Gone

A month ago, I found out that we lost our baby.  I thought I was being paranoid, going to the doctor over a little spotting, but as the ultrasound tech struggled to find a heartbeat, I realized that all my fears and worries over the last week had merit.

I found out I was pregnant in mid-January early one Sunday morning.  I had been exhausted for the previous few weeks, and I had this feeling that my body was working overtime.  I was so excited to see "pregnant" pop up on the test almost immediately.  I was about 6 weeks along.  We told immediate family and a couple close friends, and then the research began.  I read about the baby's growth and development, what to expect, birthing methods, all sorts of stuff.  Surprisingly, I wasn't sick.  I had occasional nausea in the evenings, but nothing a little zofran couldn't fix.  I had to quickly stop all my medications for my migraines since they weren't good for the baby, so I had a week of higher pain, but after that the raging hormones and chaos in my body helped my migraines settle down. Besides the exhaustion, I was feeling pretty good.  Every once in a while, I would get a little concerned that something was wrong because I kept reading that morning sickness usually signified a healthy pregnancy, but I always shook it off.

We had a nickname for the baby.  We talked about girl names and boy names, and my parents began to think of what our kids would call them.  I called my father-in-law "octo-paw," since our nieces and nephews call him Gpaw and our little one would be his eighth grandkid.  My mum started crocheting adorable baby stuff.  I had found a bunch of sewing patterns for clothes and diaper bags and changing stations - I was pumped for another great excuse for a whole lotta craftiness. Then, just shy of 8 weeks, we finally got to see little one!

The best part was hearing the heartbeat - it was strong!  Our baby was healthy, and I could not be happier.  What I didn't know was that a week later, that little heart stopped beating.  There was no pain, no bleeding, nothing to tell me that our baby had passed away.  The next week, I was worrying a lot about miscarriage.  I had no reason to think it would happen to me, but I guess some part of me knew that the baby was gone.  Then there was some spotting.  I had had little bits of spotting before, but this time I freaked out.  After talking with some doctor friends, we decided to wait until Monday and see the doctor then to check things out.  I desperately hoped and prayed that the baby was healthy.

I got in to see the doctor first thing Monday morning.  The ultrasound tech brought up a picture, and I could see our little one on the screen.  I was so happy to see that little bean, I could even see the outline of a sweet little nose growing.  Then came the bad news.  There was no heartbeat.  From measuring the baby, the doctor said it had stopped growing a week earlier.  It was a missed miscarriage.

I was in a daze.  I went home and held my nephews tight.  The two-year-old was especially cuddly, as if he knew I needed a little extra sweetness.  I didn't want to tell anyone, that would make it real.  But we began letting family know that we lost the baby.   We had talked early on in the pregnancy about whether or not to tell people, but Jeff and I both thought that it was worth telling family and close friends because they were our support network in case something went wrong.  Looking back, I'm so glad that was our decision.  They celebrated the highs with us, and when the lows came, they gathered around us and covered us with love and support and prayer.  I was especially glad to be living with family at that point - they helped me feel normal.  The boys still wanted to play and snuggle, which helped take my mind off things and reminded me to be thankful for what I did have.

A few days later, still having not passed anything, I had a D&C.   The procedure and recovery process went smoothly, from a physical standpoint.  I hated it though, knowing that it was the last day I would carry our first child.

Things have mostly gone back to normal at this point.  I still miss carrying our child, and I'm still heartbroken about it.  I think I always will be.  I wish I didn't know what it was like to lose a baby.  I never thought this was something that would happen to me.  I knew it was pretty common to miscarry, especially in the first trimester.   But I am thankful that I got to see its little face and hear its heartbeat.  And I'm truly thankful for the 8 weeks and 6 days that I got to carry our sweet baby.

Lake Texoma

Several weeks ago, Jeff and I went on our first camping trip of the year!  It was a short trip - we left on Friday around noon and got back about the same time on Saturday.  We went up to Lake Texoma, which straddles the Texas-Oklahoma border.  It was also probably the shortest hike in to a campsite we've done so far, only about half a mile, but we found a great camping spot (or so we thought) and didn't want to pass it up.

Friday was just a gorgeous day!  It was warm enough to hike and walk around in shorts and a tshirt.  After going up and down several steep hills, we found a path along the drop-off that led down to the lake shore.  There was a rocky surface that was relatively flat - perfect for the tent! - which dropped off as well.  It was roughly 30 feet from the edge of the water.  We had a great view of the lake, and it was quite, and far enough off the path that we wouldn't be bothered by other people.  In fact, many people didn't even see us down there, we gave them a fright when we yelled hi...  We set up the tent and then Jeff began collecting firewood while I blew up the camping pads.

