This is the day that the Lord has made....

I woke up singing this song, excited for what was to come.  Funny thing, I sat down to spend some time with God and pulled out my journal from 3 years ago when we were preparing for Makenna's transfer and this is the entry I found on the day Makenna was thawed....



Love it!

I started this morning with a phone call from India!  My friend Erin, who is now a missionary in India, wanted to pray over me.  It was so dear to hear her voice, hear all the hustle and bustle of a foreign land in the background and know that even half way around the globe, we were being lifted up in prayer!  Thank you Erin! 

I took the day off hoping to relax and lay low, but I ended up getting the idea to put a little goodie basket together for the doctor, embryologist and nurses so the morning ended up a little more frantic than I had planned, but it did keep my mind off worrying and I was pretty excited to share these today:)

 

 

I decided to wear my lucky transfer dress again this time.....



September 5, 2009

January 31, 2012

I had lunch with this sweetie and by 2:00 we were off to the doctors

 

 

 

I LOVE my nurses at Froedtert and I was SO very excited to find out that my 2 faves were working today.  When Amanda was taking me back to the room, she told me she and Theresa were fighting over who would get to go back with me to assist with the transfer:)  Shortly after getting back to our room, Theresa came in to say hello and I, of course, asked them what the status of the embryo was - did it survive the thaw?  Neither of them knew and a few seconds later Dr. Strawn popped his head in to say hello and so I asked him.  He didn't know either!  I think they all assumed no news was good news.  I joked with them that I wasn't dropping my pants until I knew my baby was ready for me.  Shortly after the embryologist opened the door and told us to look at the TV monitor - there it was!!!  Our beautiful little embie!! 

 

 

I can't even begin to explain how relieved and excited I was to know that it had survived and was finally ready to be transferred. 

 

The embryologist explaned to us that the embryo had actually already "hatched" out of the outer shell, which is a critical step for implantation.  This was a great sign & everything looked really good! 

 

The transfer literally started at 3:12pm and was done by 3:14pm - I am always amazed at how fast it goes!  We got to see the embryo on the TV monitor and then see the embryologist suck it into the catheter.  Nurse Theresa had the ultrasound probe on my belly so we could see it get "fired" in my uterus, too.  It is such an amazing sight!  I am so in awe of what a miracle this all is - how this tiny little embie, frozen 6 1/2 years ago was frozen just this morning (at -186 degrees Celsius, no less) and at noon today it was thawed and now it is (hopefully) nuzzling nicely in my womb.  God is so good!!  I did read tonight that once the embryo hatches it typically implants within a day or so.  Please keep praying that it would latch on!!!! 

 

When we walked into the doctor's office we saw this Liquid Nitrogen tank in the hallway, which was likely the tank that our frozen baby was in since being transferred to our clinic almost 4 years ago.  I like the "Empty" sign on it:)  I couldn't resist a few photos. 

 

 After the transfer, we headed to our favorite coffee shop - the same thing we've done after our last 2 transfers.  I got a Dreamsicle Shake and loved finding this on the side of it....

 

Hmmm, I don't mind if I do.....

 

So now the waiting begins...... we go back in for our blood pregnancy test on Sunday, February 10th.  Until then, I am PUPO (Pregnant Until Proven Otherwise for all you fertile people).  And I am going to enjoy each and every minute of it:) 

 

 

 

Prayer gathering

Words can't even describe how very blessed we were tonight to have our family and friends gather and pray over us and over our precious snowflake baby. As we prayed tonight, I was reminded at what a blessing my infertilty has turned out to be - that God has used it to bring me closer to Him, to bring us through the greatest heartache we could imagine in our first miscarriage and using it to not only bring us Makenna and this embryo, but to bring us this whole list of people that are standing by us and praying with us today. There are so many women in my life that, without this heartache, I would never have the privilege of meeting, supporting and being supported by. So thank you. God has blessed us so much. We hope and pray that He would continue to bless us with a successful transfer tomorrow.

