Our Twins Turn 3!

November 11 is always a big day for us.  It's Kira and Isak's birthdays!  I can't believe they are three.  We opened presents first thing in the morning.  They each got two presents and one to share.  Isak got a Hot Wheels track that he loves and a Mickey Mouse piano book set.  Kira got lots of princesses with clip on dresses and an electronic pad with princess books.  Sadly Kira didn't like her princesses.  I felt awful!  She rarely plays with them and when she does, she only plays for a few minutes.  :(  Maybe she will like them later.

We met Nels for lunch at Iceberg and ate some yummy food, including a shake.

We went to the library afterwards.  Then Nels's parents came to visit.  They gave the kids a huge alphabet puzzle mat.  Donna helped them make bean bags and they played together.  After Nels came home we all went to Two Jacks for pizza.  Kira was so tired she was falling asleep while eating her sucker.

So Isak and Nels thought it would be funny to pretend sleep.  :)

Before their birthday's we had talked about cakes and what kind of cake they wanted.  Luckily, they both requested the same flavor...rainbow.  But they insisted they each get their own cake.  They were very concerned about sharing one cake. haha.  Especially when candles are involved.

Oh boy, it was so cute watching them with the candles.

They waited patiently for the song...

And then blew out the three candles.

They even watched each other do it.  They blew them out at least three times each.  :)

It was a fun day and we are sure happy to have these two in our family!!!

Fertility Story

As many of you probably already know, we are pregnant with twins!  We are due in May and we are having a girl and a boy again.  We are thrilled.  So I wanted to write a little about our last fertility journey.  It's so much shorter than our last one!  The first one was 8 or 9 years long and this one happened so quickly that I am still a little surprised I am pregnant right now.  haha.  Not a lot of pictures for this post though. 

So we just moved to Provo the end of June and beginning of July.  I barely had the boxes unpacked when I had this crazy idea...hopefully inspiration from God and not just my own craziness.  :)  But I felt like we should start trying to grow our family.  And we needed to do it soon.  To be more specific, I felt like we should have the babies in May!  I told Nels and he was on board.  We wanted to be done having kids before we are too old.  haha.  And I didn't want to be in the middle of another move(since this position will probably only be for 2-3 years) and trying for another baby or being pregnant.  Anyways, we felt like we needed to do it right away.  

So when I got back from our trip to Idaho, I looked up fertility doctors.  And guess what?!  There was a clinic 5 minutes from our house.  I was so happy to have one so close because I knew we would have to go often.  It's a small clinic so I was able to make an appt right away.  I filled out paperwork and got my records transferred.  

Before the scheduled appt that was the following week, I  dropped off the paperwork to their office on July 28th.  The IVF coordinator was there and she just sat down on the couch with me and answered all of my questions!  I was impressed.  During the conversation she realized I needed to be seen right away so we could have a May baby.  So she gave me an appt as soon as possible.  Good thing too, because an appt any later and we wouldn't have been able to do the tests we did on the first visit. 

Our first appt was July 30th.  Luckily, Nels was able to come.  I was expecting just a visit and talking about what to do.  But because of where I was in my cycle we did all of the pre-tests that day.  

The next step was to get our embryos from Memphis to here.  We had to get a statement of consent signed and notarized to transfer the embryos.  We did that July 31st.  We used Cryoport to ship our embryos.  They arrived August 19.  Yay!

Once my period started, we began the prep work for transferring the embryos.  It wasn't too bad.  Just a blood test and a few ultrasounds.  Then a shot a few days before the transfer.  I also had to daily shots of progesterone that go in the backside near my hips for about 12 weeks or so.  Those are not so fun and I am very happy to not do them anymore.  Finally, September 3 at 11:45 a.m. we did our transfer.  

So how many did we transfer?  After talking with the embryologist and doctor, learning one was better quality than the other, and with a frozen cycle we had a 16% chance of having twins...and they recommended it...we transferred 2!

Then the waiting began!  I had a blood test appt for Monday Sept. 14.  But of course, I couldn't stand it and I took a pregnancy test Saturday, Sept. 12th.  And it was POSITIVE!  I was actually shocked because I had pretty much convinced myself I wasn't pregnant.  So when it was positive I was so surprised and happy.  

October 1st was our first ultrasound.  We were so excited and nervous.  The day was a little crazy though because Isak and Kira were both super sick.  Kira was throwing up.  Our appointment was at 3 pm and both of them fell asleep for naps.  So Nels came home and "watched" them while I went to the appt.  Thank goodness for technology.  We face timed the appointment so Nels could see and ask questions too.  What a special moment, seeing our babies for the first time.  

Yes, twins!  I remember feeling giddy and excited and I couldn't stop smiling as I looked at the monitor.  Our doctor talked about one baby, the heart rate  etc.  and at that point Nels could not wait--"Are there two? Or just one?"  Our doctor became a little flustered (he later explained to me that he was wanting to "surprise" us. But Nels jumped the gun.  haha.) and said, "Yes there are two."  And then he continued the measurements for both babies.