Jeff, of course, loves his camping saw.  After an hour or so, we had a pretty good pile of firewood, so we grabbed the hammock and took a little nap.  Definitely scared some runners from the hammock - we were apparently well camouflaged.  As the sun was setting, we got a fire going and enjoyed a nice hot meal while watching the sun set.

working on the firewood

we love our Eno double nest - perfect for napping by the lake :)

surprise!

Now, when we were getting ready to go to sleep, I started to hear some noises.  Coyotes, apparently.  That freaked me out a little since it was the first time I could hear larger wild animals being somewhat close by.  Nothing happened with that, but I did feel pretty vulnerable, having nothing but a measly tent separating me from the coyotes.

The real issue became apparent around 2:30 am.  This is when the wind all of a sudden picked up.  Not a breeze, but 15-20 mph gusts, right off the lake.  Since we were on the shore, we had no protection from the wind.  (Next time, we're back in the woods.)  The noise didn't bother us much, but the huge drop in temperature did.  We had checked the weather before we left - it was supposed to get down to the high 40s.  Well, at 3am, it was 40, with the wind chill making it more like 30.  It felt every bit of below freezing.  Our bags are rated for 30 degrees, but neither of us could get warm.  I had long johns on, and put on sweats on top of that - no joy.  There wasn't much sleep to be had from that point on.  The wind didn't die down either, it was still freezing the snot out of our noses as we rushed to start a fire and eat some oatmeal and pack up camp.  We decided not to stick around since we were miserably cold and rain was moving in.  I couldn't feel my fingers or my hands again until about 15 minutes into the car ride home.

the wind blew the fire sideways all morning... it was pretty miserable out

dinosaur eggs for breakfast!!!!! haven't had these since I was reaaaaaally young...

Even with the rough night/morning, it still was a fun trip for us, and we were glad to get a chance to break out the camping gear and spend some one on one time together.

10 Years

10 years ago today, we found out that my dad had cancer.  The following 8 months were some of the most difficult of my life, but throughout the whole ordeal, my dad would tell us that every day was a bonus day, something that we should be thankful for.  Today, my dad is healthy (and running 12 miles at the moment...), and enjoying all the adventures the last 10 years has brought him.  Today, we celebrate 10 years of bonus days! Here's to many more :)

The Gingerbread Extravaganza

When my family started planning for Christmas holidays this year, the topic of gingerbread houses came up.  In the past, my dad has helped make some really cool ones, like the hobbit hole that he made with our cousins.  What started as a joke about making Lonely Mountain (clearly, there's a theme here - we're big Hobbit fans), turned into an actual plan to make Lonely Mountain and the lake and Laketown with the dwarves coming down the river in barrels.  So not just any gingerbread house, but an extravagant gingerbread scene.  It wasn't a quick process - it took the better part of a week - and there were many people involved.  In the end though, it looked pretty awesome!!!

It started off with a big tabletop and rice krispies sculpted and molded into the shape of Lonely Mountain.  Also molded out of rice krispies were the rocky hills by the mouth of the river and the head of Smaug, which was then covered in chocolate.  The lake was made out of crushed jolly ranchers, which were melted in the oven and then sealed together with extra jolly rancher powder and a propane torch.

putting Smaug onto the pipe

After that, my mother made some marshmallow fondant to cover Lonely Mountain and the hills. Then we used Rolos and more fondant to make the dwarves in the barrels.

dwarves in progress!  The one in the back has its legs sticking out

Once all of the lake pieces were sealed together, we made Hollywood glass (sugar glass) to pour on top of it to make it even and less sticky.  At first, it was glassy and reflective, but it ended up becoming super sticky later on.  Humidity maybe?  We had to be really careful while pouring out the molten sugar since it could burn us badly.  It also hardened a lot fast than we anticipated, making the spreading difficult.  The Hollywood glass also turned the lake kind of green.  Not what we were expecting!

making the Hollywood glass

Then it was time to make the gingerbread houses!  We cut out the pieces, and then they were glued together with royal icing and set aside to be decorated.

Then, I got to decorate Lonely Mountain with gold coins (butterscotch wafers sprayed with metallic paint) and decorate the arch welcoming the dwarves into Laketown.

Next came the bridge into Laketown, which would also cover the wires and the battery pack for the LED lights we were putting beneath the houses.  Once the bridge was built, we laid out the position of the houses with toothpicks and set graham crackers on top of the lights to hold them in place until the houses were finished.