As I went around and introduced who each person was and how we knew them it was really pretty cool to see who God had brought into our lives, some through our journey of infertility and others whom we've grown closer to because of this process.  I love that we share our faith with these people and that they are willing to go before the Almighty God on our behalf to boldly pray for this baby!  I am so very humbled and so very grateful!! 

Let it snow!!

I love looking out my window today and seeing all the pretty snowflakes!  I think reality is starting to set in and I am getting anxious.  Tomorrow is the big day!!  Thankfully, the moments of anxiety are fleeting and I know that God is in control.  I was reading 1 Peter yesterday and God keeps bringing this verse back to my mind "Cast ALL your anxiety on Him because He cares for you."  I know God is hearing the prayers of so many people as they lift us up this week, too!  Thank you for praying for us!! 

Tonight is our big prayer night.  I am very much looking forward to being surrounding by family and friends tonight in our home as we prepare for tomorrow and pray for God's will in all this.

Makenna and I had a blast making snowflake cookies for tonight......

She is so proud!

Look who showed up half way through our baking!! 

Love these matching princess aprons Oma made for us for Christmas this year!  Makenna was SO excited to put hers on.  She loved the little pockets in it.  Thanks, Oma!

 

Messy, messy girls

Putting the sprinkles on.... trying NOT to eat them all.  After every cookie - "Can I eat THIS one?"

"We are good bakers, mama"

Mmmmm, at last!!!  "Delicious!"

Date night!!! With my baby girl!!

Daddy and Uncle Derek are off to the Bucks game tonight which means I get date night with my baby girl:) 

 

 

 

Daddy is not a fan of PF C.hangs & I love it so I thought I'd take her there..... All was going great until she wanted to order macaroni and wasn't very happy that they didn't have any. 

 

Thank goodness for chopsticks to distract her!

Here she is singing "Under the Sea" and banging her chopsticks together

 

And our fortune this evening......

 

Perfect!

Where oh where have my marshmallows gone?

"Helping" mommy make homemade s'mores and it seems she has discovered the ooey gooey goodness of baby marshmallows.  Mmmmmm

Sledding!

Look who is over her fear of sledding! She loved going down the hill belly first on the neighbor's tube.  I tried sending her down on a regular sled just before this but she want having it.  Looks like we might need to invest in a tube....

Here we go again.....

Well, praise God my lining has thickened up right on schedule this time through which means we are ready to proceed!  Our transfer is scheduled for next week Thursday, January 31st at 3pm. 

 

And starting tonight at 10:00 - SHOTS!! 

 

Don't you love my step by step visual....In case you are wondering what each of these is for...

 

Step 1 - darken the circles that the nurse has drawn on each of my butt cheeks with the "target area"... yes, I have one sharpie circle on one side and a sharpie smiley face on the other:).  Needless to say I don't think I'll be heading to the gym anytime soon.  I'm already a little leery of anyone seeing my naked butt cheeks in the locker room - even more so with the hieroglyphics on them. 

 

Step 2 - Ice!  Courtesy of Makenna, this time around I will be icing with a sweet little princess boo boo buddy!  Ha!

 

Step 3 - a little music..... I couldn't resist putting this in there.  I had totally forgotten about this until Elizabeth emailed me last night, but last time around Brad thought it would be funny to have a little theme music while he got my meds ready so he picked.... "Rumpshaker".  I went ahead and dug that little gem back out for tonight:)  Hey, ya gotta make it fun, right?

 

Step 4 - This is Brad's role and bless his heart he does a WONDERFUL job at it - get the meds ready.  This little flip flop post it note has very detailed step by step instructions on what to do - I wrote it up from his notes last time we did this.  At yesterday's refresher lesson with the nurse he took a new set of notes and I wouldn't be surprised if he showed up with a typed up, laminated version tonight at 10pm.  If you know Brad, he is quite the type A personality and he wants to make sure this big 'ol needle is full of EXACTLY the right amount of meds.  He also HATES this part, so honey, THANK YOU for doing this for us!!

 

Step 5 - I contemplated putting a big ol picture of my circley/smiley faced butt cheeks but decided against it.  Let's just say this is the YOWCH!!!! part....

