and the litter should be born the third week of January, which means we hope to bring home our puppy around March 10th. And we still haven't decided on a name yet. I went looking the other day and I came across a few that I sent Jim; Thor, Conan, Zeus, and Amarok....at least we still have several weeks to decide.

We also recently decided to move Jimmy's bedroom. Jim has been wanting to switch the office and Jimmy's bedroom for quiet some time now and it looks like we'll be doing everything in a few weeks when I finish this semester. I have about a month between semesters and I really think it will be perfect timing to patch some holes, paint his new bedroom, install a few ceiling fans and clean everything out. It's not exactly a project I'm looking forward to but in the end it should be nice. I'll be sure to take pictures throughout the project, so keep an eye out for updates within the coming weeks.

I went through the camera today so I think I'll end this post by sharing some recent photos with everyone:

I'll start with a few pictures of the animals, of course I don't have a good one of Corki...

Here are some pictures that my mom took on Thanksgiving.

Mystery Diagnosis

2007-11-08T19:02:00.000-07:00

Okay, I know it's been a while since I updated all of you on the pain that I've been getting on my right side. I've been taking birth control pills now for 5 weeks and while I haven't had any major "flare ups" I've still been getting some pain. Luckily nothing has been so intense that I've had to take pain meds, but the pain is waking me up. I'm now back to getting the pain daily at around 4am and it goes away shortly after I've gotten out of bed in the morning. I'm not scheduled to go back to see Dr. Thompson until January but he did suggest that I see an OBGYN (mainly because I haven't had a pap smear in several years) but also so we could get another opinion.

Yesterday I met with an OBGYN from Santa Fe who seems to think the pain is a result of my appendix being removed. When I had my appendix removed, I was told it was covered in scar tissue. I went a year and a half with no pain and now I'm here with the pain again. So what could have happened during this year and a half to cause this pain to return. Well, it would appear that it takes about one to two years for the body to fully heal and form scar tissue around the wound. Unfortunately, to much scar tissue can form and it will begin to contract...causing pain. Scar tissue does not appear on an ultrasound and the only way to find it is to go in and look for it.

So, I've elected to have another laparoscopic surgery to pull the scar tissue out and hope it doesn't appear yet again. At this point I don't have anything scheduled, but I plan on calling the office tomorrow to see when I can be fit in. All I know is it will be on a Tuesday, since she does all of her surgeries on Tuesdays. Since it's laparoscopic it's a quick surgery with a quick recovery. In fact I only plan on taking that Tuesday and Wednesday off from work.

Anyway, I'm looking forward to getting relief from this annoying pain and I'll update all of you when I find out more info.

Happy Halloween!

2007-10-31T18:48:00.000-06:00

So there comes a time in ones life where we must embarrass ourselves. Well, today was one of those days for me. I went to work this morning dressed in my normal work attire...with no plans to dress up for the festive occasion. I hadn't been at work for very long when everyone began asking me where my halloween costume was...I didn't have one. As luck would have it our loan department decided to have everyone dress up as pumpkins for a pumpkin patch theme and they had an extra costume (one employee was out today for a family emergency). And yes, they decided to have me join them in their pumpkin patch.

I felt very naked and "open" today as I walked around in my little pumpkin costume. Oh, I had to go commando for this costume, which is probably why I felt naked. You see, I stood in the mirror after putting this costume on and I realized you could see through it...and right at my black thongs I was wearing today. So, they had to come off....

Anyhow, here are two pictures that were taken today. The first picture was a group shot taken today in the loan department. The second picture is one that Jim took right after I got home...enjoy, and yes please laugh at me if you please.

Luckily, I'm now sitting here in comfy cloths just handing out candy to all of the kids that come by. No more costume..

Fall Has Arrived

2007-10-09T19:32:00.000-06:00

I was standing outside in the driveway after I got home from work tonight talking to my mother when I was suddenly struck by the fact that the leaves are really changing colors now. The temperature has begun to change here and there are now leaves resting on our driveway. When mother left I decided to grab my camera and take a few pictures of the tree in our front yard that is in full fall colors...gorgeous actually. Anyway, I thought I would share these photos with all of you.

Puppy Update

2007-10-03T21:30:00.000-06:00

Well, I thought I would give you a quick update on our ongoing puppy fever. It's official, we decided to go ahead and get a puppy. I found what appears to be a wonderful breeder in Ravensdale WA. I came across this breeder through terrificpets.com which is pretty much classified ads for dogs. I was struck by a simple picture that was advertising their own website. The malamute in that picture looked just like Nanook, but darker, so I had to investigate. There was something about their site that really struck me...I can't pinpoint it, I just knew these were wonderful people.

While searching their site I was able to find the dog that was pictured on terrificpets.com...his name was Champ Blaze and he was beautiful. So, I sent them an email and told them we were interested in a male puppy possibly from Champ Blaze. I also told them we weren't in any hurry and would prefer to wait until after the new year. Oh, I also included two of my favorite pictures of Nanook. Anyway, to my surprise they responded to me right away (I'm still waiting for a response from the breeder in Colorado that I came across) and I was told that Champ Blaze was set to breed with Staray any day now. Well actually Staray was suppose to be pregnant now, but I was told the timing has been off and they're hoping to have her pregnant shortly. I could hardly contain myself....

So, it looks like we found our match and I'll be sending them my deposit shortly and waiting patiently for word that Staray is pregnant. Since they reside in Washington they did tell me I could have the puppy flown to us, or we could just drive up there. Jim really wants to make the drive but I'm a little reluctant. It will probably still be winter when the puppy is ready to come home and I'm a little concerned about the weather. For some reason I'm thinking that Washington gets hit pretty hard with snow and I'm afraid of road closures. However, it seems kind of weird to have a puppy shipped to you...although we're thinking we should be able to pick him up in Albuquerque.

So, the next subject is what to name the new little guy. Both Jim and I are stuck on Odin..which is a norse god meaning god of war. However, I wouldn't mind at least considering other names. So once again I'm asking all of you to help us out, if you come up with a great name we'd love to hear it. I do want to find something that has to do with Alaska or northern gods. Oh, if anyone is wondering Nanook comes from the inuit mythology meaning master of bears.

If you would like to check out the site for Wokini Alaskan Malamutes their address is as follows:

http://www.wokini-alaskan-malamutes.com/index.html

Puppy Fever

2007-09-22T19:34:00.000-06:00

So Jim apparently has puppy fever. We've been debating all weekend about adding another animal to the household. A good friend of ours recently got a blue healer puppy and both Jim and I fell in love with him. So, I did a little internet search and I found a malamute breeder in Colorado. I sent the breeder an email this weekend asking if they have any puppies available and they have yet to respond to me.

Jim and Jimmy are up for a puppy. However, neither one of them has ever dealt with a puppy, and neither one fully understands how hard it will be. Jim says the ball is in my court and the decision is now entirely up to me....ugh. Of course all weekend I've been trying to figure out if a puppy would be right for us and I've made the mistake of viewing malamute puppies on the web most of the weekend. So, how would it impact the house? Let's take a look...

1) Housebreaking a puppy sucks and its very time consuming! I can clearly remember housebreaking other puppies and its no fun at all.

2) Can our furniture hold up to a puppy? Puppies chew...and I still have images of some of our old dogs chewing on the legs of furniture (because they were teething and I'm guessing their gums liked splitters).

3) How would our other animals react? I'm sure Nanook would be happy as hell. I feel bad that he doesn't have a daily playmate and I would swear he looks depressed on some days. Sasha...I think she'll adjust after a few days. Although she will not be happy during those first few days and I'm sure she will not allow any of us to touch her during this period. Corki...I'm afraid another dog will throw him over the edge. He barely tolerates Nanook and he already has mental issues when it comes to him not getting enough attention. The good news here...he'll be bald in about a week and that's less cat hair to vacuum up.

4) More fur....I already vacuum about three times a week so I don't think the extra fur will be a problem.

5) More poop....I know it's gross, but it's also the truth. Jim currently cleans up after Nanook so the extra "yard cookies" will be his responsibility.

6) Two dogs instead of one dag to walk. Unfortunately, I don't walk Nanook nearly as often as I would like...with a puppy I would really have to go walking more often.

7) More sleepless nights. This will be entirely me, I always seem to be the only one that gets up in the middle of the night with Nanook.

8) Two large dogs to feed. Nanook isn't very expensive, but he really doesn't eat a lot. Hell, some days he doesn't even eat at all. Don't get me wrong, there is always food in his bowl, he just chooses not to eat it everyday.

Alright, so that's how it would impact all of us. I must say though...puppies are so damn adorable! Not to mention Nanook really does need a little friend. So, what would you do? Is this the right time to get a puppy? Please help me decide....I'm stuck.

Here We Go A-GAIN

2007-09-20T08:08:00.000-06:00

I think most of you remember when I got my appendix removed last summer (July 2006). I was getting persistent pain on my right side on and off for about six months. I made several trips to the ER as a result of the pain and no one could figure out why I was getting this pain. I spoke to one surgeon whom thought it could be a chronic appendicitis which they are just now starting to talk about in medical school. Its pretty rare, but we thought it might be the cause of the pain. So I decided to have my appendix removed and I hoped for the best that we found the source of my pain at last.

When I had my appendix removed I started calling it my miracle surgery. As it turned out my appendix was covered in scar tissue and it did need to be removed. However, only time would tell if the pain on my right side had been stopped. Six months after the surgery I was feeling great and finally confident that I was cured. Having my appendix removed also cured a few other oddities that I suffered from for several years (not realizing it was my appendix). One year post surgery and things were still great!

Four weeks ago I began waking up at about 4am with a dull pain on my right side (centered around my ovary) all the way through to my back. I didn't think anything of it...especially since after I got up, showered, and got ready for the day the pain would stop. On Sunday I started my period and oddly I didn't have any pain on that right ovary. At this point I started to think, okay, it must have something to do with my period. On Monday the pain returned, but this time it was all day and it was more of a throbbing pain rather then a dull ache. On Tuesday I started to panic and I started to entertain the notion that this was in fact the same pain I was getting last summer. Jim urged me to see a doctor and after debating for a while I started calling OBGYN's yesterday morning. I didn't know where to begin since I really don't have an OB. However, I did feel like I needed to be seen that day. Eventually I was able to get an appointment with my former infertility doctor at 3:30. I left work at 1pm, in pain but at least it was bearable. By the time I made it to Santa Fe the pain was no longer tolerable, it was constant, and my feet and hands were going numb. I knew I would never make it to Albuquerque on my own, so I called Jim and asked him to drive me (it was very difficult holding the gas pedal down with a numb foot). 15 minutes later I picked Jim up and instead of going to Albuquerque we went straight to St. Vincents Hospital in Santa Fe.

While at St. Vincents they did an ultrasound, an internal exam, and lots of blood work. And as usual, they found absolutely nothing wrong with me (oh, my feet and hands were going numb because I was hyperventilating). I left the hospital with painkillers and I was told that I suffered from"ovary pain"...kind of sounds like a bullshit excuse in my opinion. So, here I am back to square one on the quest to find the source of this pain so that I may prevent it. I can't help but ask, why did it take over one year for this pain to resurface? What took place during the surgery that placed this pain at bay for over a year?

Today I'm still in some pain, but not nearly as bad as it was yesterday. I've called Dr. Thompson's office already and I'm waiting for a nurse to call me back. Is it possible to suffer from "ovary pain", or is it just an excuse. Anyway, I'll keep all of you updated on this quest as information becomes available.