When I got home from the appointment, both kids were just waking up.  We showed them the ultrasound pictures and said, "we are having two babies."  Isak immediately threw himself on the floor and wailed, "No!"  Kira asked sweetly, "another baby like Kira?" I think Isak's reaction was due to being sick and just waking up because he is handling it pretty well.  He'll even pat my tummy and say "Hi, babies."  :)

So there you have it!  About a month and a half and we became pregnant with twins.  I am so grateful it all went well so far, so good.  Here are a few prego pics.

I am only 10 weeks here, but at the time I felt so huge.  haha... Now at 28 weeks I am definitely huge.

After an ER scare (always, have to have one those right?)  we were sent to a high risk specialist for a workup.  The ultrasound tech took this picture of the babies.  It's my favorite.

This is fifteen weeks.

And boom... here's twenty!  Definitely grew with all the yummy December treats.  haha. 

26 weeks.  

And that's all the prego pics.  I am 28.5 weeks right now.  Yes, I even count halves. haha.  So happy to be to this point, but I am counting down.  :)  Pregnancy definitely isn't a piece of cake...speaking of cake that was one of the things I craved.  Chocolate cake.  And I indulged.  Anyways, props to all you  women who go through pregnancy again and again.  Hopefully, this story wasn't too boring.  I love to read other peoples stories so thought I would share ours :)

October Wrap Up

Here's the random pictures from October.

Both kids get so excited when they see water holes for some reason...Kira was ecstatic when she found a purple one!  She had to stand on it and sing her "Twinkle Star" song.

We went to Red Robin for Nels's free bday burger.  He loves his burgers!

Silly Isak.  haha.

One day they put together all of the puzzles we have and lined them up.  (I helped line the puzzles up) And then we took a picture.  They were pretty proud of themselves.  I was happy too, because I got to do something else while they worked on the puzzles.  :)

One day I found that Kira had done some matching/sorting.  As you can see in the picture below, Kira placed blue toys on the blue color section of the puzzle and so on.  I was pretty impressed because she did it all on her own!

We went out on a little playgroup outing to the Bean Museum at BYU.  The kids did well, so afterwards they all sat on the bench outside the museum and ate a snack.

Nels's spray painting tractor costume project.

This was Kira's first reaction when I put the bumblebee costume on her.  She actually does this with everything new that I buy her.  She has a hard time with change.

But after ten or fifteen minutes she was happy and smiling and singing on top of the stairs.  Isak wanted to sing too, but Kira was being a little possessive of the stairs.

Here's Isak trying on his tractor to see if it fits.

We went to the Halloween party at church.  Isak was so happy with his tractor and kept it on the whole time.

Kira did well too.  They both really like their buckets.  Especially when there is candy in it.

One day we went to the library and the kids noticed the bike racks.  They played on them for a good while!

They stood on them, and went under them and they even figured out how to swing on them.

My mom made this cute apron for Kira!  I had taken her shirt off to eat...ketchup...and she asked to wear her apron.   So that's why she doesn't have a shirt on.  :)

Working on the peg puzzle together.  These moments are sweet, but they don't last too long.

Haha.  Isak being silly at meal time.

And Kira being cute.

Last year church was at 1 p.m.  For a couple of Sunday's, Kira would fall asleep for the last two hours of church instead of going to nursery.  Sometimes going to church is tough when you are little.  :)

When the kids were still doing preschool I would get two hours to myself!  Ah!  I have to admit, it was really nice.  One of the times they were at preschool, I decided to go hiking up the mountain behind our house.    

It was so nice to be out in nature and see the fall colors starting to emerge.

The trail and area is called Slate Canyon.

I don't know why, but I like to take pictures of shoes/feet.  So here are my hiking shoes.

Fall is here.

And that's the view looking over the Provo area.  Beautiful.

And that wraps up October.  It's always a fun month with birthdays, fall activities and halloween.  

Happy Halloween!

I really enjoy all of the fall fun.  Pumpkins, crinkly leaves, apples, the colors and even though it is a bit of a pain and stressful the costumes and trick or treating.  

I took a few pics with the kids in their fall outfits.  Isak gave me this great smile. :)

It was a little bright outside, so my timing wasn't that great.

Playing with the one little tree in the front yard.

Fifty pictures (or close to it!) later and I was still getting this from them...

With a little bribery I got this.

AND Finally they are both looking at the camera and smiling!!

For Halloween this year, my sister Melissa invited us to go with her family and my other sister Mandi's family.  It was so fun to be with family.  Even though it was a short drive both kids fell asleep holding their Halloween buckets.

After eating some yummy chili and rolls we got the kids in their costumes.  This year for costumes, my sister Kari let us borrow her daughters adorable bumble bee costume for Kira.  I had no idea what to do for Isak.  So one day while we were eating I explained Halloween and costumes and asked him what he wanted to be.  He thought for a second and then excitedly yelled, "A Tractor!" Oh, okay!  I looked up ideas online and he was pretty excited.  So we got to work.  Nels cut the box and painted it.  I put it together and bought him a flannel shirt.  He loved it!! I think it turned out pretty cute too.

Although he couldn't sit down in it.  :)

I love how happy he is!

And even Kira is happy too.

The kids caught on quickly of how this getting candy thing worked.  And boy did they have fun!

It was a memorable halloween.