 

Step 6 - Band aids!  Courtesy of Makenna, this time around I will not be boring with small circle band aids but rather I have Tinkerbell, Elmo and Princesses to choose from.  That will surely make it hurt less, right? 

 

Step 7 - Heat, heat, heat!  That seemed to work for me last time. 

 

Here we go!!!!  If I am lucky (i.e. and get pregnant) I will be able to continue with this every night for the next 12 weeks!!  That is only 84 shots to go!! 

 

Bring em on!!!!

You'll never find me mama!

Take your Daddy to school night!

Breakfast is served

Perfect start to the day!

Prayers for our journey...

As Brad and I continue on our journey through infertility, we thank you for your prayers and support over the years. Some of you have been walking through this with us from the very beginning, while others are a blessing God has brought into our lives as a result of our struggles. We are so thankful to God for each of you and how you’ve helped us through. As many of you know, we adopted Makenna along with 2 other frozen embryos back in 2009. While one of them was transferred with Makenna and God called it home, we are so thankful to have one frozen embryo remaining. As we prepare for the next transfer, we would be honored if you would join us in praying for this little snowflake baby.


I started my meds for this cycle earlier this month and will go back for a follow up ultrasound on January 24th to see if my body is doing what it should. Please pray with us that my body would cooperate and that all would go smoothly. Once my body is ready, we will start those lovely progesterone shots (this is where Brad gets to join in the fun) and our transfer will be scheduled for one week from that date. Again, please be praying that my body would cooperate and would respond well to the medications.


We covet your prayers in all of this. As many of you know, we have been very open about this entire process from our first embryo transfer that resulted in a very early miscarriage to the successful pregnancy we had with Makenna. One of the reasons for this is that we appreciate all your prayers and support. As Psalm 127 (which coincidentally was a reading at our wedding) says “Unless the Lord builds the house, the builders labor in vain. Unless the Lord watches over the city, the guards stand watch in vain. In vain you rise early and stay up late, toiling for food to eat- for he grants sleep to those he loves. Children are a heritage from the Lord, offspring a reward from Him.” We are inviting the Lord to watch over us in this process once again. We know that we can’t do this on our own. We come to Him asking that He bless us with this baby. We know that this is completely out of our hands and we need to trust in Him once again. We invite you to pray with us for God’s will. I pray that he would knock our socks off once again with another miracle baby. And in the process, I pray that He would get all the glory.


Similar to what we have done before the last 2 embryo transfers, we want you to know you are welcome to pray with us the night before our transfer. If anyone is interested in joining us at our home, we would love to have you. Those memories of praying with a group of 20 of our close friends and family all around us before both our first and second transfers are ones that I will always cherish as I think back on our journey. How powerful it was and how humbling to see the amazing things God was doing right in the midst of our struggles! If you can’t make it or would prefer to pray solo, we ask that you would remember us in your prayers that night. In 1 John 5:13 – “This is the confidence we have in approaching God: that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us.” We know that God heard us at both our prayer nights in the past and are confident as we look at our sweet little Makenna, that His will was done. We are thankful that He used the first miscarriage to draw us closer to Him and to bring us to Makenna.


I will keep you all posted with email updates as it gets closer. We are anticipating a transfer date somewhere between January 31st and February 2nd, depending on my response to the meds. Thank you all for your friendships, your love and your prayers!!

 

I found this coloring sheet at the library at church today. How perfect!!!


Thanks for following my blog and continuing on our journey with us!! 


Love,

Bradley, Laura & Makenna

Hot?

Or was her pillow just not quite fluffy enough? At least she kept her diaper on this time...

I have to read my Bible mama

Birthday fun!

 

We had a great time celebrating Daddy's birthday!  Daddy's lifelong friend Ben shares a birthday with Daddy so we decided to celebrate with their family at dinner & then cupcakes and all things princess at our house after.  We had so much fun!

 

 

Makenna and Avery

Playing Hide & Seek, toddler style.  Avery kept counting and Makenna kept saying - "Avery, you'll never find me!".  It was hilarious!