Midwest Nationals

2007-09-03T20:21:00.000-06:00

I wanted to go ahead and make a quick post about our weekend. I spent the weekend with my softball team in Dallas attending the Midwest National Tournament that we qualified for while Jim and Jimmy spent the weekend in Omaha NE. I had a wonderful time in Dallas and our team placed 7th at the tournament. Our defense did really good but unfortunately our batting was not as good as it normally is. Our team consists of several batters that are really good and always get really good hits, but for some reason our bats were not alive this weekend and our consistent batters struggled (very unusual). I think one of the biggest obstacles was the fact that our team is not use to playing in that kind of humidity and as odd as it seems the ball doesn't carry as far in the humidity and that elevation.

As for myself, I wasn't hitting well at all and I never even made it to second base. Since I started playing golf this year I've picked up a very annoying "golf swing" when I'm at the plate. And unfortunately that causes me to pop the ball straight up in the infield...which I did on numerous occasions.

Since we didn't really have a lot of teams compete they ended up mixing both the D division and C divisions together and combined the tournament into one day. The one day tournament worked out great and left us with another day to sight see. So on Sunday most of us got together and did the Dallas World Aquarium, The Sixth Floor Museum, and The Palace of Wax Museum. Of course I took several pictures during the weekend so I plan on sharing those with everyone (except for The Sixth Floor Museum that doesn't allow photography).

I'm not sure which adventure I enjoyed the most but The Sixth Floor Museum was very interesting. That museum had footage, facts, and chronicled the events of the day that JFK was killed...very interesting and very moving. Here are some photos for your enjoyment.

Here's a team photo taken right after we were cooked for the day.

Here's a group photo of all of us before we entered the aquarium. We were lucky enough to get a group discount since there was so many of us.

I had problems with my camera in the aquarium, so I have very few photos that turned out decent.

The following pictures were all taken at the Palace of Wax Museum.

So Julie would kill me if she knew I published the following photos....shhh, don't tell her.

Here are a few pictures I took of Ica...she wont kill me for doing this.

Here's me with Opera.

And finally I can't leave everyone without including pictures of Julie, Ica, and myself testing our love factor.

So Julie's love factor is boring....

My love factor came up as lovable...

And finally we have Ica, whom came up as a teaser. I love the look on her face here.

Just Stuff

2007-08-17T07:34:00.000-06:00

Instead of making my final post about San Francisco I think I'll talk about something that happened while I was gone. Just before I left for San Francisco my four year old washing machine broke yet again. In April of last year I replaced the motor and apparently the motor went out again. I remember when I bought that washer and dryer, I used the last of my tip money from when I was a waitress at Peppers to pay for them. They were suppose to be a top of the line washer and dryer, so needless to say I wasn't happy when the motor first went out last year. So when the second motor went our two weeks ago I decided they needed to become paperweights at the local dump.

I went shopping for a new washer and dryer the day before I left for San Francisco and I finally decided on the Frigidaire front loader. I know it sounds stupid but I was so excited about the new washer and dryer...I could hardly contain myself. Although I'm not sure if my excitement was for the new machines or for the fact that I wouldn't have to go to the laundromat anymore to do laundry. They were delivered while I was gone so Jim was the first to play with them and so far so good. I've only done two loads at this point and I'm amazed at how quiet they are. You have to be standing right next to them to know they are even running. I would highly recommend these.Today I think I'll also go ahead and include this picture I took of Sasha yesterday. Apparently she wanted to help me load the dishwasher.

The City of San Francisco Part 2

2007-08-16T20:12:00.000-06:00

Okay everyone here is the second half of last nights post. This time I will be posting pictures of the expensive housing district that the trolley car took us through as well as pictures of the Golden Gate Bridge.

Here's a picture of Sharon Stone's house.

Here's a picture of Robin Williams' house.

I think this is the house that Mrs. Doubtfire was filmed in. That is if I understood the trolley driver correctly, otherwise this house is owned by the mayor.
Here's the house that Party of Five was filmed in (I use to love that show).

And finally if you're in the market to buy a house then the following house could be the one for you. For just a mere $55 million you could own this lovely house in San Francisco. I think I'll write the check tonight...

The City of San Francisco Part 1

2007-08-15T20:49:00.000-06:00

Okay, I think I'll go ahead and break this post down into two parts. I plan on posting several photos so I thought it would best to break it into parts one and part two. On Monday night our conference director set up group tour of San Francisco. The entire group boarded a trolley car that took us all over the city. This was a 2 1/2 hour trolley tour that took us to Ghirardelli Square, The Palace of Fine Arts, The Golden Gate Bridge, an expensive housing district, and some large mountain that I can't seem to remember the name of (with awesome views by the way). Once again, Sam and I froze our ass off on this little adventure. Luckily, the trolley drivers are use to people getting cold so they provided blankets for most of us. So without further adu, I'll provide pictures of the Palace of Fine Arts, and some great views ontop of that mountain. I'll post the remaining photos for your viewing pleasure tomorrow night.

Believe it or not, these pictures were taken the same evening. Notice the difference in weather and blue sky in less then an hours time.

Alcatraz and Beyond

2007-08-14T21:21:00.000-06:00

Since my last two posts on San Francisco were focused on the end of the week, I feel the need to rewind to the beginning of the week...then go forward. Sam and I arrived on Saturday afternoon and after we checked into our hotel we decided to do our first bit of walking...to check the place out that is. We were lucky enough to stay at the Hyatt on the Fisherman's Wharf...right where all of the action is. We were walking along the Wharf glancing into the many shops when a local fisherman was soliciting people for a bay cruise. At this point we already knew that we would be unable to visit Alcatraz. Apparently, we didn't know we should have gotten tickets a few weeks in advance. So we figured the bay cruise would be the next best thing.

The bay cruise was our first taste of how cold San Francisco really was. It was very foggy, and very windy on the bay. The boat went directly below the Golden Gate Bridge and as we looked up, we still couldn't see the entire bridge...it was that foggy. Once we made it back to land, it took me two hours to get warm again. So tonight I think I'll share some pictures of the bridge and some pictures of Alcatraz.

Crooked Street

2007-08-13T20:37:00.000-06:00

I suppose I need to begin by telling everyone a little bit about my trip to San Francisco. I realized I didn't do this in my post from last night....sorry. Anyway, I left last Saturday bound for San Francisco on a business trip. I knew for several months that I would be going to San Francisco and I was really looking forward to it. Jim was unable to take time off from work so I took my best friend Sam with me, which worked out really well. Sam happened to have a free ticket voucher from Southwest Airlines and she just happened to have the same week off from work. She mention to me one day that she had always wanted to go to San Francisco so I asked her to tag along...hell the hotel was paid for by the credit union so she only needed spending money. We kept the week pretty mellow considering we were two girls in a big city alone.

Anyhow, Sam and I had a wonderful time together and even though I was in class during the day we did managed to pack in lots of sightseeing. Sam spent the days studying, as she is working on becoming a certified Montessori Teacher while I was in class. First off, we froze our ass off! I would swear it was October, and I certainly wasn't prepared for the cold weather. You know it's cold when vendors sell winter jackets on every street corner as someone would sell t-shirts in most tourist towns. We did have one day of "warm" weather, Thursday, it was the only day we awoke to a blue sky. Otherwise it was foggy and cold most of the time.

So today I plan on sharing pictures of the Crooked Street in San Francisco. If it weren't for Sam I wouldn't have even known this street existed. This was a sight that Sam was really interested in seeing. So, before the baseball game on Friday Sam I decided to walk to this street. Since most of the streets in San Francisco have extreme hills and this walk was pretty difficult for us...it was straight uphill. I think going down the hill was much harder then walking up the hill. We sat at the hotel for about an hour after this walk.

Bonds Record #758

2007-08-12T10:44:00.000-06:00

Sam and I got back late last night from San Francisco and we had a wonderful time. I spent the majority of my time in class but our evenings were free to sight see. Neither one of us wasted any time in the evenings and we crammed in several sights during the week. So, during the course of this week I'll post pictures of our trip and tell a few tales. Check back often as I hope to make a new San Francisco post daily...I took 130 pictures while there, so trust me I have plenty of things to talk about.

Anyway, I chose the highlight of my week for my first post. On Friday class was over at 11am so we had most of the day to wonder before catching a baseball game. We all knew Barry Bonds was getting close to breaking Hank Aaron's record well before I left for San Francisco so I hopped online to see if Bonds was going to be in town and sure enough they were scheduled to play the Pirates this week. I got even more lucky when I was able to get tickets for the game Friday night....I couldn't control my excitement.

Before I arrived in San Francisco, Bonds had already tied the record and I was holding my breath each night with the hopes that he would break the record on Friday, while I was at the park. Bonds did break the record over the week, but not on Friday. Yes, I was very bummed that I didn't witness it, but it was still exciting to be town with this kind of history. Bonds has continued to hit home runs and while Sam and I weren't lucky enough to see Bonds hit #756, we did witness home run #758! Below are some pictures of AT&T Park and of course a few distant pictures of Bonds...the new home run king.

By the way...I pretty much had to drag Sam to the game since she hates baseball, but in the end she said she had a great time. We both enjoyed the stadium, even though we froze our ass off the entire time.

Here are some pictures of AT&T Park.

Here's a shot of Barry Bonds warming up in the outfield and one of him running the bases.

Here's Bonds running the bases after hitting #758.

AT&T Park officials changed the field home run ticker immediately, so here's a shot of the current count.

And finally, I can't close out this post without showing everyone our "view" from our seats....this picture says enough.

Runner Up

2007-07-31T07:21:00.000-06:00

I have excellent news to post today. Jim, Jimmy, and myself spent this past weekend in Ruidoso watching me and my team compete in the USSSA NM State Tournament. We had a great time in Ruidoso and our team placed second. This is the best the team has placed at state since I've been a part of this team. All of the games were really exciting and our team played awesome!

When I got to work yesterday I received a team email saying that we have been invited to compete at the Midwest Nationals in Texas. This is an opportunity of a lifetime and our team couldn't be more excited. We played our last league game last night (we placed first in the league) and we're still trying to officially decide if we will attend. Nationals will be held just outside Dallas during the Labor Day weekend....it should be exciting if the team goes. Anyway, here are a few team photos and a few of our players receiving awards.

Getting Back In The Saddle

2007-07-26T19:55:00.000-06:00

I didn't waste any time getting back in the saddle and playing some softball. We had a doubleheader last night and I was so excited to play. For the most part things went really well...although I'm still having some problems batting since I started playing golf. I did have a de-ja-vu moment playing the outfield again...another pop fly from the same batter that hit the ball that hit me in the forehead. No, I didn't catch it...it freaked me out and consequently I didn't get under the ball.

I originally had plans to have Jim hit balls to me tonight, but the weather is horrible and cold. I'm still hoping that Jim can hit balls to me so I'm hoping maybe we can find an open field before we start playing on Saturday morning. I just feel like I need to get it out of my system so that I don't have any problems this weekend.

Jim, Jimmy, and I leave for Ruidoso tomorrow for our State Softball Tournament and I'm really looking forward to it. Ruidoso is a beautiful town and I can't wait to go. We plan on leaving after Jim gets off work and I'm hoping to hit the batting cages in Santa Fe before leaving town. I need to correct the golf swing that I've got going...it's really starting to annoy me popping the ball straight up just behind the infield, which happens 50% of the time now.

I have no pictures to post today but I plan on taking the camera with us, so maybe I'll shoot some good photos that I can share.

