{Gnome Garden}

I had to make my gnome a ladder to climb up the tree stump. All I did was break sticks and hot glue them to twine!

 

As winter is approaching upon us quick (too quickly actually) in South Dakota, I realized that I never posted about my gnome garden. While the fair garden boxes seem to be a big trend this year, I went for the gnomes. We have a large tree stump sitting in our yard, so I decided a gnome garden would beautify it. While I purchased some of the times at retail stores, I did find A LOT of the items at rummage sales. Just think of all the fun you can have doing this! 

The mini-stump house is a candle holder I painted & the beads are for vases to form water.

Beer/soda bottle caps made for an excellent entry way to the wood house I found at a garage sale for $.50.

Autumn Mug Swap

Check out Jessah's awesome blog where this photo came from!

My friend Jessah over at Dreaming of Dimples is such a positive inspiration to me on my fertility journey. She always has this silver lining, not to mention a gorgeous blog (which I'm completely jealous of because of its great design!).
I wanted to share this Autumn Mug Swap she's putting together.

How it works.
This swap is open to all bloggers and instagrammers (in the US).
If you'd like to participate, just leave a comment on this post with your blog name or Instagram name AND your email address. The last day to sign up will be Oct 31st.
Swapping.
On Nov 1st, check back to find out who your swap buddy will be. After matches are posted, you will contact the person you're matched with, swap addresses and mail out your mugs.

Shopping.
You can choose a cute, pretty, inspiring, or fun mug from one of your favorite stores. I've seen super cute mugs lately at Pier One, Anthropologie, Home Goods, Target, Etsy, and Starbucks. The mug must be new and something you'd like to receive. The max price you should spend on the mug is $15 but you can spend less. If you find a mug for less than $15, you can include a card, some treats or other small gifts in the package as well. 

Sharing.
On Nov 20th, I will host a link up where bloggers can share their mugs so we can see all of the happiness that was spread. For Instagrammers, you can post your new mug package images on IG using the hashtag #autumnmugswap
Why November 20th?
According to Bizarre and Unique holidays, it is a Beautiful Day. A day created to share in the beauty all around us. What a perfect day to share the happiness we received from a fellow blogger or instagrammer.

Now, go over to Jessah's blog and sign up!

Sprinkle Bomb Cookies

Whenever I'm in the mood for a sweet treat, I usually want something quick and easy.  Cookies are always a crowd pleaser,  so today I made some Sprinkle Bomb Cookies.  I was inspired after seeing some in the mall.  I thought these would be fun for a birthday, any holiday, or anything special like having free time before noon on a Sunday.

I have a confession: these are the easiest cookies.

Ingredients:
1 box yellow cake mix 
2 eggs
1/2 cup oil
Dash of vanilla (optional)
Sprinkles

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350.
2. Poor sprinkles into a bowl. Keep sprinkles to the side. 
3. Mix all ingredients except sprinkles.  You may need a touch more oil if your batter is very dry. It can be a bit dry, so I do recommend adding the vanilla to the batter.
4. Once fully mixed, take a spoonful of batter and roll into a ball. 
5. Drop the ball into bowl of sprinkles.  Roll in sprinkles until covered. 
6. Place sprinkle covers dough on a greased cookie sheet and gently and lightly flatten cookie.
7. Bake for 12 minutes.  
8. Enjoy!

Rock bottom.

I don't know how fertility nurses do it. Half of their job is to deliver you bad news. I guess it must be the half that provides hope.

I got the call with about 30 minutes left in the day.
Another one of our test results came in off the deep end of the spectrum. 
It came back to far on the bad side that they said our chances of IVF success rate were not high enough and they wouldn't recommend doing it.

Luckily we have a great doctor and nurse combination that didn't make me feel like my world was crashing down. Luckily I was at work and had to keep myself together.

Luckily I waited until I go into my car to cry. I had to tell my husband the terrible results and terrible news. The poor guy has been through so much in his life, losing both parents before age 25, that I felt twice the heart break. He has thick skin because he's been through so much. Skin so thick that I told him and he just went on about his day. He's so much stronger than I am in this area that I feel bad crying and getting upset about it in front of him.

I looked all around and felt alone. No one wants to hear about sadness. No one wants to hear about infertility. 

I got these terrible results that I had to hold inside (and share on here because let's face it, I don't have any followers). I felt like the grim reaper walking around. I shared the information with one friend who lives across the country and she managed to understand and had flowers delivered to me. 

It's one of those times that you really find out who your friends are, the quality friends: the ones that can look you in the eye and know that something is wrong; the ones that will soak up your tears, the ones that will bring you a bottle of wine and say let's cry this thing out together, the ones that will bring over your favorite movie for a laugh, the ones that are across the country and still send you a hug over the phone--it's those ones that count.

