A Promise Fulfilled- Tale of a Blighted Ovum, Part 5

This is the conclusion to a 5 part series about a miscarriage and life afterwards.
If you haven't read the beginning of this story, please first read:

♥Part 1:A Win and a Loss

♥Part 2:The Beginning of the End

♥Part 3: Labor
♥Part 4: An Empty Womb No More

I spent most of my pregnancy walking on eggshells- so very afraid of having my heart broken again. Despite all my worries and fears, in September of 2003, we welcomed our first little boy into the world. Not only did God bless us with one child, but He gave us 3 more as well! We went from wondering if we'd ever conceive a healthy child to having 4 children back to back!

Although writing the first two parts of this series brought back a flood of emotions, I can honestly say that almost 7 years later, I can see the good that God worked out of a bad situation. Had we not conceived our first baby, we would not have won the $1000 for baby items. When we gave birth to our first son, we were completely out of money. We almost had our electricity and auto insurance canceled. Buying a crib or car seat would not have been something we could have afforded. I believe God provided for us by allowing us to win the gift certificate when we did so that we would have what we needed later on. Perhaps the rest will make sense someday, but for now, I rest assured in God's goodness and that He had a plan even in our time of trouble.

♥"When my spirit was overwhelmed within me; You knew my path" Psalm 142:3

Here are some verses I found encouraging when we had the miscarriage:

Psalm 113:9

"He makes the barren woman abide in the house as a joyful mother of children. Praise the LORD!"

1 Samuel 1:27-28a

"For this boy I prayed, and the LORD has given me my petition which I asked of Him. So I have also dedicated him to the LORD; as long as he lives he is dedicated to the LORD."

An Empty Womb No More- Tale of a Blighted Ovum, part 4

This is Part 4 of a series. If you are new, please read first:

♥Part 1:A Win and a Loss
♥Part 2:The Beginning of the End
♥Part 3: Labor

Time passed slowly after my miscarriage. Every single day I would pray, asking God to please give us a healthy child. Not a day went by that I would forget to ask God for a child. My pregnancy hormones disapeared, but my crying remained. I had dozens of baby items, infant clothing, and even children's books, yet no baby. My friends were pregnant, and yet my womb was empty.

It was during that time that I clung to Psalm 113:9. It was my lifeline on the roughest of days. The verse says,

"He makes the barren woman abide in the house
As a joyful mother of children.
Praise the LORD!"

In early January, 2003, I found out I was pregnant again. I was terrified of having another miscarriage. My new doctor, an O.B., assured me that the odds of NOT having a miscarriage are 80%. Once the heartbeat is seen or heard, the odds are 95% that everything will be fine with the baby.

Around 7 weeks pregnant, we awaited an ultrasound. I held my breath as I was scared of seeing another empty sac. This time, however, my eyes saw a tiny oval. In my womb was a precious little child who's heart was already beating.

Every day we prayed for our little child. We set up the crib, the stroller, the car seat- all the things that we had won from our first pregnancy, yet had never had a chance to use. This time, they would be used and sit in boxes no more.

Here are a few pictures from my pregnancy.

To be continued...

Labor- Tale of a Blighted Ovum, Part 3

This is Part 3 of a series telling about the loss I experienced with my first pregnancy almost 7 years ago.

If you are new, please first read:

♥Part 1:A Win and a Loss

♥Part 2:The Beginning of the End

3 hours after arriving in the E.R., I was still sitting in an exam room waiting to find out the cause of my bleeding and cramping. At 12 weeks pregnant, I feared the worst. Finally the doctor returned with "Good news and bad news". My first thought was, "maybe we're having twins!". My bubble was soon burst as the doctor declared that the baby had either "died at 9 weeks or we had a blighted ovum".

What is a blighted ovum? It is when conception occurs, but something happens that causes the baby to stop developing very early on. Instead of the body miscarrying right away, the sac and placenta continue to grow as though there is a healthy baby inside.

Confused, devastated, and heart broken, I cried once again. I don't remember much else from that night other than one of the doctor's last comments to us. He told my husband and I to be careful to stay together through the pain rather than push each other apart as many couples do.

With a prescription for pain medication in hand, my husband somehow got me home that night. The next day I received meals and phone calls from friends. My pregnancy was confirmed as a blighted ovum after having a follow-up ultrasound, and this time I was allowed to see the screen. There was my womb with a large sac inside, but no baby.

