About Us

Hi! Welcome to my "Baby Book" of a blog. I started it literally the day I found out I was pregnant, because I didn't want to miss one single second. You can read about that fabulous day here. I also am terrible at scrapbooking, and babybooking, so I thought a blog was the next best thing. I have posted about every little thing that has happened, and also have found a hobby for photography along the way (I guess all moms develop this, since they take thousands of pictures of their babies!). Thanks for stopping by. Here is little bit about sweet lil' family of four.

This is me:

This is me and Jake (go Vols!).

We got married on a fall day in Knoxville, TN on October 19th, 2002. If you are in the south, you should know that all fall weekends revolve around football. It is what it is. So, we chose one of two fall weekend that did not host a UT football game. And here we are on our wedding day. In love and ready for our journey together.

We decided to wait a while to start a family and just enjoy being married. We traveled alot, and enjoyed each other and had fun. In early 2007, we decided it might be time to have kids. Little did we know that God had other plans for us. We spent the next 2.5 years of peeing on thousands of sticks, getting prodded, tested, procedured. surgeried, pricked, etc, etc, etc, until we finally got the answer we had been wishing and praying for.

I know you can't really see it, but as a pee-on-a-stick expert, there is a beautiful line :)

Then another surprise was waiting for us. Multiples! Then our real journey began, and I went from this:

10 weeks

to this:

34 weeks

Now our little life is perfect and complete. I would not change our journey is any way. It has made me be a better mother, I believe. These babies were very wanted and very loved way before they came to us, and I cherish every second with them. Welcome to our crazy, funny, ABSOLUTELY fabulous life.  You can contact me at apstribling@gmail.com

Update

We went for yet another ultrsound this morning. We have been quite spoiled with weekly ultrasounds. It is going to be quite a shock when someone tells us that "they'll see us in a month". We are special at the moment, and I like it that way :)

The fertility clinic has released us to our regular OB. (Well, actually my regular OB will probably just tell us to go see a high-risk Ob). That was sad today. I have been going to this clinic for a year now, and see them at least once a month. And here lately, I have been seeing them weekly. They are so sweet. It's sad for them because they have done all of this work for us, but don't get the glory work of a pregnancy and birth. They all gave us hugs and wished us well and told us to keep them updated.

My regular OB's nurse called me this afternoon and I talked to her for a long time about my pregnancy. It's funny, once you experience infertility, it is amazing how many women are secretly going through the same problems. This nurse has been trying for a baby with her husband for 2 years as well. So we talked a long time about everything she has done, different things she could do that I have learned along the way, and abotu how hard it is for her to work in an OB's office. I hope I get to stay with my regular OB, because she was great to talk to.

Anyway, that's it for now I guess. We are off to the beach and Atlanta for the Yankees/Braves game. IPlease keep us in your thoughts and prayers as we go through this journey.

Baby A

Baby B

No Morning Sickness

So, far, I haven't had the slightest bit of morning sickness. I am still not convinced if that is a good thing or a bad thing. "They" say that the more morning sickness you have, the healthier your baby. And since I have two in there at the moment, you would think it would be off the charts. I have been SUPER tired, though, and SUPER hungry (which is not good as I still haven't been given the clearance to do any exercise). Plus, my mother says she didn't have morning sickness with me, Ginny, or Leslie, and we're fine. So, I am trying not to get too worried about it.

Multiples???

Well, Jake and I have had one surprise after another in the ultrasound room. When we went in at 5 weeks (first week of June), the u/s technician saw two sacs. Possible twins!! While it took us a few days to wrap our mind around it, we started to get excited. The chances of both sacs developing a heartbeat was about 53%, so I was fully prepared to only have one baby in there.

Well, imagine our surprise when we went in at 6 weeks. Baby A - measuring 6.2mm and 6w3d, and good strong heartbeat. Then they saw Baby B - measuring 5.2mm, 6w2d also good heartbeat. So excited!!!


Now, I know that we are still REALLY early, and that none of these babies will make it, but I feel our probability is up, up, up with one out of two!

Baby A

Baby B

Pregnancy post

I have been a member of a wonderful online support group for over a year. It is a group of wonderful ladies who have been trying to conceive for 6+months or longer. I wanted to record my pregnancy announcement on there, so I will never forget it. Here it is!

I can't for a minute believe for a minute that this could actually be real. I
never really thought it would happen. It's just kind of been a month-to-month
"what do I do next" game for me. And yet, here I am. After 2 years and 3 months,
I can say I am pregnant. It makes me laugh just to type that. It's
UNBELIEVABLE!!! I honestly cannot believe it it happened. And I can't stop
saying that!

Well, because I drive in my job all day, I pay VERY close attention to everything going on in my body. B/c I have nothing else to do, LOL. My bbs have been hurting pretty badly since the last positive pregnancy test last month. (It was a chemical prgnancy) Then after that I was on on Follitism (hormone injections), which made them hurt, them Progesterone, then the positive pregnancy, so they haven't had a break. At 7DPO, I had strong AF type cramps during the day. on 10DPO, at 9-10am, had af cramps in the center. at 11:30am ,they stopped and felt like a there
was a balloon on something in my right side. Then,at 12:00, I had pain/soreness
in my lower back in the center. Which surely must have been implantation??

Things I did this month: I did injectibles for the first time this month-75ml of Follitism. I had a LOT of folliciles. I think I posted it up in the waiting to O section. I had ALOT and my lining was great - 13.2. When they did my Estradiol level, it was over 1000 on Friday night, which I think was good too. Also, I Oed about 5 days earlier than I normally do. I have never, ever Oed on CD 14. So, too many things of this cycle just made it feel right. If I did not get pregnant, I would have seriously thought something was wrong with me. Every night I took a baby aspirin, pre-nanal vitamin, 150mg of B6, my three herb pills from the acupuncturist, and evening primrose oil up until O. Also, I have been getting weekly acupuncture since January. Also, I ate a ton of watermelon before O, and lots of pineapple (skin and all!) after O.

If you are still reading this, WOW!! I'm so sorry, I ramble when I'm excited!!
My beta was done yesterday at 11DPO at it was 40!!! Soooo excited about that. And my progesterone was greater than 80. I go back in on Friday for Beta #2. YAY!!!