Maybe this is my silver lining--finding out who's real.

As I throw myself this pity party and my cup of coffee catches my tears, I tell myself to get over it and stop feeling bad for myself. I try to run away from this ominous rain cloud and into the sunshine.

Maybe now I can spend the rest of my life traveling the world, living carefree on an adventure.
Maybe now I can start my own business and work those long hours establishing myself without worrying about missing out on my kid's events.
Maybe not I can workout and get into great shape.

The maybes fulfill me for a brief time before my world crashes down on me.
I need time to grieve. I need to process this experience. Most of all, I need to move on.

Kid's Room Banner

Banner love. Banner happy. 

Call it what you will, but I have it.

After making my "Welcome" burlap banner, it dawned on me the number of banners you could make.

Weddings, parties, and bedrooms...oh my!

I tried to contain my self and make a banner that someone would use.

My sister just had a baby so I couldn't think of anyone more fitting for this project.

I apologize that the picture isn't the best, but here you go!

If you need directions refer to my Burlap Bunting tutorial for the details, but remember this is yours so make it your own.
Here's a bit better picture.

High five {Fridays}

The five things I'm loving this week:

1. 1. Junk Bonanza. Absolutely the most fun and creative event I've ever been to in my life. So many inspirations and ideas there. To top it off, everyone had a smile on their face, all for the love of junk.
2. My fam. Jay is the best guy. Always there. Always keeps me grounded, but isn't afraid to let me dream a bit with my head in the clouds. Always my voice of reason.
3. FGL. Florida Georgia Line puts on a great show. I went last night and it was exactly what I needed after the week I've had. Thank God for good friends who will dance the heal off their boots with you!
4. "Someday it's gunna make sense," seems to be my new mantra lately or so I keep trying to engrave that idea in my head.
5. South Dakota traffic. Talk about a beautiful sky. There's something special about being in the middle of no where; it makes you feel as if you're really part of something bigger.

One test, ten steps back

All it took was one test.
One test's bad results rocked my world.
Two days before the doctor's only option for us was insemination. While I was trying to stomach the idea that the various types of insemination were our only options, I was also a bit hopeful because we had options.

We had options for two days. Two days of hope, excitement, uncertainty, and feeling like we were moving forward.

Then we got one test result that was bad. It was so bad that the doctor wouldn't move forward with us. We're again, stuck in limbo. We'd done these very same tests months ago and everything came back normal. With the specific test, which I'm going to remain nameless, we came back at 6% and normal is 40%. My heart literally sunk and I swallowed the tears as I'm frantically writing notes onto a sheet of paper while the doctor was explaining everything to me. I was too caught up in getting the facts to cry.

My husband comes home for lunch and we talk about the results. I remain calm because he's always calm and relaxed about everything. He leaves to go back to work and I lose it. I can't pull myself together to face the world. I just want to curl up in a ball and get away from it all. I want to hop on a plane and go to some far away exotic island where I can be too wrapped up in island life to worry about it all. But I can't.

Retest in two weeks and again in eight weeks.

This is going to be the longest time in my life. I can't even think about dealing with the sincere question of how the "whole baby thing" is going.

To top it off, work isn't the best.

When it rains it pours I guess.
Until it stops, I'll be waiting for that rainbow after the rain.

Katie

Unexplained Infertility itself is a journey. It makes you step back and really look at the important things in your life. It also makes you hurt and think of all the things you would change about your past. It makes you hurt and have to tackle each day with that same painful smile on your face. It makes you busy trying to distract yourself. It makes you lonely.

The worst thing it does: it makes you put a price tag on a child.

After our RE appointment, the choices she recommended were exciting. They were exciting until we got to the details. Calculating how much it was going to cost and calculating how far we could or would be willing to go with our modest incomes.

The excitement of starting next cycle wore off as soon as the price tag was put on.

What am I doing? Am I so selfish that I would spend our live savings to maybe have a baby. The maybe is key. There are no guarantees. There's no money back. There's no tears back either. As if infertility isn't stressful enough, you just go ahead and top it with crazy big doctors bills.

As in all things in life, the choices make it hard.

I don't think there is a right or wrong in this. I think there's heartache either way.
There's pain and anger.
There's excitement and fear.

How do you share something like this? If we move forward, how do we tell people? What do we say when people say, "I can't believe you finally got pregnant!"? How do we respond? Is it a simple smile and thanks or is it something like, "Yeah..we worked really hard with our team of doctors to get this, it's truly a gift." I know I'm jumping way ahead of myself, but those are the things going on in my mind.

If you've done this, please leave a comment and offer advice.