One Week Later

2007-07-21T20:52:00.000-06:00

Well it's been one week since my stupidity hit me square in the forehead. Currently, there is very little swelling in my forehead and my eyes still look like they have permanent eye makeup covering them. My colorful eyes are getting better but I'm guessing it will be close to another two weeks before my eyes look normal again. It also still hurts to chew on the left side of my mouth. I'm actually starting to get worried at this point, hoping it's not some other underlying damage that we don't know about yet...like a broken or chipped bone. During the last week I have felt improvement in the pain but it hasn't improved at all the last three days.

As promised here's an updated photo that Jim took just a few minutes ago. The stripes on my forehead are still holding up well and I'm not sure when they will fall off on their own. If they're not gone by Wednesday then I'll take them off myself...one week should be long enough for them do what they need to do. Anyway..

Stef, I hope your flashbacks to when I was six will start to subside now...

The Three Stooges

2007-07-20T21:03:00.000-06:00

Quick update on my injury; my forehead and eyes continue to look better day by day. The incision has started itching today and it's pretty hard not to scratch the hell out of it...I've been trying to rub rather then scratch. Earlier today while I was trying to rub my forehead I realized that I don't have a lot of feeling above the incision..it's still numb. I really hope the nerve endings come back because it feels very odd. I plan on having Jim take an updated picture on Saturday afternoon...one week post injury and I plan on posting it here.

Once again this weekend Jim and I will attempt to play some golf...providing neither one of us does anything stupid before Sunday. Unfortunately I'll be in the office all day Saturday, which means I'm really looking forward to some golf and getting outside.

Anyway, I had a request to post some updated pictures of the animals. The last few days I've taken some pretty cute pictures of the cats helping me read the newspaper and one cute picture of Jim tormenting Sasha. I also have one picture of Nanook.

I'm a Legend

2007-07-18T19:40:00.000-06:00

It's been a couple of days since my last post and I thought I would once again update everyone. The swelling in my eyes have come down, but they're still very colorful. When I look closely I can tell that the bruises are subsiding and I need to remind myself that they will return to normal with time. At least I don't need eye makeup for awhile. And, for some reason they have also itched the last several days. So bad that it borderlines on annoying...I can't wait until that one goes away.

I got my stitches removed today and was kind of shocked when I made my second trip to the ER. Apparently, I'm a legend in the Los Alamos Medical Center Emergency Room. When I made my first trip there on Saturday the ER doctor told me it was the worse softball injury he's ever seen. When I went back today, of course there was different staff this time, and the nurse that saw me immediately said, "Oh, you must be the softball woman". Startled I looked at her and asked, "How did you know?" I was then informed that the entire staff had been talking about the injury and how bad it was. I have always wanted to be a legend, but not for this.

More good news for the day; the ER doctor that I saw today was very impressed with the stitch work that the original doctor had done. So impressed that he mentioned that he himself wouldn't have been able to do such a good job. Needless to say I was very relieved since this is yet another scar on my face. I've also looked into possibly seeing a plastic surgeon next summer (depending on how this scar heals). However, I think I'll try a scar cream before I make a move to a plastic surgeon for a consult.

Anyway, here's an updated photo for you that Jim took tonight. At least it's looking better by the day.

Better Late Then Never

2007-07-16T17:28:00.000-06:00

I just thought I would take a quick minute to update everyone on my injury. Well I woke up this morning with my right eye swollen and just as pretty as the left one (at least they match now). I went to work today and I resorted to wearing sun glasses all day...to cover up my eyes. My co-workers are very surprised that I don't have a headache. My head really hasn't hurt much at all. You would think I would have a massive headache, but I don't.

Good news for the day, a package from my sister arrived in the mail containing pictures from my last trip to Maryland/Virginia...back in May. Mom and I walked around the National Zoo and here are some very cute photos for your enjoyment:

18 And Life

2007-07-15T16:43:00.000-06:00

Most of you know that I'm really into softball during the summer months and I play any chance I get. I usually participate in a few tournaments during the course of the summer. I woke up Saturday morning very excited that I would be playing in the Jalapeno Popper here in White Rock. Jim and I also had plans to go golfing on Sunday. It was suppose to be a fun filled weekend for the two of us, then this happened...

During the second inning of our second game I was in the outfield when a pop-fly came my way. It was quite a ways in front of me and I had run up on the ball in order to catch it. I made it to ball but I never got my glove up in time to catch it. Instead the ball hit me square in the forehead. One of my teammates drove me to the ER and Jim met us there. After spending a few hours in the ER I walked out with 18 stitches...yes 18. I will end up with a very interesting scar on my forehead...it's shaped like a 'Y' with the bottom part of the 'Y' just below the edge of my left eyebrow. It was an extremely deep incision (we think it went all the way to the bone), and the ER doc that stitched me said it was the worse softball incision he's ever seen. Here's some answers to a few common answers:

1) Yes, it hurts (although not to bad at the moment).
2) Yes, I look very funny (you're more then welcome to laugh at me).
3) Yes, I plan on continuing to play softball (although this is my second trip to the ER as a result of softball).
4) No, I don't need to get my eyes checked.
5) No, I didn't catch the ball.

Here are also a few photos for your entertainment:

I came home with this mummy-like bandage. You really can't see much...except for the fact that my hair is sticking straight up. My hair was caked with blood and they wouldn't let me wash it.

I woke up this morning with my left eye swollen shut. Notice, I still haven't been able to wash my hair.I was finally able to wash my hair late this afternoon and gently clean the wound. This is what it really looks like....yuck!

The Big 30

2007-07-03T19:22:00.000-06:00

For those of you that didn't know I turned 30 on Sunday. I feel like I took it pretty well. Or at least I took it better then my sister did when she turned 30. When my sister turned 30 she barely even got out bed. Anyway, the only thing that I had a hard time with was the whole goal thing. I was suppose to have my degree by the time I turned 30 and I was suppose to be done having children by the time I was 30. I'm still working on my degree (about two more years to go) and we all know the whole baby thing didn't work out.

So you may be wondering, what did I do for my 30th birthday? My birthday and my wedding anniversary (which is the day after my birthday) was very much of a disappointment this year. The highlight of my birthday...going to the grocery store. I'm guessing I just need to get use to it. Anyway, Jim and I did go golfing on our anniversary but that was the extent of it.

I took some time off from work to celebrate, so I've been enjoying a few days to myself. I've just spent the last few days lounging around the house. Jim and I have no plans to celebrate the 4th of July except to watch the fireworks. We plan on climbing on top of the roof to watch the show. I'll try to take some photos but I'm not sure how they'll turn out.

Ahh, The Great Outdoors!

2007-06-24T21:20:00.000-06:00

Okay, so I know it's been close to a month since I made my last post. I just really haven't had anything to comment on lately. Yes I've been busy, but I didn't think you guys would want to hear about all the golf Jim and I have been doing. In fact we've been golfing almost every weekend for several weekends now...it's been great!

Before I get started I wanted to take a minute to thank Tom. I'm not sure if any of you pay attention to my cluster map or not but Tom recently made a visit to Hawaii. While in Hawaii Tom logged into my site, so that little red dot in the middle of the ocean that you see is actually Hawaii. Thanks for the mark Tom!!!!

Anyway, this weekend I didn't go golfing. Instead I accompanied some friends up to their cabin on the border of New Mexico and Colorado. Their cabin is actually located in an abandon ski resort, Ski Rio. I'm told that during it's prime Ski Rio was the second largest ski resort in New Mexico (Taos is number one). Due to poor management Ski Rio was closed and the buildings and lift structures were left to rot away.

The cabin is located at the base of the ski basin and has some spectacular views of the surrounding areas. Our weekend consisted of relaxing, enjoying the wildlife, playing a few games, and spending some time on ATV's. Let me step back to the enjoying wildlife...there were lots of cows, a few elk, and oh one bear. Yep, Pam and the kids saw a brown bear not far from the cabin just as they were to set off for a nice hike. Unfortunately Paul and I were off in the mountains enjoying some ATVing so we both missed out on this event. Pam did manage to get a picture of the bear...from a distance, and I was bummed that I missed out on it. Oh well, maybe next trip. All in all it was a very beautiful place and I had a wonderful time. Unfortunately Jim was unable to join us...he was stuck working. I hope to make another trip up there during a time that Jim could us, I really think he would have a good time.

I took several photos while on top of mountains and I thought I would share them with you. I forgot to take pictures of the cabin though...

Believe it or not, there are elk in this picture. They are in the meadow at the bottom of the picture. I promise they are there, but it's really hard to see them and I don't think blogger will allow you to zoom in.

The following pictures are just of some of the views that Paul and I saw while on the ATV's.

Golf Outing

2007-05-26T20:19:00.000-06:00

What would Memorial weekend be without a movie, some time in the sun, and a BBQ? Well, so far this weekend we have accomplished all of those (and it's only Saturday). On Friday we went to the movies and watched Pirates of The Caribbean...it was very good. I bought tickets early to avoid any long lines or risk showing up and the movie had sold out...I think I bought tickets at 11:30 for the 7pm showing. Friday was Jimmy's last day of school and I thought it would be fun to go out and do something to celebrate with him. He had a friend spend the night so the four of us had an awesome time!

Today was also a fun day...the three of us spent the day golfing! For those of you that didn't know, Jim bought me golf clubs for Christmas this year so I've taken up golfing. I've really enjoyed the time on the course and even though I still pretty much suck at the moment, I'm really enjoying it.

Jim and I have played a few times this year but we keep getting rained out. So, today was the first time we were able to play all 18 holes. We got sprinkled on some but at least we didn't get rained out. Jimmy and I enjoyed making fun of each other since we're both at the same playing level, and as a result Jim got pretty cranky. Oh well, we had anyway...

Here are a few photos from the day...

Okay, so when I was downloading these photos apparently there were a few pictures of the animals that I never shared. And of course I can't post a blog and without including the animals. Anyhow, I actually only have two pictures of Sasha to share with you. Corki isn't very photogenic and I managed to go a week without taking any pictures of Nanook. So, here's Sasha...

I'm not sure what she's doing on top of the wood stove, but I can bet you she's about to get into some mischief...either that or she was just saying hi to Jim's Dad....who is directly above her head by the way.

Apparently Sasha thinks she needs a bath...

The Dream

2007-05-18T09:43:00.000-06:00

I'm sitting at work and I'm feeling physically and emotionally drained at the moment and I'm really not in the mood to be here. I probably shouldn't be composing this blog at work but I have a few things on my mind that I had to get out.

The last couple of weeks have been really hard on me for some reason and the reality of everything is starting to hit me. I'm sure this is why I feel drained at the moment. Anyway, my mother made the comment over the weekend that we went to two funerals in one week...certainly not a happy time.

We finally completed the service for Jim's dad on Saturday May 5th then on Monday May 7th we received word that my mother's aunt had pass away and my mother and I made an emergency trip back home. Aunt Susie was a wonderful woman and she will be missed by all of us. Oh, did I mention this all happened in the middle of finials? I successfully made it through finials, although I'm still waiting for my grade from my business law class.

Our trip back home wasn't all bad though. Mother and I did have one day to ourselves to get in some sightseeing. We walked around the National Zoo, where we really enjoyed watching the pandas and we walked through The Bodies...an exhibit that's traveling all over the U.S. about the human body. This trip I didn't take my camera with me so I borrowed my sister's camera where I did take some photos at the zoo. However, I'm still waiting for my sister to send these pictures to me, and once she does I'll post them here (yes, Stef this is a hint).

