Up, Up, UP!

M went in for another blood test on Saturday and our numbers have gone up to 1383! We go back in for another beta test next week and THEN they will schedule our ultrasound depending on those numbers. This waiting is worse than the tww was!

As the girls are coming up on their one year old birthday, we thought we'd make a list of all the words they understand completely at this point. We were surprised at the list we came up with and are even probably missing some. The words they know are: Cheer.ios, ball, balloon, Barne.y, book, Mom, Uncle Tim, no, milk, cookie, pool, dance, juice, cheese, toast, kitty and puppy. They also know each other's names. They both say one word each - R says "Mom" and A says "EEEEEE" as in kitty or puppy. And of course A said "dada" a while back but has stopped since probably because she got no positive reaction out of us. ;)

Today we went to the NYC pride parade with our girls and met up with Puffer, Chicken and their cutie cutie little boys. It was a HOT one but we all had a great time!


R (with her hair slicked back from sweat) waving the pride flag.


The girls holding hands while drinking their milk at the parade.

Our beta doubled!

Our new beta as of yesterday morning is 541 at 17 days past trigger. We are scheduled to go back in Saturday morning for another beta test. We CAN'T wait for the ultrasound!!!

On a side note, I just wanted to wish my beautiful wife (J) a very happy birthday! Yesterday was her birthday but with family in town visiting, I didn't have time to post. I love you!

We've got numbers!!!!

Well, we've got numbers to back up our positive pregnancy tests. We don't know if our beta is trying to tell us something by duplicating a certain number 3 times or if it is just a really solid singleton number but either way we are ecstatic with our beta of 222! We are 15 days past the HCG shot so we have a really strong number either way.

We go back in on Thursday for another beta test - maybe this beta will help tell the story. Can't we just jump to an ultrasound??? ;)

A +

We don't go in for a blood test until Tuesday BUT.....

Almost two weeks ago we did the Trigge.r shot and now we have a BEAUTIFUL plus sign showing on our p-test! (It looks a lot darker in person and we even saw a hint of a plus sign yesterday morning as well!) We are kind of in disbelief at the moment as this whole process has been pretty laid back and worry-free. Life is just SO busy that the two week wait flew by and now we are sitting pretty looking at a perspective sister or brother for A and R! We wouldn't be being completely honest if we didn't mention that we can't wait to see the B.eta numbers but more importantly an ultrasound to see how many sacs are in there. With M having 3 mature eggs 2 days before we triggered along with many smaller ones, it just makes you wonder. As we know it isn't likely, the shows like "J & K + 8" and "Ta.ble for 10" makes our minds wonder. Either way, we are pregnant and did a bit of a "We're having a baby" dance with the twins this morning. They were equally excited (although they are always full of smiles when we walk into their nursery in the morning).

As we mentioned it's been a busy few weeks. For one, the girls went to their first fair. A hadn't napped and we knew they would both be going to bed after their normal 7pm bedtime so we didn't really know what to expect but they did GREAT! It helped that we had M's mom and 2 cousins with us along with J's brother. More hands to help but the girls had a great time people watching and trying tidbits of fair food (primarily a "turkey leg" and some ice cream). A got EXTREMELY excited when she saw huge lion and tiger stuffed animals hanging from a game vendor. J luckily captured a snapshot of it. That girl LOVES animals.

They also went on their first ride - the carousel. J sat on a horse with R and M with A. A LOVED the ride but R clung to J tighter than ever and whined the entire time. We felt so bad but J couldn't even get down off the horse because it was constantly moving up and down and... when the heck did they start going so high off the ground?!?! A was holding on to the pole with one hand and trying to pet the horse with the other. That will be the child going on all the fair rides with M in the future and R will be holding purses with J ;)

R is really walking around quite well these days. She has great balance! Yesterday A took a few steps with a little cheering and guiding! We had her hold onto our rocker and we pushed the couch ottoman out a bit and cheered her on to push off and take the necessary 2 steps to the ottoman. It worked and she felt SOO rewarded when she did it! When A is excited about something, she squeals exactly like "Carrie B.radshaw" from SATC. It is the cutest thing in the entire world!

Yesterday the girls went to their first friend "kidd.ie party". It was lots of fun as our friend has acquired quite a few outside toys over the past 2 years of her daughter's life. They played for quite some time in a plastic "little t.ikes" house with 2 other little boys. It is interesting to see the interaction between other kids and our twins. The 2 boys (not related) kept stealing toys from each other and our girls. Our girls didn't cry or mind as I think they are used to it since they (mainly R) always steal toys from each other. But if a toy was taken from one of the boys who are both only children, cries insued. It was interesting to watch.

R has her top left tooth breaking through which has made her a little whiny but all in all she has been pretty good with her teething although she hasn't had any teeth break through since her first 2 bottom over 5 months ago. We didn't think she was EVER going to get more teeth! R still has 2 tops and 2 bottoms.

A couple more days until we get our first round of betas... BRING ON GOOD NUMBERS PLEASE!!!

You're Fired!

We had to let go of our nanny today. As we've mentioned in previous posts, she is unreliable, she is only on the floor playing with them about half the time and doesn't really talk to them. This is the age where their language skills are developing so it is imperative to have communication going on. The straw that broke the camels back was that J asked her to be at our house at 10am this morning and to PLEASE NOT BE LATE (since she always is) because she had to run a meeting at 10:30am. We were smart enough to give her a 30 min cushion KNOWING that she would be late even though we specifically told her she couldn't be today. It was ridiculous that we even had to do this but it is what it is. So, 10:15am rolls around and J is getting a little nervous. The babies were sleeping at this point but of course they would wake up at exactly 10:30am if our nanny wasn't there by then. At 10:25am, M calls our nanny and asks where she is and she said she was running really late. M asked if she was at least close and she replies no. NO?!? She said she "wasn't even close." M was fuming and let J know. We both decided that this was it. We had to stop dragging our feet and find a new nanny ASAP. M called our nanny back and said that we didn't need her today and that actually we didn't need she services anymore as it wasn't working out.

J's brother is staying with us so he was luckily available to watch the girls while J had her call.

So.... it's back to the drawing board for us. It will be a little hairy around here until we get a new nanny but all in all we're glad we let this one go. She added more stress than help.

(Side note: we're still very much cheering on M's mature eggs and the millions of little guys swimming around hoping for a happy collision. Cyst check on Monday.)

An insemination like never before...

and now we enter the wonderful TWW.

We triggered this morning at 4:15am which is why this is going to be a short and sweet post. Neither of us fell back to sleep before our little darlings woke up at 5:30 and were ready to start the day. Next insem is tomorrow at 4:15pm. Our dr told us M had 3 mature eggs before the trigger and a great sperm count with 65% motility.

Yawn.... goodnight!

Rocking and Rolling...

Or should we say Poking and Producing!

M had bloodwork this morning to make sure the Rep.ronex is actually working. And.... IT IS! We keep with the same regime of 2 powders, 1 cc liquid and go in tomorrow for bw and an u/s. Very excited mommies in this household of ours!

M has been doing really well with the injections! Ice, clean, stick, inject, ice... all with no problem! M pinches the area, J darts the needle in and M inserts the hormone... we have it down to a science as all we did was reverse rolls from J's IVF last year. The one thing that isn't consistent is the size of the welts J had vs the size M is getting. M was nervous about the welt size and pain that was associated with J's injections. She is VERY LUCKY so far!!!

Comparative pictures:


J's belly during her Repro.nex injections a year and a half ago.


M's belly with the Rep.ronex injections. TINY WELTS! YAY!