Here We Go...

Alrighty, then, ready or not, here is my new blog address:

www.chaiandmandazi.com

It's not perfect, I may change the layout dramatically, or I may not.  

After driving myself crazy and nearly quitting the entire project out of sheer frustration, I gave up trying to put everything about myself, my life, my past, my present, and my future into a single name and just went with simple and homey.  

Chai?

Well, chai is tea in Swahili, whether plain or with maziwa (milk) and masala spices.  I grew up in East Africa and chai is a daily part of life.  And while I love coffee, I will always be a tea kind of girl.

Mandazi?

Another Swahili word, this time for a triangular shaped fried puffy donut type of thing (no word for it in English that I know of) made with cardamom.  Best served warm, wrapped in old greasy newspaper.

Chai and Mandazi were tea time treats that we would have whenever the lady who made Mandazi knocked on our door with her goods on a giant sufaria (round aluminum tray) perched atop her head.  Or when we would go hang out at our friends' house, whether American or African.

My family's method of eating Mandazi was to bite off one of the three corners and drizzle honey on the inside.  Or after biting the corner off, dipping it in our chai, letting it soak up all the yummy goodness in one bite.

So good.  So simple.  

Chai and Mandazi.  Life doesn't get any better.

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Coming Soon...

A new blog.  Owned totally by me, domain and all.  I'm so excited!

I thought I knew what I was doing, but I didn't so I screwed up the first domain I bought.  Thank goodness for 48 hours to change my mind!  In the end, though, I'm glad for the learning experience because I figured out I hated the domain I chose.  And I learned a ton, like you can't transfer a private domain ever while it is private, and no domain can be transferred within 60 days of purchase.  Something about registration, etc.  Don't even get me started on the steps to self-transferring either, versus paying someone over a hundred dollars to do for me.  It's so complicated.  Ugh.

I *think* I know what I'm doing, now, after staying up until two in the morning the other night, educating myself on the basics of domain ownership.  I hope I do.

And this time I'm taking my time and letting my name choices marinate.  It's such a big decision, like I'm branding myself or something.  And picking a name that encompasses the different facets of my life and writing without sounding generic or blasé is tough enough without throwing in availability.  Seriously, every perfect domain I can think of is already taken.  Shocker.

My naming rules are as follows: 1) short and sweet; 2) The blog name and domain must match; 3) all encompassing but not generic; 4) upbeat.

As soon as I figure out what I want to call my writing space, potentially forever (scary thought!), I will get everything set up with transferring over all my old posts and then give you my new home address.  

Have I mentioned I'm so excited??

Eeek!

(Ignore the continue reading button on this post.  I can't figure out how to make it not show up and this post is not truncated.  The joys of using a Wordpress skin on a Blogspot blog.  :/  Thanks!)

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In Between

I'm not sure where to begin this post.  I suppose with my last.

Yesterday I went through Facebook and deleted a bunch of dead profiles I was friends with, a lot of the husbands whose wives I'm friends with (but whom I don't interact with - the husbands I mean), and people who posted offensive matter consistently (like memes with foul language, etc), and people I had never heard from or who didn't even write on their own walls, etc.  

It amounted to about 200 friends, total.  Mostly acquaintances, actually, or people I haven't had a conversation with in many many years.

Those deletions and my changing feelings towards Facebook in general has me thinking about my blogging life and how nowadays I often lack inspiration to write.  But how I feel I need to write something because otherwise, why have a blog?

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The end of an season

The older I get, the less I like Facebook.

Part of it is the waiver you have to accept - that they can use whatever images you upload for whatever they want.  That alone has me seriously thinking of deleting my account.

Throw in all of the nasty fighting going on in the way of sarcastic memes directed at people in different political parties, of different religions, or different value systems and Facebook has been stressing me out big time.

I am by nature a high stress individual.  I get that.  Worry comes easily to me.  Wanting people to like me is something I too often crave and chase after.  But I also know what I believe and having that attacked, even by people who don't realize they are necessarily attacking me personally - more what I stand for, is not fun.  I don't enjoy the fighting, the bickering; or the inhibitions that the web removes.  I find people are much more willing to be horrible because they aren't doing it to my face or anyone else's.  It's through the guise of being funny, most of the time.  But it is annoying.  It makes me want to delete my account even more.

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Crazy, fun weekend

The weekend started off with a bang for us.  Literally.  