Jim was unable to make this trip with us since he doesn't have a lot of leave time. So, he stayed home and took care of all of the animals. I'm sure he felt like he was herding cattle at times since he had our three animals plus my mother's three animals. Jim was such a trooper about it and both mom and I really appreciate him taking care of everyone.

I had the oddest dream last night that has been popping into my head all morning and it's really starting to wear on me. I guess I shouldn't call this a dream...more of a nightmare. I'm not sure why, but I've been having very vivid dreams the last few weeks. For instance last week I had a dream (well, more of nightmare) about my former sister-in-law. I can still clearly remember this dream and I wish I knew why she popped into my head...we never really got along while my ex-husband and I were married. She was a back-stabber and I can't stand back-stabbers....

Anyhow, my dream last night was that I was raped. Yes, you read that correctly...raped. Certainly not the most pleasant of dreams to have. So, I'm sitting at my desk thinking about this dream trying to analyze it, then it dawns on me....I feel raped...at work that is. There have been a few things going on here that have been eating at me and I feel very ostracized these days. That old saying..."it's lonely at the top", fits perfectly for me. Anyhow, I just thought I would throw that out here....

Here's something else that dawned on me yesterday...it's now cheaper to buy a pack of cigarettes then it is for a gallon of gas...just something to ponder.

The Champagne Bottle

2007-04-24T21:05:00.000-06:00

Earlier this week I was cleaning out the refrigerator and found our last bottle of champagne sitting on the bottom shelf. I quickly realized that Jim and I had been saving that bottle for our impending pregnancy and were going to use it to celebrate. We received the bottle as a gift when we moved into this house and now the bottle sits lonely on the bottom shelf...aging, with no pregnancy to celebrate. Every time I open the fridge I'm reminded of that bottle and its significance.

Mother's Day is around the corner and every year I dread that day. I thought this year would be the first year that I could actually celebrate Mother's Day and have something to be thankful for. Now, I have no desire to celebrate that day. So maybe I can convince Jim to go out of town that weekend...

April Showers?

2007-04-14T09:29:00.000-06:00

I've never really understood the weather of New Mexico, one minute it's sunny and warm and the next minute it feels like December. Yesterday we woke up to a few inches of snow and blizzard like conditions. This morning I was standing outside staring at my tulips with the sun beating down upon me and it was comforting to feel the warm heat. There's also no evidence outside that we received a flake of snow yesterday.

When the snow hit my tulips were in full bloom and I didn't know how or if they could survive. When I was staring at them this morning they actually looked rather depressed....very droopy (sp?). Anyhow, I took two pictures to share with all of you and maybe you can give me your opinion as to whether or not they'll survive a few more weeks.

Keep in mind I won't be upset if they don't make it, I'm actually wanting to get rid of them and replace them with rose bushes. The tulips reside in the garden in the front of the house. Last summer I was in the middle of tearing out that garden before I had my appendix removed and once I fully healed from that surgery I never went back to the garden. So, once the tulips go away I plan on ripping them out and completing my work. Anyway, here are those photos:

Little Maggie Mae

2007-04-08T21:16:00.000-06:00

What a busy and interesting day it was. It's just after 9pm here and I've pretty much just now sat down for the first time today. Our day started with church at 8am and then Jim and I came home and I started cooking dinner. I decided to cook Easter dinner this year and it turn out very yummy. It was just the four of us for dinner and as usual I cooked to much food...it was all very good though.

Mom got a kitten about two weeks ago and she decided to bring little Maggie Mae over to the house for a "play date" so to speak. Although, I'm not sure who the play date was really for....little Maggie, our cats, or us. Maggie seemed to have had a good time with Nanook and Corki but Sasha on the other hand wasn't so happy to see her new friend. I think all of us got more of a kick out of Sasha then we did Maggie. None of us could come near Sasha without her making some really funny noises. And for those of you that don't know Sasha well, she's not normally a vocal cat and she's usually pretty quiet. Anyway, here are a few pictures and Maggie taken today:

Here's two pictures of Maggie sniffing around the laundry room (Sasha would let her leave).

Here's a picture of Corki and Sasha sleeping together on Nanook's bed. Notice I still have those ugly Motel 6 curtains in the family room.

Softball Season Is Here

2007-04-01T18:37:00.000-06:00

Today was our first softball practice for the season and the weather was awesome! I was actually kicking myself for not wearing shorts. After much debate I decided to play this year...I originally wasn't going to play and then Friday night I decided to play. Since Jim and I have had so much going on the last two months I really wasn't interested in playing, then I decided I needed the exercise. The IVF meds took a toll on my body and I gain at least 15 pounds. So I'm pretty much playing just so I can try and lose the extra weight. I don't plan on doing as many tounaments this year and I'm even thinking about just doing to local tournaments.

As I was getting ready this afternoon I couldn't help but think I shouldn't be playing. I never intended to play this year as I was hoping to be fat and pregnant. Unfortuantely, life never works the way you want it. After ten years my physical body has been run down as a result of all of the meds. I've had two breast tumors removed thus far and I've increased my risk overian cancer considerably. Oh well, it's not like I can turn back the biological clock.

Jim spent the majority of the weekend working in his shop. He was hoping to finish today but ended up with a lazy streak and didn't get everything completed. Since he didn't complete everything I don't have any pictures to share with everyone. Maybe in a few days he'll get it completed and I can shot some photos.

The Beauty of The Falls

2007-03-23T19:07:00.000-06:00

We have internet again here at the house so I am able to share these photos with all of you. Just a warning...expect several photos.

I had to include this photo of the US/Canadian border...I thought it was a cool tourist picture.

It's very wet at the falls and my hair hates the humidity so I look like I just stepped out of the shower.

The following pictures are all of the Canadian side of the falls.

These pictures are all of the American side of the falls, not as nice, but the ice formations are amazing!

Lots To Think About

2007-03-23T09:19:00.000-06:00

For those of you that check this site often I apologize for the long wait between posts. Jim and I finally returned from Canada on Sunday after a long drive. My flight was cancelled out of Buffalo on Friday and I was forced to drive back with Jim. Well, my flight was kind of cancelled...the flight I thought I was suppose to be on was cancelled but in reality I wasn't suppose to leave Buffalo until Monday. Apparently, my sweet sister didn't book my flights correctly...oh well I survived the drive home.

Also, we haven't had internet at the house for most of this week. Jim is in the process of changing our internet provider and hopefully we'll have it up and going by the end of the weekend. In the meantime, I'm using my work computer for all of my internet needs...something I'm not comfortable doing. Anyhow...

Canada was pretty cold the entire time we were there and overall we had a wonderful time. After Jim picked me up from the airport on the 13th we drove straight to Niagara Falls. Since Niagara has been extremely cold we were able to see lots of ice formations in the water. I took loads of pictures but have yet to move them off of the camera. I hope to download those pictures this weekend when we get the internet up and going again. Jim also gave me the grand tour of Toronto and we did lots of walking in the downtown area. All in all we had a pretty good time.

Okay, moving on to our latest infertility news. For those of you that are wondering how Jim and I are holding up we still taking things one day at a time. As for me, I continue to feel devastated at the prospect of not being able to bare children. I feel less and less of a women and I feel very isolated and let down. I've been keeping to myself for the last two weeks not really wanting to talk to anyone...just my way of handling things I suppose. I imagine I'll emerge from this "shell" eventually but I'm not sure when. Today is actually one of my better days and I'm not feeling as depressed today as I have.

We had our "final" appointment with Dr. Thompson yesterday and our options were laid out in front of us. We were told that we could do another round of IVF with my follicles and Jim's sperm using the assistance of ICSI (a process of injecting a single sperm cell directly into the follicle) to see how my follicles reacted. However, ICSI was an option for us but Dr. Thompson seriously doesn't recommend using my follicles....my follicles are that bad. I really didn't get any indication as to why my follicles are so bad...nothing in my past could have given us a clue that this would have happen. A part of me, the part that can't seem to let go, would really like to try ICSI once, but then reality sets in and I know the cards are stacked against us. Not to mention the financials aspects of all of this and financially we can't take that large of a risk.

So where do we go from here? We actually have two other options in front of us....donor eggs and donor embryos. With donor eggs we could either pick a donor or the office could recruit a donor. Recruits typically come from students at the university needing cash and we would be presented with a picture and a profile of the candidate(s) and then Jim and I would chose which candidate we liked best. Or, we could "size" up our young friends (she has to be younger then 35) and use them as a donor. After Jim and I discussed this option we decided that we would rather use a recruit rather then someone we know. Jim just feels like it would be to weird for him if we knew the donor. I will respect his feelings and lean on the side of an anonymous donor.

We also have the option of using donor embryos. These are embryos already frozen in time that former patients have decided to donate to couples like us. This option is considerably cheaper then donor eggs, but the child would have no biological ties to either Jim or I. I'm not sure which option Jim and I will chose but more then likely it will boil down to our financial needs. I'm still secretly hoping that Ed McMan makes a surprise visit to the house, or that the Powerball fairy comes by the house sometime soon. Whichever option we chose it will be a few years before we can afford to do anything....we need to payoff the existing loans first.

Results

2007-03-12T14:06:00.000-06:00

My results are in and as perdicted they came back as a big fat NEGATIVE.....

Peace & Quiet

2007-03-10T08:36:00.000-07:00

Jim left after work yesterday for Toronto and drove all the way to North Platte NE. I'm currently sitting here in the house enjoying the peace and quiet of everything. No television on...just me and the Three Stooges (Nanook, Sasha, and Corki). I just got done staring at the refrigerator trying to figure out what to cook for breakfast. Unfortunately, I really can't bring myself to cook just for myself. I kind of figure....why bother. Don't get me wrong I love to cook, I just prefer to cook for other people. Not to mention I really shouldn't be leaving any leftovers in the fridge since I'm going to be gone all next week.

My weekend will consist of catching up on homework. I managed to fall a little behind in school the last couple of weeks as result of all the IVF stuff and I want to spend the entire weekend catching up. I really would like to leave for Canada and not have to worry about taking any homework with me or trying to complete anything last minute. If I have time tomorrow I might try to catch a movie...a nice little treat for myself.

Anyway, Jim took the camera with him so I will not be posting any photos this weekend (not that I can think of anything to post) but hope to when we return from Toronto. I think we might have a few days where we can get away and I can take some pictures of the city. We also plan to make a trip to Niagara Falls....the highlight of the week. Hopefully, the falls will be a nice healing place for the two of us....

Coping

2007-03-08T18:53:00.000-07:00

It's been a few days since my last post and I thought I would give you all an update. The cramping has subsided and physically I've been feeling really good. Emotionally I'm pretty much just going through the motions of everything and taking it one day at a time. Four more days till our pregnancy test and I feel like I should be looking forward to it, but I'm not. Somehow I feel like I'm cheating myself of an event that should be joyful.

This morning I was getting ready for work and when I stood in front of the mirror putting on my eyeliner it dawned on me that I will never look at a child and say he/she has my eyes, my smile, my odd sense of humor, or any other feature for that matter. I suppose this is just part of the grieving process that I will have to endure on my own.

Jim continues to give me daily injections of progesterone and butt is very sore. In fact, I've officially retired my right butt cheek. For some reason my left cheek handles the injections better and I don't seem to be as sore on that side. I spend much of my evening sitting on a heating pad praying for some relief. I've also changed injection sights for the heparin since I've run out of spots on my stomach. Not to mention, my stomach looks like a war zone and it needs some time to heal.

