Long Time Gone

Where do I start?

I think this was the longest break that I've taken between posts since I started this blog.  It's a mixture of having a busy summer and being at a loss for words on where I am (fertility-speaking).  Let's start with the busy summer--because that's more fun.

Okay, so I posted about our trip to California to visit my family.  It's was the perfect way to break up the three-weeks with my husband, but Ella and I stayed busy with swim lessons as well.  My husband came back towards the end of June, and we jetted off to Montana the following weekend to surprise his parents for their 40th wedding anniversary.  It would have been a perfect weekend--if we hadn't been so scared about a huge 200,000+ acre wildfire that was raging about 20 miles away from their house and moving quickly in our direction.  The sky was grey on our drive in, with ash falling at the party.  It left us without power for most of the weekend, but my father-in-law is an amazing man who always makes sure that his family--including six grandkids--are well cared for.  Not only did he keep a generator going nearly the whole time we were there, but he also hooked up the trailer and brought the kids down to the river to swim (I should note that the Powder River, which runs along their ranch, only came up to Ella's waist at the very deepest point).  Ella reconnected with her Montana cousins, and got to meet her three Wisconsin cousins on the trip (she's the youngest of the six grandkids on my husband's side of the family).  As in the past, Ella was a wonderful traveler, though I'm sure the two hour drive-two hour flight-three hour drive (plus one hour delay on the return) wasn't really all that exciting for her. 

We got back on Monday, worked on Tuesday, celebrated the Fourth of July on Wednesday, worked on Thursday, and then headed out to Palm Springs on Friday to meet up with some friends and their 16-month little boy.  Again, Ella tolerated the six hour drive as well as I could have hoped, and napped for the last two hours after our lunch stop.  We enjoyed a hot but relaxing weekend, and probably spent more time in the pool than on dry land (we definitely got our money's worth out of our $2 swim lessons!).  Ella is a little fish--to the point that it's almost scary!  By the end of the weekend, she was pushing off the steps to me...but hasn't quite gotten the hang of "kick your feet and move your arms and blow bubbles simultaneously", which meant that she typically just started sinking to the bottom, eyes and mouth wide open in utter excitement.  She would just spit out the water and do it all over again without a care in the world--but we have a long ways to go before I'll feel as "comfortable" with her being around water as she apparently is.  It would have been a nearly perfect weekend--if the air conditioner in our car had not gone out as we were leaving Phoenix, while it was 105 outside.  We had a two-hour drive in the heat, and Ella kept requesting "No wind!" because she (and my husband) were not fans of having the windows down.

But we made it home last night, despite the heat, and enjoyed a slow morning before heading to Ella's first dentist appointment.  She was such a great little patient!  This was just the initial "sit in the chair and get used to the noises of the office and count your teeth" sort of appointment, but they said that everything looks great so far!

So I think that catches you up on our busy summer, which means I might as well turn to where I am--emotionally speaking--in regards to my in/fertility.  If I were to sum it all up in three words, it would be:  "I don't know".  I think I got carried away last month, so I'm trying the complete opposite approach this month.  I'm trying out a "I'm not going to think about it at all" style for this month.  No more temping.  No more checking for phantom signs.  No more calculating.  I'm literally trying to change the subject with the internal conversations that are going in my brain.  On occasion, my mantra has been "not gonna think about it".  Perhaps I'm acting like an ostrich by burying my head in the sand, but whatever I was doing last month by being super healthy and exercising regularly clearly wasn't working for me because I ended up with the longest cycle I've had since I stopped breastfeeding.  I recognize that I got caught up (again) in wanting so desperately to be pregnant--maybe the tardiness of my cycle really was stress related.  So this month has been a good experiment in self-discipline as I try to not (over-)analyze anything related to my fertility (or possible lack thereof).  Don't get me wrong--I'm not completely oblivious.  I remember that my cycle started when I was home in California, and that was around the middle of June...but I'm not going to pull up a calendar or count back the days. 

As for how I'm feeling about it all--I'm just trying to enjoy every moment that I can with Ella.  She is such a delight.  If this is the only chance I get to parent a 21-month old, then I want to live it up.  I love her dearly, and as much as I would love to get to do this all over again, I am so blessed to have the chance to be her Mommy.  I just wish my body would work correctly...

So there you have it--our busy summer and my update on where we stand for trying to add another one to the mix.  I can't promise I'll write daily, but I definitely do need to share some more "Ella-isms" soon. 

Today's blessing is the beautiful desert!  If you're unaware, we actually get monsoons here in Southern Arizona.  We came back from our trip to Palm Springs to bright green ocotillo in our backyard.  It's hard to imagine when it's 100+ outside, but it really is beautiful.