On Friday night, Hubby was giving Z a bath, and as he stood her up to wash her bum, she reached for a toy and fell over.  At first we thought she was fine and just crying because she was scared, as Hubby had seemingly caught her.  But a couple of moments later there was a growing goose egg on her forehead, turning ugly shades of deep blue and purple.  We threw her pjs on her, and still dripping, drove her straight to the ER.  

I have to say, our nearby hospital has an amazing ER.  We were in and out in less than 45 minutes, start to finish.  Z was more traumatized by being checked out by the doctor and several nurses, and cried harder than she did over her head.  Thankfully she was fine!  I think we were more of a wreck than anything and the ER pediatrician spent more time reassuring us than she did on checking Z out.  

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Peace and Freedom

I was pretty nervous yesterday morning as I called our FET nurse to let her know about Bear and our upcoming move, effectively canceling our FET and squashing any hopes for embryo adoption using our current home study.  I was very pleasantly surprised by her reaction, though, which was warmly congratulatory and understanding.  

I don't know what I expected, but I was prepared for her to be upset that we were canceling so late in the game, after she worked so hard to get us added to the September group in the first place.  Instead, she was extremely gracious and genuinely happy for us.  

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I Just Can't Chance It

The past few days of this week have been rather illuminating.  We've made some tough decisions (emotionally), but they were necessary and I think we're both in a good place.

We've decided to stop with our September FET.  Tomorrow I will make the necessary calls to the nurses and doctors involved, and make it official.  We had pretty much come to this conclusion last night, but wanted to give it 24 hours to see if we still agreed.  And we do.  

Our reasons are many and varied, but it comes down to a pregnancy right now being too risky with a newborn, a 900 mile move looming, a necessary and unavoidable cross-country trip to pick up Baby Bear (formerly Kumquat), busy Christmas plans, the end of Hubby's military career imminent, and the millions of details involved with so many life changes happening all at once.

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Boy, Oh Boy, Oh Boy

First off an explanation.

Yesterday I was feeling pretty low and sorry for myself, plus icky because my second cycle of the month of July (yes, the second - ugh, only 20 days apart thanks to the Estrace and Prometrium) started as well.  I took my first bcp in prep for our Sept FET this am.  It's on.  But I don't feel ready.  Even with an upcoming adoption that couldn't be going better, a little one already firmly established in our home, an amazing and loving husband, and all the support and love of my family and friends, I struggle with fear over how we're going to get child number three.

Sounds stupid, I know.  And ungrateful.  

But I'm not.  Not at all ungrateful.  Not in the least.  

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In Case You Were Wondering...

Our Little Miss Z, aka Peanut, has some important news to share after the jump...

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Cranky

It's always rough when my hormones are manipulated during any kind of cycle.  This past month has been no different.

It took me a while to find a brand of bcps that didn't make me sick to my stomach or give me debilitating headaches.  Finally I was able to settle on Lo-Seasonique and once I was on it for a few weeks, my moods evened out.  I ended up with probably the most emotionally calm time I've had since the triplets.  No crazy mood swings or weird side effects that I noticed.  I felt more myself than I have in a long time.

Then July 4th was my last bcp and I've been a hot mess ever since.  Ask anyone who has to be around me for more than five minutes!  I've been having a rough time.

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My Z

I've been rather bad at writing about Z.  

Part of it is hesitation on my part - I'm much more conscious about posting details of her life on the interwebz.  Some of that hesitation is instinctual and stems from wanting to protect her.  Part of it comes out of a respect for her in that her life is her story to tell.  I'll talk about myself all day long and it's fine because I am choosing what to say, what stories to tell, what details to share.  But I don't write personal stuff about my husband or my daughter because you would be getting everything second hand, my point of view of their lives, not their own.  And my point of view is not always correct, or I may talk about stuff they don't want me to.  Plus, my words wouldn't do them justice at all.  Factor in that I spend most of my time running after my toddler and I'm not left with the time to even begin to try to do the two most important people in my life justice when it comes to my writing skills.

Don't get me wrong.  If you talk about your kids or husbands or both, that's fine.  It's just not what I'm particularly comfortable writing about in such a public medium.

So here are some pictures my mom took from the past week instead.  (Which will cross some people's boundaries of comfort in their own lives, but which I feel is fine because I would post these on Facebook.  It's all about levels of comfort.  You have to do what is ok for you and your family.  No judgment whatever you decide.)

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Fish

Hubby started fishing as his main hobby when we moved here last year.  He's been out several times, but has been pretty unlucky in catching anything, other than milkfish (difficult to eat because they have a bazillion bones).

Today, though, he went out early with one of his guys at work and caught this:

Dinner 

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The Back Burner

It's been a loooong day, somewhat emotional, I'm on Estrace AND Prometrium at the moment, and I've had a glass of wine.