Looking down at my own belly was like a cruel joke. For the past 8 weeks I had thought a baby was growing and developing just as it should have. I had no idea that my womb was a tomb. Empty and now barren, holding no visible remains of the one that had been so precious to me.

After 5 nights of agonizingly painful labor, it was over. However, the emotional pain had just begun.

to be continued...

The Beginning of the End- Tale of a Blighted Ovum, Part 2

♥This is Part 2 of a series about the loss of my first pregnancy almost 7 years ago.
If you are new, please first read Part 1- A Win and a Loss.

My pregnancy progressed well. I was so excited that I was going to become a mom! Each day I would read in my pregnancy book what should be happening with the baby and how big the baby was. My husband and I speculated on whether we would be having just one baby or twins. I even made a $1000 order on Amazon.com, (with my gift certificate from the radio station), purchasing a crib, stroller, carseat and many other things that the baby would need. Every 4 weeks or so, my husband would take a belly shot of me. I would marvel at how my body was changing and was so very excited with each pound I gained!

Then 12 weeks came around. I was finally past the 12 week mark and was so very excited about going in for my 3 month appointment the next week. However, things didn't go as I had planned. On a Friday evening, I started feeling ill. I found myself running to the bathroom with an upset stomache.

Saturday morning came and I was feeling better, but during a trip to the bathroom, I realized I was spotting blood. I didn't panic too much as I had heard this could be normal. However, when the spotting continued into the next day, I was starting to worry quite a bit. That evening, the bleeding had become heavier and I was cramping. Seeing as there was nothing my doctor's office was able to do over the phone, my husband took me into the E.R.

At this point I was scared. The baby I had dreamed of, prayed for, and wanted so very badly was now something I wasn't sure I would have. Crying, bleeding, and in pain, I waited in a cold E.R. exam room to find out what was wrong with me and my precious baby.

After an hour and a half of waiting in the exam room, now with a pad on, I finally received news that I would have an ultrasound by "Satan", or so the nurses had nicknamed him. As he did the ultrasound, I begged for him to turn the screen so my husband and I could see. He declined. I pleaded again, that he would please let me see. He didn't respond, and he never allowed me to see what he was seeing. He did his work, taking measurements, and then left my husband and I in the darkened room alone. Taken back to our exam room by a nurse, I sat cold, scared, and unsure of the future. Once again, I started to cry.

A Win and a Loss- A Tale of a Blighted Ovum, Part 1

♥The story of my first pregnancy

I was 19 years old and a newlywed. My husband and I decided we wanted to try for a baby. A couple months after we made the decision, we heard an advertisement on the radio for a pregnancy contest. They were having the contest in the theme of the Breeders Cup, only their version had nothing to do with horses, but rather seeing which couple could get pregnant first. The first couple to get pregnant would win $1000 towards baby necessities!

We decided to fill out an application online, but never thought we'd actually make it into the race. To our surprise, we received the call that we were in! I, along with 5 other women in the contest, had to take a pregnancy test at a restaurant to confirm that I wasn't already pregnant. It was negative, so we were officially in the race!

Soon we started receiving phone calls from the radio station during the wee hours of the morning. They would wake us asking us what we were doing (sleeping, but I doubt that was the answer they were hoping to hear).

A month went by, still not pregnant. Another month or two passed and I was finally pregnant! We had stopped receiving calls from the radio station, so I thought the odds of us being the first ones to become pregnant were slim to none. Thankfully, we really were the first ones!

We went into the radio station and they had me take another pregnancy test, this time with the female disk-jockey on-air in the bathroom doing a play-by-play! Unfortunately, I hadn't drank enough water, so back into the broadcast room to drink several cups of water while they interrogated us on-air. Not long after, I tried again with a pregnancy test, and succeeded in going this time! Indeed, the test was positive! And everyone listening to that radio station heard it all on-air!

Now 20 years old, I was expecting my first baby, and we now were $1000 closer to having what we needed to care for a baby.

I wish I could say the rest of the pregnancy went as well as the beginning did. However, as the title of this post declares, this is not only a story of a win, but also a loss.

More to come....

Foods That Make Diaper Changing Scary!!!

There are certain foods that my 15 month old absolutely loves, but I dread to see the second time around during the next day's diaper change. Here's my top 5 gross foods for diaper changing:


5. Green, Blue, or Red frosting. Makes for very interesting poo poos which have you wondering whether your child is ill until you remember the brightly frosted cake they ate the day before.