I also realized today that if the pregnancy test on Monday comes back negative then I can discontinue my injections and my period will start soon after. Unfortunately, that means I will dealing with my period while in Canada. I know this period will be heavier then normal and probably more painful since my uterine lining is so thick. I'm really not looking forward to dealing with this while in Canada and would prefer to be at home where I can mope on my own. Oh well, at least I'll have Jim with me...

Jim leaves tomorrow to start his trek to Canada and I'll be joining him on Tuesday afternoon. In the meantime my cousin will be administering my progesterone injection since I can't reach my butt on my own. I'm not sure if she has ever injected a human or not (she's a veterinary assistant) and I sure hope she doesn't try to shave my butt....just kidding. Either way, I can easily walk her through it.

Weeding Out the Bad People

2007-03-05T14:57:00.000-07:00

As I sit here on the couch trying to do homework so that I may be ready for class tonight my mind wonders. The last several days my mind has been wondering a lot and I'm waging a war between my subconscious and my heart. I've been cramping a lot today and the thought that this IVF cycle isn't going to work is looming high on my head. I've felt these same cramps before...the same ones I felt with each failed IUI done in the past...11 to be exact.

I did have one successful positive pregnancy test in March 2005. I had never seen a positive pregnancy test before and I was delighted to see the dark line on the stick I had just peed on. Jim even took a picture of it...kind of gross but he felt the need. A few days later I began to bleed...I will never forget that day. As you can imagine, I was devastated. I raced home and I was bleeding so bad that at one point I decided to just sit on the toilet and let the blood flow freely from me like someone had just turned on the water faucet. I didn't think it would ever end and I didn't think the emotional pain would subside. Of course with the passage of time the bleeding stopped and somehow I manged to move on with my life.

Jim, the doctors, and myself had high hopes for this IVF cycle. My body responded well to the meds and I was feeling pretty good knowing this was our only shot at getting pregnant. Financially, this was the only chance we had. I even had to take out a loan to pay for everything and I walked away from the casino empty handed and nothing to show for our lost time.

As I sit here today (I really should be doing homework) I'm filled with the same dread that I had in 2005....knowing this isn't going to work. I'm still thinking back to those 11 IUI's I had and wonder why I even wasted my time. I could have saved so many years of my life had I known that my follicles would malfunction. For ten years my infertility was classified as "unexplained" and I always said I could cope better if I knew the exact cause of my infertility. Well, here I am with the cause and it's just as hard to cope. I also could have married Jim and told him that my fertility status would prevent the two of us from having children and I would have avoided letting him down.

Above all I'm strangely reminded of a comment made by my ex-husband when we first "discovered" we couldn't get pregnant. His comment was, "It's God's way of weeding out the bad people." I guess he was referring to nature running it's own selection course so to speak. Either way, that comment has never left my head and I'm more so now reminded of it and his callous ways.

So, I ask myself why has this happened to me? What could I have done differently? Was my car accident as I child to blame? My years of smoking? How about the fact that my Grandmother took the dreaded DES drug now linked to infertility? Did any of my sexual choices in my past play apart? What about my age? These are questions I will probably never know the answer to. The one thing I do know for sure is I will never have a child that is biologically linked to me.

Jim and I walked out of Dr. Thompsons office with our instructions for the next few weeks and two pictures of the embryos. Yes, you read that correctly, we were able to get pictures of our two slow dividing embryos. One pictures was taken from the ultrasound immediately after they were placed inside my uterus (an event Jim was proud to view) and the second picture was taken by the embryologist while they were still in the incubator. You can clearly see that they were only two-cell embryos at the time of transfer, but still they are my hope and faith that given the small 5% chance that they might survive.

And to top off everything else going on in our lives, the tea pot between Jim and I has been running over for days (a culmination between numerous issues I suppose) and I will no longer be joining him in Canada next week. Instead he will be going alone and I will be having a nice private vacation in some place far from here. In a strange way I'm looking forward to the seclusion of the week and being able to regain my thoughts.

Until next time....

Answers At Last

2007-03-03T14:33:00.000-07:00

Jim and I just got home from transfer and it didn't go nearly as well as the two of us had hoped. In fact it was pretty much a disaster. Dr. Thompson met with us about the results from our fertilization and we received no good news. When normal follicles meet with sperm, one sperm penetrates the nucleus and something (I'm not sure exactly what) prevents any other sperm from entering the same follicle. Immediately after the penetration the follicle is now considered an embryo and the embryo starts to divide into multiple cells. My follicles on the other hand do not follow this routine. Instead of letting one sperm cell inside they allow several sperm cells to enter. When this happens the embryos are not viable for transfer.

With that said I did have four follicles that only allowed one sperm cell to enter. Those embryos however did not divide at the normal rate and will most likely not survive. We did go ahead and transfer the two best embryos back into my uterus but our chances of them surviving are less then 5% (we would normally have a 65% chance if everything proceeded normally).

Needless to say both Jim and I were very upset. I feel like I lost at the IVF casino and my body let me down. How do you deal with knowing you will never have a biological child? We were told if we were to try again my follicles would follow the same path and it really wouldn't be worth our time. So our only option at this point is either adoption or donor eggs. I'm still not keen on the whole adoption idea as I want to fuck up my own child and not someone elses. I feel like a failure as a women not being able to bare children...

How do we move on????

Gumball Retrieval

2007-03-02T10:17:00.000-07:00

First I wanted to apologize to everyone who has been patiently been waiting for a post from me since I had the gumball machine emptied. I really haven't been feeling all that well the last several days so I haven't been turning on the computer (I'll get to that later). Anyway, for the most part things went rather well on Wednesday. They were able to extract 15 follicles from my ovaries...I was honestly thinking they would have gotten more but we were very happy with 15. I was knocked out for the procedure so I didn't feel anything, but damn did I feel like crap when I woke up. That was certainly some of the worst cramping I have ever felt in my life...to the point where I couldn't sit down. Eventually the cramping subsided and I felt much better. Jim and I went to eat after we left the office and then we went straight home and I spent the rest of the evening on the couch.

On Thursday I started doing my heparin shots again and I also started taking an antibiotic to combat against any possible infection from the retrieval process. The antibiotic I'm taking is tetracycline, which I would swear I've taken before without any problems. This time however the tetracycline is kicking my ass! I've had the worst stomach pain that I narrowed down to the antibiotic so I was forced to stop taking it. To give you an idea as to how bad the pain is...it's difficult to stand up straight and I've been comparing the pain to the same pain I had when my appendix was removed. So, I was able to get a hold of a nurse this morning and they prescribed a different antibiotic for me. I stopped taking the tetracycline yesterday afternoon and I didn't get relief from the stomach pain until early this morning.

Okay, I'm sure most of you wondering what the next step is for Jim and I. I was instructed to call the office yesterday to find out how many of those 15 follicles had fertilized and was told that only 4 had fertilized. Both Jim and I were very disappointed and honestly a little depressed that more didn't fertilize. I do not have any answers at this point as to why only 4 had fertilized, since I just spoke with a nurse. I'll ask several questions the next time I'm in the office to see if the embryologist has any answers for us. In the meantime Jim and I are just praying that those 4 lonely follicles survive to transfer and beyond.

Transfer is scheduled for tomorrow morning. From there I'll be on bed rest for the next few days and then the only thing Jim and I can do is wait. We'll have to wait two weeks before we know if I'm pregnant or not. Also, I don't know how many follicles we'll be transferring back in tomorrow. I was really wanting to transfer 2 follicles back but since things have changed we will not know until tomorrow.

With that said, I'm not sure when I will have the opportunity to post again. Please bare with me as it may be a few days before I can get to my computer. As usual here's a list of my meds...notice it's much shorter now.

AM:
Heparin (25 IU)

Noon:
Prenatal Vitamin
Baby Aspirin
Antibiotic

PM:
Heparin (25 IU)
Antibiotic
Progesterone (1 CC)

Time To Empty The Gumball Machine

2007-02-26T17:02:00.000-07:00

I received word today that it looks like our retrieval will be Wednesday. I don't know about anyone else, but I'm so excited!! For the last six months I keep waiting and waiting for this day and it's finally here. I'm also excited because the doctors will get an up close and personal look at the quality of my follicles. Maybe, just maybe this could shed some light as to why I've never been able to get pregnant on my own. Remember over the last ten years doctors have only seen my follicles through ultrasound so this is really exciting.

Anyway, currently I have 15+ follicles between both of my ovaries and the last couple of days I've certainly been feeling all of them. I'm kind of "full". So, Jim will be doing my trigger shot tonight at 1am and retrieval is scheduled for 11:30am on Wednesday. The next couple of days will be very hectic for Jim and I so wish us luck. The following is the list of meds that I have taken today....it will continue to change over the next few days. Notice I get a break from that yucky heparin...for a few days at least.

AM:
Lupron (5 IU)
Heparin (25 IU)
Follistim (75 IU)

Noon:
Prenatal

PM:
Repronex (50 IU)
HCG (2 CC)

What a Week!

2007-02-25T20:43:00.000-07:00

Ahh, what a week it has been. I'm hoping that this week will be a happier one filled with wonderful things (and little ones) to come. I spent most of my weekend going back and forth to Albuquerque for doctors appointments and working on homework. And yes you read that correctly, even though it's the weekend I was still expected to be in Albuquerque for appointments. Unfortunately the women's body doesn't pause for the weekend...proof that a women's work is never completed. Anyway, my ovaries continue to produce follicles at a high rate and I'm really starting to feel "full" now. I didn't realize how full I felt until I had the ultrasound prob inside me and it was pushing on my ovaries...not so comfortable.

As of this morning they are talking about doing retrieval on Thursday...not the original Wednesday. I'll continue to keep all of you updated if that date changes.

AM:
Lupron (5 IU)
Heparin (25 IU)
Follistim (75 IU)

Noon:
Prenatal

PM:
Heparin (25 IU)
Repronex (50 IU)

Margot The Gumball Machine

2007-02-23T21:43:00.000-07:00

The last couple of days I have pretty much felt like a gumball machine that is getting ready to burst at the seams. My ovaries continue to respond well to my meds and I even managed to get a huge thumbs up from the doctor today. My right ovary has 10 - 12 follicles and my "lazy left" ovary has 5 follicles. Things keep progressing well and there is a possibility that I might "trigger" myself on Monday. If we trigger on Monday then I think retrieval would be on Wednesday.

The reality of all of the injections has really hit home the last several days. My stomach looks horrible and I'm running out of injection sites. I'm also pretty positive that the hormone effects have affected my moods. I was rather grumpy today so I worked most of the day with my office door shut...just in case.

My next appointment is tomorrow morning...

AM:
Lupron (5 IU)
Follistim (150 IU)
Heparin (25 IU)

Noon:
Prenatal Vitamin

PM:
Heparin (25 IU)
Repronex (100 IU)
Lexapro
Trazadone

Fat Cat

2007-02-20T19:08:00.000-07:00

As I was downloading pictures of Jim's shop I realized that I had taken some pictures of the animals last weekend and I forgot to share them with all of you. So here are some of the latest photos that I've taken of Sasha and Nanook...

Ahh, this cat cracks me up...

And The Walls Go Up

2007-02-20T18:15:00.000-07:00

Jim has completed his weekend project for the most part. I'm not sure if most of you remember or not but we had these fake panel walls that were pretty much useless and were obliviously just there to cover up the installation. Jim replaced the panels with plywood so that he can more easily hang stuff from the walls...not to mention the plywood looks better then the panels. Anyway, here are a few photos that I took. He still needs to organize the shop and clean it up but at least the walls are up. He's worked very hard on this for the last two weekends so it's nice to see the finial results.
Jim also continues to work on the sever and he's in the process of rebuilding my computer (I'm currently using a loner computer). Judging by the fowl language and the things being thrown against the wall I don't think it's going well. As a result Nanook has been glued to me...he hates to see either Jim or I upset.