 

Ahhh, time for cupcakes!  Mmmm.  I apparently didnt' get a picture of them in their princess dresses, but you can sort of see in this one that they have matching princess dresses on.  Makenna even got all dolled up with Avery's earrings, bracelets, amulet and crown.  They loved it!

 

Look who has matching Jammies!

Daddies and their princesses.  Love this one!!

 

Happy Birthday Ben & Brad!!!

 



Happy Birthday Daddy!!

Singing happy birthday to daddy

 

 

 

A very special happy birthday wish to Daddy!

And in honor of Daddy today, I want to start with a little something special.....

As a mom, I get the priviledge of seeing the amazing and special interaction between a daddy and his little girl on a daily basis. It is something I really treasure and I can't wait for daddy to come home from work each night, just to see the smiles on each of their faces. I know this stage won't last forever, so I want to make sure I remember every little detail.

Makenna, I love the way you....

-Call your daddy "Your Majesty"

-Get SO very excited every night when he walks in the door

-ask daddy so sweetly..."daddy, will you play with me, daddy"

-always start your sentence and end your sentence with "daddy" when you are talking to him

-put your arms around your daddy so very tightly

-try to "hide" from daddy, the entire time yelling at the top of your lungs, "Daddy dragon will NEVER find us in here"

-giggle when Daddy dragon does finally find us

-say "daddy"

-tell daddy "I love you daddy" everytime he says "Makenna, you know what?"

-call for daddy first everytime you get a boo boo

-ask if we can pick daddy up from work every time we drive anywhere near his office

-ask where daddy is first thing in the morning when you wake up

- say "I lub you daddy"
-run and jump into daddy's arms, completely trusting that he will catch you

 

Daddy, I love the way you...

-Get SO very excited to see Makenna every night when you walk in the door

-jump at every opportunity to play with Makenna when she asks you to, no matter how busy you are or how crazy your day has been

-will drop everything at work when we call because Makenna has a boo boo and really just needs her daddy to make it better

-love to snuggle and watch a good princess movie with your little girl

-pretend that you can't find us when we are hiding and then come and scare us

-have a smile that lights up your face when you see your little girl smile or giggle

-snuggle in the "castle" each night with us at bedtime and read & pray with us

-call to talk to Makenna in the morning when you don't get a chance to see her before you head in to work
-get so excited to see Makenna run and jump into your arms ready to give you a big snuggly hug

I love you Daddy! I love you Makenna!!

Princess playdate

In honor of the Sophia season premiere this morning I decided to have all my girls over for a little princess playdate.  Makenna played so well with all the kiddos and judging by the mess everyone left, I would say everyone had a blast!! 

Makenna crowing our prince charming for the day

Even Bugsey was a good sport

Group picture, not so much....

Makenna really was happy most of the day - picture apparently just weren't her thing. 

 

I love these get togethers.  I love looking around the room and thinking back to these same group of ladies sharing in our infertility bible studies and support group meetings wondering if God would ever answer our prayers.  And I look around the room now and all I can do is praise God for His perfect plan for each of us. 

 

 

Good guys...

The other day, Rachel and I were discussing how very lucky Makenna is to have so many great guys in her life.  Her Daddy, of course, loves her more than I think he ever even thought possible.  Not only that, but she has 2 awesome  Grandpa's that care so much for her and would do anything for her...

 

And then there are the uncles.....

This week it was Uncle Derek's turn to love on her.  He texted me today letting me know that he needed a Makenna fix.  He had just redecorated his office with pictures of Makenna all over it and was apparently missing her.  It just so happened that we were planning on going to dinner that night and the Disney store to get Makenna her Princess Sophia figurines she has been eying up so we invited him to join us.  Makenna ADORES her uncle Derek and was thrilled when I told her he was coming along.  

 

Makenna's exact words "Uncle Derek, do you have any money?"  Love it!

 

Disney Store = one very happy girl!

 

Princess Sophia in hand= one very, very happy girl!

 

We love you, Uncle Derek!!

Celebrating Daddy's birthday a little early over Mexican