4. Raisins- let's just say that they look just about the same after they're eaten as they did before. Ick!!!

3. Peas- see #4 for explanation

2. Corn- it holds it's shape. EWWW!

1. Mandarin Oranges- okay, this one is downright nasty. If you really need an explanation, I'll give one to you, but trust me when I say it's gross!

Valentine's Day Cut-Out Cookies

Yesterday I made these cut-out cookies with the kids. I made the dough, then let one child at a time come up and pick out cookie cutters to use. The older two helped a bit with pushing the cutters in, but my 2 year old daughter mostly just ate the dough instead of helping.

The cookies turned out delicious! I used my grandmother's recipe. I spent the wee hours of last night decorating the cookies, then left some icing and let the boys decorate some cookies this morning. They actually did a great job! In the picture above are the cookies I decorated by myself.

I'd like to share with you the recipe I use for icing. My husband's aunt, who makes BEAUTIFUL cookies, shared this recipe with me and it has worked very well for us. It originally came from a magazine, but I'm not sure which one. The recipe I'm giving you is a double batch. I made the single batch yesterday and found that it didn't make as much icing as I would have liked. Better to have too much than too little when it comes to decorating cookies.

Ornamental Icing

♥(1) 2 lb bag Powdered Sugar

♥6 Egg Whites at room temperature

♥1 t. Cream of Tartar

♥In large mixing bowl, beat together ingredients for 8 to 10 minutes until stiff peaks form.

♥Cover bowl with dampened paper towels & plastic so that icing does not get hard. Remove only as much as is needed to fill pastry bag.

note: Icing can be kept several days in fridge- beat before using.

TIPS:

♥Spoon icing into a bowl for each color you plan to use. Put a knife in bowl for kids to spread onto cookie.

♥Many grocery stores and Wal-mart carry a package of neon food coloring- that is what I used for most of my colors and have found that it makes briliant color!

♥Wal-mart also carries cake decorating icing in little containers for a couple dollars each. Those work great for getting nice reds and blacks that you can't get with the liquid sqeeze tubes of coloring.

♥After you have the icing mixed with color, spoon into seperate ziplock baggies. Seal baggies, then snip the corner just a little bit. These make really nice icing bags for very cheap!

♥ Zion took this picture of my me with my 2nd. and 4th. babies. I was trying to get an apron pic. to send into the Apron Goddess... might have to try again when I'm not wearing cut off sweats and tangled hair!

♥♥♥Zach and Molly- THANK YOU for the cookie cutters!!!! As you can see, they work great and we had a lot of fun using them. Thank you for the thoughtful gift!!!

What Books are YOU Reading?

You can tell a lot about a person from what they read. What their likes and dislikes are. What they'd like to learn more about, what their struggles are. Whether they have a large vocabulary, or are amused by the simple things. Whether their sense of humor is dry, or perhaps if they enjoy extra mystery and excitement in their life. So what are YOU reading? What books are in your pile, waiting to be read soon? Do you enjoy fiction or non-fiction best?

Here's what's in my current stash:

*Love and Logic Magic for Early Childhood- Practical Parenting from Birth to Six Years
*Say Goodbye to Whining, Complaining, and Bad Attitudes... in you and your kids!
*Parenting the strong-willed child : the clinically proven five-week program for parents of two- to six-year-olds
(Do you notice a theme here?!?)
*Sunset by Karen Kingsbury (she is such a great author!!!!!!!)
*Family Camping
*Camping Made Easy
*Sarah Ban Breathnach's Mrs. Sharp's Tarditions Reviving Victorian Family Celebrations of Comfort & Joy

Last, but definantly not least, is:

*Love Dare . I have only just started this book last week. I will let you know how this one goes when I finish it, but for now, if you've never heard of it, google and find out! It's a marriage booster & saver from what I've heard! Also, check out the movie Fireproof if you haven't already.

How to Survive the Grocery Store w/ 4 Children 5 & Under!

This evening, my husband and I took 4 very hungry little children to the grocery store. We loaded them up into two shopping carts- one shaped like a police car and the other like a fire truck. Each truck/cart has two steering wheels inside and it makes shopping SO much easier because the kids are entertained and think they're driving the cart! That is until my 5 year old decides to climb on the outside of the truck...

There is one thing, though, that makes going to the store 100x's easier- the free cookie from the bakery section! Did you know that most Wal-marts and local grocers offer free cookies for children? Some grocery stores will have them out on the ledge for kids to take, however others don't. If they don't, then all you do is go up to the cake lady, butcher, or whoever is working the bakery at the moment and ask if each of your kids can have a cookie. Wal-mart gives out kind of small cookies, but our local grocer does big ones- today was a Smores cookie! YUM!