As for me I've spent the last several days on the couch sick. I've been running a fever the last few days and I finally started feeling better at about 4:30 this afternoon. Unfortunately I had to skip class last night and I didn't go to work today. I did however manage to drag myself to my doctors appointment this morning. Well actually my mother drove me since I wasn't comfortable driving all the way to Albuquerque when I was running a fever and having dizzy spells.

As for my appointment things are progressing very well. I have about 10 follicles forming on my right ovary and 4 follicles forming on my left ovary. My lining is also looking good and I don't have to go back until Thursday. So in a way I get to sleep in tomorrow morning and I should make it to work around my normal time. My dosage on all of my meds will remain the same until I return on Thursday morning.

In an odd way I've gotten use to all of the injections and I've kind of become a pro at it. My stomach on the other hand looks like it was used as a punching bag and its physically sore from all of the injections. The heparin is the one that's really killing me...it's leaving bruises the size of penny and I don't think there is much I can do. I didn't realize how sore my stomach was until the cat decided to walk across it while I was napping this afternoon....ouch.

AM:
Lupron (5 IU)
Follistim (150 IU)
Heparin (25 IU)

Noon:
Baby Aspirin
Prenatal Vitamin

PM:
Heparin (25 IU)
Repronex (100 IU)

Pulling My Hair Out

2007-02-17T17:32:00.000-07:00

I must have the most annoying cat on the face of this planet. I recently got done vacuuming...not because my house needed it but because of the cat. Yep, I had to vacuum because of the cat. Apparently, when the cat gets stressed out (I have no idea why he's stressed) he literally pulls his fur out. I walked into the living room this afternoon to find he had once again pulled his fur out, which prompted me to vacuum. And I promise he pulls a lot of it out at one time...then eats it. He's pulled so much of his fur out that he now has bald spots. So, if anyone has any suggestions, or you yourself would like a cat please let me know I have one that's free to a good home.

Anyway, Jim continues to work on his weekend project and I'll be taking pictures tomorrow although I'm not sure if I'll get them posted tomorrow or not. Jim continues to work on the server and has yet to get that completely fixed. I'm sure he would have been done by now expect now we are also experiencing problems with our internet connection. We have a tech coming out to the house on Tuesday to check out the lines. Jim can't seem to catch a break.

I started the balk of my injections this morning and so far so good. Currently, I have a headache and I'm not sure if its related to all of the meds or not. In a few days I plan to take a picture of my stomach since the heparin injections are leaving a large bruise and I just can't resist showing all of you. I really think in a matter of just a few days my stomach will look worse from all of the shots then it did when I had my appendix removed. Only time will tell and I hope all of you get a good laugh out of it.

Tomorrow is the start of Nascar season and I couldn't be more excited (well it officially started early this week, but I'm only concerned with Sunday). Once again my Sundays will be complete as I will be spending Sunday afternoons watching full horse power zip around an oval tract. Thank goodness for Sundays!

AM:
Lupron (5 IU)
Follistim (150 IU)
Heparin (25 IU)

Noon:
Baby Aspirin (81mg)
Prenatal Vitamin

PM:
Heparin (25IU)
Repronex (100IU)
Trazadone
Lexapro

Cupids Strong Hold

2007-02-14T22:04:00.000-07:00

Happy Valentine's Day everyone!! It's been an interesting day here and I have a few things that I need to get to. First, Jim was able to bypass some stuff and we now have internet service here at the house again. I know this doesn't sound romantic but I bought Jim a new hard drive for Valentine's Day....I feel like such a wife. So I'm confident that he'll get everything back up and running again shortly.

Jim and I spent most of the day in Albuquerque. We had our doctors appointment, ran a few errands, and then had a descent Valentine's dinner. We ate at the Black Angus Steakhouse and while Jim and I enjoyed each other company the food certainly could have been better. Oh well, maybe we'll have better luck next time.

Anyway let me move on to our doctors appointment. We had our baseline ultrasound today to make sure that the Lupron is doing what it's suppose to, and to make sure that my uterine lining is thin. So far things look great! My ovaries are suppressed like they are suppose to and my lining also looks great. I was then given my instructions for the next few days. I start stimulating my ovaries with more medication on Saturday morning. Starting Saturday I will be giving myself five injections per day...yes you read that correctly five injections, three in the morning and two in the evening. As the nurse put it...I'll start to resemble a battered wife. My next doctors appointment is Tuesday morning and from there I will be in Albuquerque every day for ultrasounds and blood work until we have our egg retrieval.

This process is starting to feel real now since we officially wiped out our bank account today when I paid for the IVF procedure. My anxiety is also starting to go up. I feel very anxious on so many levels. I know I need to just focus on the end result but a part of me can't help but think I just left a shitload of money at the IVF casino and I'll be playing the slots for the next two weeks praying that I hit the jackpot.

Lupron (5 IU)
Baby Aspirin (81 mg)
Prenatal Vitamin
Lexapro
Trazadone

Server Crashed!

2007-02-11T13:51:00.000-07:00

So Jim will apparently have his hands full for the next several days if not a week or more. At some point last night our server crashed and he's thinking we might need a new hard drive...ugh! So, with that said we currently do not have a fully functional computer at the house. Currently, I am at the office using my work computer so that I may at least get my homework done.

I originally had plans to post pictures today of Jim's little weekend project that him and Jimmy have been working hard on but I'm not comfortable downloading pictures to my work computer. Don't worry eventually I'll post those pictures for all of you to see.

Also, if I don't post anything for a few days you'll all know why. I know I have a series of doctors appointments coming up and I'll try real hard to post any info from those appointments. What I'll probably have to do is work late and post that stuff after hours. Here's today's medication list:

Lupron (20IU's)
Prenatal Vitamin
Baby Aspirin (81mg)
Lexapro
Trazadone

Just Stuff

2007-02-10T13:24:00.000-07:00

Things have been pretty dormant this week and we really haven't had much going on. I took my last birth control pill this morning and was very delighted to throw the pack away. They expect me to a "minor" period within the next few days and then our baseline ultrasound is still scheduled for Wednesday afternoon. Time seems to stand still these days as Jim and I are anxiously awaiting the last week of the month and then the first week of March. Also, Jim and I finished taking our antibiotic this week...which relieved both of us since it made both of our stomachs upset. At the end of this email I'll give all of you the latest list of meds that I'm taking. I expect the medication list to get longer once we've had our baseline ultrasound. For those of you that are wondering, the purpose of the baseline is to make sure I don't have any cysts preventing us from continuing...I don't expect I'll have any.

Since Wednesday is our baseline and it happens to be Valentine's day Jim and I have plans to have a nice dinner in Albuquerque after our appointment. So, I made us reservations at the Black Angus Steakhouse....yummy. I tried to get us into The Melting Pot but as of last weekend they only had one table left and it was a $200 table. I have no desire to pay $200 for dinner, no matter how good the food is. Anyhow, Back Angus will be great and the atmosphere is pretty romantic...not to mention the food is wonderful.

I hope to make another post tomorrow which will include pictures of Jim's weekend project. I'll post details later on that project...I don't want to spoil it for anyone.

Baby Aspirin (81mg)
Lupron (20IU's)
Prenatal Vitamin
Lexapro
Trazadone

Bruises Upon Bruises

2007-02-06T19:58:00.000-07:00

Well after four consecutive days of self injections the bruises are starting to appear. I'm pretty confident that after a few weeks of medications I'll be able to play connect the bruises. At this point the only injection that I'm doing is Lupron, but things will pick up around Valentine's Day and shortly thereafter I'll be injecting three different medications during the course of one day. Here's a list of the meds that I took today. Oh yeah, apparently I shouldn't take my prenatal vitamin, baby aspirin, and antibiotic at the same time....my stomach was not to happy with me.

Necon (birth control, I take my last one on Saturday)
Baby Aspirin (81mg)
Prenatal Vitamin
Lupron (20IU's)
Z-Pack (antibiotic, I take my last one tomorrow)
Lexapro
Trazadone

Super Bowl Sunday

2007-02-04T19:17:00.000-07:00

Ahh, Super Bowl Sunday. Normally, I would spend this day cooking and counting down until game time. This year however, for some reason, I'm just not into the Super Bowl. I've actually spent a good portion of the game cleaning and not paying much attention to the game. Since Phili got knocked out a few weeks ago football season is over as far as I'm concerned and I'm ready for baseball.

Anyway, Jim and I spent this weekend in Albuquerque. The last month and a half I have spent getting ready for our Strategic Planning Conference, which was finally held this weekend. The Conference was held at the new Sandia Resort and Casino (http://www.sandiacasino.com/pages/home.html) which was absolutely beautiful! It was a really nice resort that also had a really nice Spa. On Friday I thoroughly enjoyed the Red Desert Clay Wrap. That was the first clay wrap that I've ever had done and I look forward to having it done again. I chose that particular wrap because I noticed it was good for detoxifying your body and I kind of figured since Jim and I are undergoing IVF then my body could use a good detoxification. I would highly recommend it!

Jim and I had a wonderful time together this weekend and it was also nice just to get away. The Conference didn't go a smooth as I had hoped. We had given our Board of Directors their packets two weeks ago in the hopes that they would have plenty of time to review everything and give us the necessary changes before the Conference. Well, it certainly didn't appear that anyone had read their packets since all of a sudden they had numerous changes (right in the middle of our presentation). Anyway, it was the most frustrating thing I have ever experienced in my 10 year history at the credit union. Needless to say I'm very thankful it's over.

Some quick IVF news for all of you. I did my first injection Saturday morning and things went very smoothly. So at this point I'll be taking 20IU's of Lupron daily until instructed to discontinue the medication. And, for those of you that deal with me on personal daily basis my condolences go out to all of you. I'm very afraid that I may turn into Super Bitch over the next few weeks since my hormones will be all over the chart. I've already apologized to my husband since I'm also afraid that he may take the blunt of my grumpiness.

IVF Timeline

2007-01-31T20:58:00.000-07:00

Okay guys Tom & Emily had a good question they posted on a comment page I and thought this would be a good place to address that answer. Anyway, their question was, "What's your timeline?" I got to thinking and I thought most of you would really like the answer to this question as well so I had to pull out my calendar for this one...

I start my injections on Saturday, February 3rd and I'll follow the same routine for the first week. Then on Saturday, February 10th I'll discontinue my birth control pills, but continue with the Lupron injections. They expect me to have a minor period (I'll believe "minor" when I see it) for the next few days and then on Valentine's Day Jim and I will go in for our baseline ultrasound, to make sure I have no cysts preventing us from proceeding. From there things will really start to get hectic and intense since I will be expected to go to Albuquerque on a daily basis for ultrasounds and blood draws.

My follicles will be retrieved sometime during the week of February 25th...could be as early as Monday and as late as Friday. Immediately following the retrieval my follicles will be fertilized and will sit in a petri dish for either three or five days...this will all depend on the follicles. The fertilized follicles will then be transferred back into my uterus sometime during the week of March 5th. And finally our big day will be March 14th, this will be our first pregnancy test. If this test is positive then we will retest again on March 16th to make sure our numbers are doubling as they are suppose to.