Then it was time for the houses!!!  My older sister had a couple of her fellow PhD students over to help decorate, and they did a great job!  My sister's house had a deck and a hot tub out back, one of the other houses had a big face on it, and a third house had a circular window cut out with a candy man sticking out of it.  My house was the last to go on, and it had a little porch and a ladder going down to a canoe molded out of a tootsie roll.  We laid a little floating path between the houses and cut up some Swedish fish to look like they were jumping out of the lake.

This is what it looked like in the end!!!

The final touch was to make smoke come out of Smaug's mouth.  This was done with some tubing, tupperware, and dry ice.  It looked really cool!  Of course, we couldn't just leave it at that...  Since we had a filmmaker staying with us, there had to be a video!  Sadly, I missed out on this last bit of fun (and on eating the thing!) since it happened just after we left for Texas.  Overall though, it was a really fun process!  An extravaganza for sure :)

2013 Smaug from Joe Winston on Vimeo.

A New Chapter

Last semester ended in stretch of insanity.  Over the final 3 weeks of the semester, I had over 60 pages of writing to turn in, in addition to finishing up classes and 5 final exams.  Once all the school craziness had finished, we immediately began packing up our apartment and selling off all of our furniture.  Somewhere in there Christmas shopping had to happen, and we spent most of the week around Christmas at my parents' house hanging out with family and friends and building an extravagant gingerbread scene (more on that later).  We then packed the rest of our belongings into our car and my sister-in-law's car, whose husband had driven out with Jeff's other brother-in-law to help us move our things across the country.  We drove to Nashville first, stayed the night, and then drove the rest of the way the next day, arriving just outside of Dallas just in time to watch the Eagles beat the Cowboys for the divisional title.  This Eagles fan was very excited!

So why all this craziness?  When we found out last summer that my father-in-law had cancer, I decided to load up on classes so I could take my final two classes in the spring online.  This would give us the freedom to go out to Texas and spend time with Jeff's family, helping out wherever we were needed.   Thankfully, my father-in-law is doing much better now, and is c recovering from a bone marrow transplant.  A lot of things just fell into place once we decided to move forward with this plan, for instance, Jeff found a replacement at work and had several months to train him, and our lease would run out right when we were planning on leaving.  The only major thing that could derail the plan at that point was if I didn't pass all of my classes.  Taking 6 was a huge stretch for me.  My migraines got worse with all the extra work, but it somehow all got done.  My final semester of college would be two online classes, Fundamentals of Music and Introduction to American Art History.   These two classes are all that stand between me and graduation in May!

So now we're in Texas.  We don't know how long for, but right now we're just enjoying the time we have with family and settling in to a new chapter of life.  With such a small load, I have more time to do the things I enjoy, like reading books for fun and working on hand-lettering.  I'm really excited about the time I have to spend with my adorable nieces and nephews too!  I never thought I'd live in Texas, especially just outside of Dallas, but it's shaping up to be quite the adventure.

farewell to Carrboro!

Campfire Worship

If you look up the Rend Collective Experiment on YouTube, you'll find a lot of pretty fun folk rock worship music.  Their music and vision inspired our college ministry's leadership team to put on a night of worship for the local college ministries. One of our church members has this fantastic property (often used for weddings) and generously allowed us to use it for our event.  It was a cold night, so we had a big fire going, outdoor heaters, and lots of hot apple cider.  It was such a fun night!! The music was great, the atmosphere was beautiful, it could not have gone better.

the inside of the pavilion

some of my sweet friends in the college ministry, Shelby, Keely, Grace, and Liz

my dear friend Alace

with Gemma and my younger sister

Fall Break

Jeff and I had lofty plans for fall break this year - we were going to go to the State Fair on that Thursday, and then we were going to head towards the coast to spend a few days camping.  Unfortunately, two days before break I found myself on the floor, unable to get up without Jeff picking me up.  I had somehow strained the muscles in my back, and I was in a whole lot of pain.  So we decided that since I couldn't carry a pack, we would postpone the camping until another weekend.  Instead, we hung out with my family, went to the State Fair on Friday, and I got to go to a fantastic  conference with a good friend of mine on Paul Miller's book A Praying Life.  It wasn't the break  I had expected, but it was fun and relaxing.  Given my school schedule over the next month, I especially needed that.

Jeff got to hang out in an old helicopter

An ent! Climbing over a power scooter too...

Deep fried pumpkin pie.  Yes.  It was delicious.

One of the sweet college ministry girls decorated this cake and won honorable mention for the amateur cake decorator division! 

This is Mary.  She's our college minister's wife.  She also has a PhD and teaches chemistry. She is one of the coolest people EVER.  Here, she's demonstrating what happens to a balloon when you put it in liquid nitrogen at a chemistry booth at the State Fair.

our view from the Ferris Wheel

And of course, gotta have a picture to celebrate two years since Jeff proposed!  Love my husband :)