So how do we use the free cookie to work into our advantage when shopping? We tell our kids when we get to the store that if they are well behaved they will recieve a cookie. If not, then no cookie (although sometimes a sibling is nice enough to share a bite with the child that didn't receive one). This is usually enough motivation for the kids to be very well behaved. After all our shopping is completed, we pick up our cookies and head to the check-out aisle. Our youngest two children are then still munching on their snack and our quite content throughout the checkout.

Anyone else do this when shopping? Has it helped make your shopping experience a little easier? Anyone have any other tips for making shopping easier with multiple little ones?

How Many People Have Your Exact Name?

There is a website where you can type your first and last name and it will tell you how many people in the U.S. have your name (first, last, and both combined).
The site is called "How Many of Me".

There are 13 people in the U.S. with my exact name, and my husband is one of 7.
According to this site, one of our children is 1 of 4 people with his exact name, one is 1 of 2, and two of our kids are the only ones in the U.S. with their exact names! I guess you could say we enjoy picking less common names for our kids!

How about you? How many people in the United States share your name?

Firetruck Birthday Cake

This is another birthday cake in which I got the idea from Family Fun. My 2nd. son is very much into firetrucks, so he was so excited when I made this cake for his 3rd. birthday last year. In addition to the cake, we also had firetruck coloring books, erasers, trading cards, and stickers for each of the kids to take home. Every child received a plastic firefighter helmet with their name on it.

The best part of the party? When our local fire department brought their firetruck right to our house! The firefighter gave all the children a tour of the truck and explained how the different tools worked. It was fridgid cold at the time, but the kids had a blast!

More Fun Ideas for Birthday Cakes:
*Treasure Chest Cake
*Puppy Dog Cake
*Ambulance Cake

Unnecesssary Elective C-Sections- WHY?!?

In case you're thinking of having a c-section just for the fun of it, let me give you a couple reasons of why you should reconsider having a vaginal birth:

Point 1: Does this look like the face of someone who is having a grand old time? Not hardly. It's surgery- not a county fair. It's painful and scary. I know all births are painful and can be frightening, but still, why would anyone want to have their insides on the outsides if they don't need to?

Point 2: Recovery can be much harder and longer than a vaginal birth. My VBAC friends were up and walking after their vaginal births right away. I was up walking later that day, but I did it hunched over and moving very slowly.

Point 3: If you have a vaginal birth, you don't have to worry about watching comedy movies. Let me just say that you do NOT want to watch a funny movie while recovering from a c-section in the hospital! Ouch!

Point 4: See this little guy? He went into respiratory distress within the first hour after birth. My husband and I were so scared about whether he was going to be okay. Unfortunately, this happens somewhat often with c-sections. Most not nearly as bad as my son's case was, but still- have your baby vaginally and you don't have to worry about repository distress due to not getting the fluid out of his lungs.

Point 5: If you are hoping to have more than 10 kids, you're probably going to find that is a little more difficult when you have to have them all c-sections.

If your body can safely handle a vaginal birth, then why not go that route rather than going through surgery and birth? Choosing a c-section if a person knows they (and their child) do not need it- that I truly just don't understand.

Treasure Chest Cake

I made this cake for my oldest son's 4th. pirate themed birthday party.

The cake was pretty easy to make- I baked a sheet cake first, then just cut it up. I bought chocolate buttercream frosting from the bakery section of our grocery store, chocolate coins from a discount toy store, candy necklaces & ring pops from Party Warehouse, and fruit by the foot from the grocer also.

After I baked the sheet cake, I popped it out of the pan after it cooled a little, then stuck it into the freezer. After it had hardened up a bit, I took it out and cut it up to assemble it like a treasure chest. To make it prop open, I used tooth picks on the inside under the lid, (we had to remember to remove these when it was time to eat!). Then I gave it a basic once over with the frosting, then frosted it again w/ the fudge frosting and tried to create some texture to look like wood. I added the fruit by the foot to across the middle, and used black frosting to create details. Then I just stuck the candy coins and jewels inside and voila'! Treasure chest cake completed!

The kids LOVED the candies and were very excited to eat it. There wasn't any cake leftover after the party!

If you'd like detailed instructions on how to make this cake, and many other cool cakes, check out Family Fun's website! The link will take you directly to the page that I used to get the idea to make this cake.

More Fun Ideas for Birthday Cakes:
*Puppy Dog Cake
*Ambulance Cake