I know this was a lot to absorb in one blog so I'm really hoping I didn't confuse any of you. As things proceed I'll try to make more detailed posts about our progress.

IVF Medications Have Arrived

2007-01-30T18:39:00.000-07:00

Well my cocktail of IVF medications have arrived (they came via mail). I received five different injectable medications and I begin my injections on Saturday with 20cc's of Lupron. Luckily this is a medication that I'll be able to administer myself and I will not need Jim's help. So, starting Saturday I'll become a human pin cushion. Oh and apparently I need to place a call to my doctors office because I'm missing my heparin injections. Here's a quick run down of all of the medications that I'll be taking starting Saturday (oral and injectable):

Necon (birth control)
Baby Aspirin (81mg)
Prenatal
Lupron (20cc)
Z-Pack (antibiotic)
Lexapro
Trazadone

Jim's First Woodworking Project

2007-01-27T15:21:00.000-07:00

I often wonder about my husband...did he ever grow up, or is he still 6 years old and excited about his toys? Then I remembered...as men get older their toys just seem to get more and more expensive but the excitement never fades. Jim has slowly been working on acquiring tools so that he may try his hand at woodworking and this week he was really excited because he finally felt ready to take on his first project. On Friday he took a break from work and bought the last of the tools that he thought he might need for his weekend project.

This morning I was awoken pretty early when I heard/felt Jim moving around in bed and realized he was in the process of getting out of bed. I rolled over and looked at the clock..it was 4:45, so I asked Jim why he had gotten up so early and he told me that he couldn't sleep...he was to excited about his day. All week Jim has been talking about this woodworking project he was planning on doing today and I guess the excitement of his tool pron prevented him from sleeping. So at 4:45 Jim got out of bed...please keep in mind that it's hard to get Jim out of bed before 7:30am so him getting up that early was a shock. Anyway, after I made him breakfast this morning he got right to work constructing two saw horses. Him and Jimmy finished them about an hour ago and the following pictures are the end result.

On The Road To IVF

2007-01-23T20:50:00.000-07:00

Okay guys, here's a quick update on our IVF stuff. Jim and I met with Jayme today to discuss our "calendar" for the next couple of weeks. Jayme will be our IVF nurse coordinator for the next several weeks helping us schedule appointments, keeping our medications straight, and keeping our sanity at a relatively low level. Our calendar indicates that I'll start my injections on February 3rd and our baseline ultrasound will probably be on Valentines Day. We're still scheduled for retrieval the last week of February with transfer being the first week of March. Unfortunately, Jim will be in training the first week of March so I have my mother lined up to help me get home that day. Also, once I get home I'll be on bed rest for the next few days so I'm sure my mother will be tying me to the couch since all of us know how well I handle bed rest...haha.

We also received a little bit of annoying news today...since we are now in a new year the Center For Reproductive Medicine (CRM) has decided to up their costs. Of course we are already paying an arm and a leg to have this procedure done and now they decided to increase their charges by $500 for IVF and $200 for freezing any possible follicles. DAMN IT!!!! We can never seem to catch a break! We budgeted for the original amount (an amount I'm not comfortable discussing here) and now we'll pretty much be cutting it close. I swear if it's not one thing it's another....

Crazy About Cats

2007-01-21T23:15:00.000-07:00

Okay, I'm sure some of you are sick and tired of seeing pictures of my animals. However, since I don't have children yet I do have a bad habit of doting on my animals. Anyway, Jim and I shot a few cute pictures of the animals this weekend that I thought I would share with all of you...

Here's a great photo that should be the latest ad for Weight Watchers...fat Sasha lying in front of the fireplace. I promise she eats the dog food and not her regular cat food. Can someone tell me how I can get one cat to lose weight and the other to gain weight???

This one should read...all dressed up (or packed) and nowhere to go. Jim used one of his gift certificates this weekend to buy himself a router and Sasha decided the box was bought for her. She spent something like half an hour in this box....just hanging out.

And finally here's Nanook all wiped out after playing with Sasha.

Sorry, I didn't manage to get any cute pictures of Corki this weekend...he's just not as photogenic as the other two.

In His Natural Habitat

2007-01-21T22:07:00.000-07:00

Ahh, what a weekend. I've been wanting to have a date with my husband for the last several weeks but things keep coming up and we keep having to reschedule. This weekend however, we finally had our date and it was a wonderful break from all of the busyness to reconnect with each other. Our plans were as follows; go ice skating around 2pm and dinner in Espanola at some point. In true Liberty fashion nothing ever seems to work out the way we hope.

We got to the rink at about 2pm only to find that there was a hockey tournament going on, which meant no public skating until 7pm-ish. Jim was rather hungry at this point so we decided to go to Espanola for a quiet dinner and eventually end up back at the ice rink. Dinner was very tasty and we finished early enough to go back to the house and relax. We were actually at the house long enough to watch a few movies. Eventually we did end up at the rink again, only to find the tournament was running about an hour late. Not wanting to drive back home again we decided to just stay at the rink and watch the rest of the tournament.

For those of you that don't know Jim very well (or Canadians in general) he's a huge hockey freak. So it was certainly a treat watching his face light up while he got to watch some live hockey. Okay, I realize it was just girls playing, but he still enjoyed himself. Oh, and since we got to the rink so early once the tournament was over and ice was resurfaced Jim and I were the first ones on the ice. Not only that, for about 15 minutes we had the entire rink to ourselves...extremely peaceful.

So anyway, I took a few pictures of Jim skating...or should I say Jim in his natural habitat. I'm not sure how well you can tell, but it was snowing while we were skating (Los Alamos is home to the only regulation outdoor rink in the state).

I think this is a great picture of Jim! You can tell he is really enjoying being on the ice.

Can you see all of the wonderful snow in the background? That's the accumulation of the last several snow storms and once again it's snowing tonight.

In the end our date was really nice even though it didn't start out as planned.

For me it was a rather busy weekend as I spent most of the weekend at the office finishing up my quarterly reports (with the exception of Saturday afternoon). However, you'll be happy to hear that all of my year-end reports have been completed, my quarterly reports have been completed, and the auditors could walk in tomorrow and I wouldn't blink an eye. At last my hard work has finally been completed and I can spend the rest of the month relaxing...or so I hope. So with that said, I decided to take the next few days off from work so that I may mentally calm down...I'm so looking forward to doing nothing for the next couple of days.

Breathing a Sigh of Relief

2007-01-19T20:01:00.000-07:00

Well I can honestly say that I'm finally breathing a sigh of relief...kind of. I've been really busy at work the last couple of weeks trying to prepare our budget and get ready for our strategic planning session and I'm finally done! I wish you could see my excitement! I've been so stressed out trying to get everything done, making sure that everything was perfect (remember I'm a perfectionist), and now I'm done!

Okay, I have to admit my stress isn't fully over...I still have an audit to prepare for and this weekend I have to do the Call Report for FID. Luckily, the auditors will not be here for a few weeks but the Call Report is due on Monday. So, once I get the Call Report done I do plan on getting a few days to myself. Trust me I can't wait...

I'm Still Here

2007-01-15T20:29:00.000-07:00

Okay guys I promise I'm still here and alive and well. Things have been extremely hectic around here (well at work that is) and by the time the evening comes I'm to beat to turn on the computer. I've been putting in a lot of overtime the last several weeks since I feel like I have a mound of work to do. The good news is I can see the light at the end of the tunnel and even though I know this week is going to be hard I also know it will be over soon. So, I really don't have anything for you guys I just wanted to let you all know that I haven't forgotten about you. I'll try for a better post within the next couple of days.

Survival Of The Fittest

2007-01-07T19:32:00.000-07:00

Okay guys I really do apologize for the long wait between posts. I've been house sitting at my aunt and uncles house for the last several days so that they may take care of a family emergency, and as a result I've been away from the computer. Anyhow I have a few things that I would like to talk about tonight.

Real fast, I tried to update our family photo and apparently Blogger didn't think I should update the photo. I tired for over an hour...don't worry I'll keep trying and hopefully you'll see our latest photo.

IVF News; I finally started my period on December 31st and to my surprise I was actually a few days late. I'm never late, you could time my cycle by a clock and I actually took a pregnancy test. Of course it came back negative, but I was hoping if I took a test then I would start my period...no luck. In the end I was four days late. Anyhow, I never thought I would be excited to start my period, but this time I was. Starting my period signified a few things for Jim and I...we are now officially on the IVF rollercoster! Yes, the next two months are certainly going to be a rollercoster for both Jim and I. However, we're very happy to be on this rollercoster together and most important we are excited about the end results.

So with the start of my period I was able to start taking my birth control pills...still feels kind of weird but we are certain that the doctors know what they are talking about. Oh yeah, I get to skip the placebo week and go straight into the next pack. Which means this could be my last period for about 11 months (thank goodness). At this point I'm just taking the birth control pills and the prenatal vitamins. If memory serves me correct, I think I'll start my injections on February 3rd. I do know I have a doctors appointment on January 23rd to discuss my calendar of meds and appointments so by then I'll have an exact date.

Okay, so into the main post of the night...survival of the fittest. As I write this Jim sits on the couch extremely tired and extremely sore...barely able to move. I'm sitting here tired, but at least I can move, the soreness hasn't hit me yet. So you might ask, what did you two do? I took Jim skiing today...hehe. Yes, I have to laugh but I can't laugh to hard. Mainly I'm not laughing at Jim as much as I'm laughing at my sister. You see, I took Stefanie and Mark skiing for the first time a few years ago (two years I think) and I had the best laugh of my life. Stefanie never made it past the tow rope, but at least Mark made it down the bunny hill...once.

So, when I took Jim skiing today I thought I would see a repeat of the time I took Stefanie and Mark skiing. To my surprise Jim did awesome! I really did think he would spend most of the day on his butt and my sides would be sore from all of the laughing. Nope, he skied great! Jimmy and I even had him down some black diamonds (these would be considered expert runs and all have moguls). The weather on the hill was great, you couldn't ask for better conditions. Jim did however spend some time on his butt, and when he got on his butt it would take him a half hour to get back up, so I did get my laugh in. Here are the only pictures I took of our fun filled day at the ski hill:

Here's a random shot taken from the ski lodge at one of our many breaks.

Here's Jim on his butt with Mike behind him trying to help him up. We all helped him and none of us could get him up. Eventually he got up on his own.

Half hour later, here's Jim up and going again. Things went great from here on out.

U.S. Capital Tour

2007-01-02T19:00:00.000-07:00

On Friday December 22nd after we defrosted thanks to our walk in the Botanic Gardens we were finally ready for our tour of the U.S. Capital. After we went through all of the security stuff we entered the building excited about our tour. Then we met our tour guide...not sure if I could classify her as a tour guide or not though, she was horrible. She talked very quietly, we couldn't understand her, and she rushed us through much of the building. Once we got past the the horrible tour guide we had a really good time.

I went to DC in the 8th grade as part of a class trip and had forgotten that I had actually been in the Capital building before, then I walked into the Rotunda. Once in the Rotunda it all looked familiar to me and I had remembered being there before. One noticeable change, during my 8th grade trip we were able to see more of the building. A change I'm assuming is a direct result of 9/11. Anyhow here are some photos of the Capital building inside the Rotunda. Keep in mind as you few these photos this is the exact place where the former President Ford laid in state until today.

This is actually the ceiling...in case you were unsure of what you were looking at.

Here's Jim and I in front of the Capital building. Notice the Capital Christmas tress behind us. Oh, it's also raining...

Here's Mark and Stef in front of the Capital building.