I guess that means I am claiming I am not responsible for what I type, or at least not completely.  :)  Just warning ya.

Back to the Prometrium.  Dr. K at NEDC/Southeastern Fertility (SF from here on out) put me on it for 5 days total starting last Tuesday to induce a period since being on Estrace in prep for my medical clearance appointment apparently confuses my body to the point that it doesn't know what day of the month it is any more.

Prometrium is progesterone in a concentrated form, either pill or in oil (PIO) that you have to give yourself in a shot, or even suppository that you have to administer you know where three times a day.  Thankfully I'm on the pill form for now.  Once I start prep for the actual FET in September, I will be on both the pill form and the shot form.  My butt is going to be angry, even more so than previous IVFs, because if my assumption is correct I have at least one PIO a day, perhaps two (??).  I'll get my protocol at the end of August and will know more then how often I'll be shooting up (well, Hubby will be the one administering it).

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Another Zig in the Zag

I've been on a bit of a blogging break, imposed upon me by having to leave for our trip to NEDC two days earlier than planned because Hubby had to swing by a base near his parents for work on Friday.  Which meant we left Thursday instead of Saturday.  And then the internet was not working at the in-laws and I HATE typing posts on my tiny phone.  Thus the radio silence.

In the time I've been missing from the web, several significant events have occurred.

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Small Happenings

I am digesting dinner after a busy day of running errands, and though I need to run, I am looking for ways to procrastinate.  Blogging is perfect for that.  :)

- Took Z to her first dentist appointment.  Our pediatrician had said we were supposed to take her at 1 year and I've been feeling guilty because we didn't.  Found out today that the dentist that takes our insurance doesn't take kids less than 18 months old and Z will be turning 19 months tomorrow, so it all worked out.  

As far as the appointment goes, she didn't do so well.

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De-Friending

Today was the first day since I started using Facebook ages ago that I have ever de-friended someone for their political opinion.  Well, not their political opinion per se, but the way they explained themselves.

I respect anyone's right to post whatever they want to on their wall.  And I expect the same in return.  You don't have to like what I put out there, but you cannot attack me personally for it.  Your choices are to not read what I post, to block me, or unfriend me if you would like.  But you cannot make me silent.  And you are not allowed to take ideological viewpoints that you disagree with and then attack me personally for them.

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26 Seconds

That would be the time I shaved off my 4 miles, or should I say my 4.25 miles.  

(Pic courtesy of here)

I didn't want to run today.  NOT at all.  I am still sore from Saturday.  And I certainly didn't get up early to run, but the sentiment is the same.  I made myself and I'm happy I did.  I always feel better about my physical self when I do, which is pretty much all the motivation I need.  

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Nesting??

It's the only word I can think of to describe my compulsion to get rid of crap, pare down our belongings, organize our lives, and gaze with longing at strollers and travel high chairs on Amazon.

But organizing and tossing whatever is "not beautiful" or "not necessary," or a combo of those two, to our everyday lives is a bit like I would imagine walking through a pool filled with molasses might be.  

It is hard work and at times can be downright discouraging.  Especially because I am a notorious packrat.  But this packrat is turning into somewhat of a minimalist because I have hit my limit of holding onto memories with things.

I put stuff in one box that we haven't used in years, like our cappuccino machine, and Hubby walks by and takes it out.  Neither of us are any good at choosing between our many bookshelves of books.  And I feel guilty about giving away any wood carvings or other stuff from Africa, Asia, or wherever else we've been and/or lived.  

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Carpe Diem

First Post-Surgery run.  No headache so I carp-ed the diem.

52 minutes, 4 miles, 2% incline (accidentally - won't happen again for a while).

Interval training = the way to go, for me at least.

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Headache, Go Away, Don't Come Back Another Day

I've always been plagued by awful headaches.   I get them from stress or eating foods I'm allergic to.  Allergies complicate matters.  Hormones beginning or ending complicate matters. They get much worse in hot and humid climates, thus my HUGE objection to the Air Force moving us to Florida, Headache Central in my opinion.  But this is where we are living for a time and I keep telling myself that the pains I get in my head are just temporary.

Lately, though, I've gone from a couple a month to nearly every day, once again.  I had this issue back when I didn't know I had a tumor in my head and since surgery last summer and over Christmas, they abated for the most part.  Now that it's summer, though, the barometric pressure is constantly changing from the afternoon storms, while the heat and humidity continue to skyrocket.  My head, in the meantime, threatens to explode.

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