United States Botanic Garden

2006-12-31T08:01:00.000-07:00

On Friday December 22nd we had plans to tour the Capital building and watch the Washington Capitals play hockey. We had a few hours to kill before our tour of the Capital began and this was the day that it rain all day so we decided to spend a few hours in the United States Botanic Garden not far from the Capital building. It was a warm and dry place to walk around, not to mention the Garden was rather interesting.

These two photos are of the model trains that they had setup throughout the gardens. It was really neat being able to view them and it made you feel like a kid again watching all of the trains.

This photo was taken in the children's section of the garden. They have these fake flowers setup for you to smell, each with a different scent. The "flowers" are filled with things such as thyme, oregano, garlic, vanilla, and cinnamon. So here's Jim sniffing one of these flowers. It's actually a very cute idea...

The following photos are all replicas of the different DC monuments and buildings. I overheard several people say that these were made with the different stuff found inside the garden. They are all spectacular and awesome to look at, certainly the highlight of the gardens.

DC at Night

2006-12-30T17:58:00.000-07:00

I plan on slowly posting pictures and stories from our Christmas vacation. I didn't feel the need to make one large post so I decided I would tease everyone a little. This post will be the first of probably about three or four posts. On Thursday December 21st we decided to tour (or should I say walk) DC at night. There are a few monuments that are best viewed at night so my sister Stefanie and tour guide Mark took the liberty of showing us around. Unfortunately, we tired out quickly so we did miss several sites but we also had a lot of fun. Keep in mind this is the night that Stefanie got pulled over in the Pentagon parking lot...sorry no photo to follow.

Apparently, my camera doesn't take good pictures at night so I only have a few that turned out well enough to post. Enjoy!

The following three photos were taken at the Air Force Memorial. Tour guide Mark told us that this monument had just opened. It's an awesome monument that is perched on a hilltop with stunning views of downtown DC.

This photo turned out great! It's a picture I took of the Imo Jima (sp) Memorial. We went to this monument directly after getting pulled over by the Pentagon Police, which means Stef was still rather cranky and we were all trying to keep our distance from her.

Here's Jim and Mark at the Albert Einstein's statue. Stef's no longer cranky at this point....

More Winter Wonderland

2006-12-30T07:29:00.000-07:00

It continues to snow here in Los Alamos which makes this day three. I woke up this morning not expecting much more snow...guess I was wrong. We now have about a foot and a half of snow here at the house and I can't wait to call my best friend Sam, she lives in the Jemez Mountains. When I talked to her yesterday she had over two feet of snow so I can't even imagine how much she now has. It's two early for me to call her but you can bet I'll call her in a few hours. Also, as of yesterday she had no power and she was very worried about the food and meat she had in her freezer.

Jimmy spent all day yesterday at the ski hill snowboarding. He had a really good time and it's so wonderful to see the ski hill getting snow this year since last year they received no snow. Jim, Jimmy, and myself already have plans to go skiing next weekend and I can't wait. It's been a few years since I skied so I'm really looking forward to it. Jim has only skied once so needless to say I'm also looking forward to watching him spend the day on his butt...haha.

Anyway, here are some more photos for your enjoyment that I took about an hour ago.

Here's an updated photo of our backyard. As you can tell it's still snowing.

This photo is taken from the front of our house. That's our driveway in front of you. I promise Jim did an awesome job shoveling it yesterday and now you can't tell it was ever shoveled.

And of course here's another photo of Nanook playing in the snow. This is his favorite weather.

Winter Wonderland

2006-12-29T21:33:00.000-07:00

I was so disappointed that I missed most of the snow last week, but as you can tell from the photo above (this is our backyard) we have received more snow the last few days. In fact it's been snowing the last two days straight with the Jemez Mountains receiving almost two feet. Los Alamos received 8 - 9 inches and here in White Rock we received about 7 inches.

I love this weather! I'm not entirely sure why I love the snow so much considering I can't stand to get cold, but for me a fresh snow fall is the most beautiful thing on earth. Jim stayed home today and shot some photos of the snow fall. Nanook has pretty much migrated outside and has been having a blast playing in the snow.

Here's Nanook in the backyard this evening. As you can tell, by the time this photo was taken the street was clear. However, the street is once again covered.

This is my favorite photo that Jim took of Nanook in the snow....I plan on framing this one.

National Lampoons (Libertys) Vacation

2006-12-24T18:01:00.000-07:00

I wanted to post a quick recap of our vacation thus far. It's been quite interesting at this point and it's not over yet. We have no internet connection at our hotel...or at least nothing cheap. So, I'm using the internet at my sisters house. I'm hoping this is going to be one of those posts that will make you laugh. Honestly though, I'm not sure how I'll be able to convey the funniness of our vacation through the internet but I'll certainly try. One last thing before I get started, I will not be posting any pictures until I return to New Mexico since we plan to wait until we can download the pictures to our server at home.

So here I go...

We arrived last Wednesday night and luckily we didn't get caught in all of that mess from the massive snow storm that hit our area. Apparently, we just missed the storm (we left the same day most of it arrived). Although I would have loved to see all of that snow and get some really awesome pictures, I heard Los Alamos received over one foot of snow....maybe the next storm.

Anyhow, I arrived here sick. Jim and Jimmy both had the flu a weeks ago and apparently I finally came down with a pretty bad cold as a result of the flu that they had. I'm packed full of phlegm from the chest up and my family is certainly having a good time making fun of me. On Thursday I thought I was feeling descent enough to do most of the monuments at night which was really fun, but also really cold. For those of you that don't know, my sister drives a POS (piece of sh*t) and Mark had the bright idea of driving around the Pentagon parking lot so we could get a really good view of the Pentagon and, guess what? We got pulled over by the Pentagon Police because the car had a headlight that was burned out. I thought about asking the trooper if he would take a family photo with us, but he didn't seem like the type. Needless to say, we didn't get the picture...so Stefanie never got a ticket and we were able to move on our happy way.

It rained all day Friday and we had plans to tour the Capital Building in the morning and go to a Washington Caps game Friday night. By this time I'm completely drugged up on Tylenol and unfortunately the best way around DC is by foot. So, yes we walked all over DC in the rain. Luckily we were pretty much dressed for the occasion. By the time we made it to the Caps game we all looked liked wet St. Bernard's coming through the cat door from spending the entire day in the rain. For those of you that are interested, the Caps lost to New Jersey 4 to 1.

Saturday ended up being a bust...we were all to tired to do anything and I all I wanted to do was sleep. My fever was up and down all day....probably from spending the day in the rain.

Sunday...the main event...spend the day with Aunt Suzie. The day started out pretty descent, although Mom was late as always. We decided to pile all of us in the POS and drive up to Elkton (my home town). My sister has this tradition of stopping at the Maryland House every time she drives to Elkton. So we made the usual stop, we all got out of the car, did our own thing and met back at the car. Apparently, while most of us were gone my sister and Jim decided to "fix" the driver's side window that was broken. They didn't fix it at all...in fact they made it worse, the entire window came off of the track. So here we are, Christmas Eve, driving to Elkton in the POS with a window that is permanently down in the freezing cold weather. Things went great in Elkton, although we did feel like we had to cut our trip short so that we could leave at a descent hour and not freeze our butts off on the drive home. Did I mention that my sister drives a POS???

It was a cold ride home, so don't be surprised if the next blog reads that I have pneumonia....

Merry Christmas Everyone!!

Heading Home

2006-12-19T22:17:00.000-07:00

I'm so excited to report that Jim and I will be heading home to Maryland tomorrow...wahoo! I spent the entire day doing laundry, cleaning the house, and packing our stuff. We've been planning this trip for months, but I think I'm more excited about taking Jim to see my old stomping grounds around Elkton. Not to mention, Jim has never been to DC and my sister has lots of activities planned for us. It looks like tour guide Mark will be showing us around the next several days. So, during the next week I'm not sure how often I'll get the chance to post a blog, but I'll certainly try when I get the chance. I'm taking my laptop with me, but it doesn't look like our hotel offers free internet service so I'll have to shop around.

Northern New Mexico has been receiving snow the last two days and the last time I turned the news on the airport was closed. I have a gut feeling that tomorrow could turn out to be a longer then normal travel day for us. I had wanted to take pictures of the snow tonight, but apparently the camera is already packed. Oh well...I'll post several pictures when we return if I don't get the chance to post while we are in DC.

Christmas Shopping

2006-12-17T21:38:00.000-07:00

Okay, I know it's been several days since I last posted and I really do appoligize for the long delay. There really hasn't been much going on here in the Liberty house. I've been working my butt off at the credit union trying to get ready for my vacation and I've also been trying to get ready for Christmas. I can't believe Christmas is next Monday...it doesn't feel like Christmas here. The weather has once again been unseasonably warm these days and I think the warm weather certainly hasn't helped. We did get an awesome snow storm a few weeks ago (I should have taken pictures to document it), but within days the weather turned warm again. We are also suppose to get more snow today but I managed to get my Christmas shopping done in a short-sleeved polo shirt...with no jacket, so I don't think it's going to snow anytime soon.

Anyway, like I said, I did get my Christmas shopping done today. I spent the day in Albuquerque finishing up my shopping while Jim spent the day in the mountains getting more firewood. While in Albuquerque I went to the new ABQ Uptown shopping center and was really impressed with all of the nice shops that have moved into Albuquerque. I can't wait to go back there again when I have more time to look around and enjoy myself. Anyway, nothing else here...

Victory at Last!

2006-12-12T21:56:00.000-07:00

After seven straight loses, Toronto finally pulled off a victory tonight! Toronto played Tampa Bay and saw a 5-4 victory. Feel free to use the Liberty Links on the right to get the full story on this nail-biting game. As I'm sure you can imagine, Jim is feeling confident in his team again and hopefully the Maple Leafs can go from losing streak to winning streak. Their next game is scheduled for Friday night against Carolina, so tune in later for all of the game highlights.

As for me, I really have little news to report on. I'm breathing a sigh of relief tonight, as this semester has now officially come to an end. I took my economics final today and I'm feeling pretty good about my performance on the test. So, I'll be enjoying the next month with no class and no homework!

With the semester finally over I now feel like I can concentrate on getting ready for Christmas. Jim and I leave in a week to go home for Christmas so now the stress really begins. I've gotten some of my Christmas shopping done, but I still have a lot more to go. I'm not sure if I got lazy this year, or I was just forgetful, but it looks like I will not be doing a lot of my traditional holiday stuff. Normally, I make loads of cookies and send out Christmas cards to the entire family. This year I haven't managed to do either and I really don't think I'll have the time now. So for those of you that normally enjoy my cookies...sorry, maybe next year. And for those of you that normally enjoy my annual Christmas card...sorry, maybe next year.

Lumberjack Jim

2006-12-11T11:48:00.000-07:00

I can't believe how far my wonderful husband has come since he moved to New Mexico. He has quickly gone from city boy to lumberjack and it's really cute to see. This winter he has really taken to playing in the woods and chopping firewood. We woke up on Saturday morning with the intent of going to the mountains to get some firewood and pick out our Christmas tree. Going to the mountains to pick out a Christmas tree is an event that I'm very familar with, but this is something that Jim has never been a part of. Jim had a wonderful time and I think this will be something that we will be doing every year from here on out.

I only managed to take the two pictures that you see now. I apparently came down with the stomach flu while we were in the mountains, so taking pictures was the last thing on my mind. I am feeling much better today, although I am still home from work. Finals are this week and since I spent the entire weekend sick, I didn't have any time to study. So, today I'm spending the day studing.