This blog is now located at http://motionary.blogspot.com/

london.

our beautiful baby girl is here...



london marie murphy
11.19.09, 4:12 pm
8 lbs, 20 inches


more posts + photos coming soon.
london is doing well, mom is recovering, and everyone needs a little sleep :)

the waiting game

here i am, 5 days past my due date... just waiting. and while i'm beyond excited to meet her, we've waited this long... i can keep on waiting until she's ready :)

photo from this weekend:



i'm sure i'll get some inappropriate comments, but you know what? i don't care :) i think i look amazing. we're both glowing. all of our hard work has paid off, and i'm proud of my body and our baby.

so for now, i'm just trying to keep busy. still working. still enjoying our time together. 2 weekends ago we went to frick park to enjoy the beautiful weather and snap a few shots before sunset. here's the belly in action, 4 days before our due date:



and a family photo:



also some more freezer paper onesies + homemade boppy cover (design matching shower invitations, and room theme):





now i just need to actually work on her quilt. its hard, i've made so many quilts that i've loved, that i feel like the one for our baby has to top those, design wise. its a lot of pressure! i will probably work on that during maternity leave, when i have the time and i can actually reach the sewing machine without her in the way ;) i'm going to do a modern quilt to match the nursery fabrics, possibly with some screen printing or bird stencils (a la boppy cover). then, i might do a vintage quilt. before my dad died, he gave me all of his quilting supplies and some pre-cut fabric squares. he even gave me all the pieces + patterns from my grandmother, so by vintage, i do mean "vintage". i think it will be sweet to give my baby a quilt from her grandparents...

i think its obvious to say at this point, i'm really missing my parents. i wish they were here for this. its so unfair, and i get so emotional now that we're getting so close. i've talked to my dad at the cemetery about this, which, well, isn't quite the same. my mom doesn't know who i am, let alone that i'm pregnant. its hard to go through this life changing event without my parents, but i am so lucky to have ian. he makes dinner, rubs my back... he even gives me pedicures. he's going to be a great dad :)

5 weeks and counting

5 posts in one year... thats kinda sad. in the back of my mind i'm always saying "yea, i need to update my blog", but i hadn't realized how infrequent it had been. i can't promise anything, but we'll see if i can start to get back into the swing of things.

the most obvious event to blog about is our pregnancy. maybe thats why i've been a little hesitant. i announced the good news in may, but didn't really give the back story or follow up on anything. we'll, i'm at 34 1/2 weeks, so we have about 5 1/2 weeks til the due date. for the most part, its been a fairly easy pregnancy. much easier than actually *getting* pregnant.

here we are at 32 weeks:


we had been trying for over a year and a half when i decided to see a fertility specialist. we were officially diagnosed with "unexplained infertility" back in july 2008. that was problem X that i would occasionally refer to in blog posts. we tried 3 cycles of medicated IUIs, with no luck. we tried another IUI with injectables and that didn't work. (at this point i should point out my extreme fear of needles and blood work. i was having bloodwork every week at this point, ian was giving me shots, it was no fun at all). after serious discussion, we decided to try IVF.

the process was much harder and stressful than i thought it would be. i was working FT and going to the doctor before work to get BW + ultrasounds done every other day. ian was giving me shots every night for about 2 weeks, and the 3rd week it was 2 shots a night. i remember laying on the couch one night after the shots, and a baby lotion commercial came on. i just started sobbing and asking how much more i could take. luckily, i responded well to the drugs and developed 13 eggs that were retrieved. 8 fertilized. 3 made it to the day of transfer. 1 little girl is on her way :) based on how hard it was to get pregnant, we kept things quiet for awhile. i'm technically considered "advanced maternal age" at 36. i've been terrified that something would go wrong this whole time. so its been a little hard to blog about. we wanted this for so long, and sometimes its hard to realize that it actually is happening.

everything is going well, and i'm feeling great (except for the nasty cold that just surfaced). we had our shower last weekend and we've been putting all the wonderful gifts in their respective places. i've been washing little blankets and baby clothes. and i've been knitting like crazy. baby sweaters are fun because they knit up quickly, and you can use stash yarn :)

offset wraplan, 3 months:


black cat hoodie:


i also made some freezer paper onesies:


she's already a rockstar :)

three.

i believe the unofficial 6 month hiatus is over. i'm back. enjoying the sun, outdoors, life. all that fun stuff.

and finally... some good news!



poor sydney and tan cat are going to have to share the spotlight with a new little murphy. this little one will be 14 weeks tomorrow. after all the heartache, it truly is a wonderful change in our lives. we've been struggling to make this happen for over 2 years now, and had to rely on modern medicine. i believe my fear of needles is slowly being resolved :)

i'm beginning to believe that maybe every cloud does have a silver lining....

ohiopyling

this past month has been a busy one, and i haven't had the time to post. but, everytime i open up my homepage and see that photo of my dad from the last post... well, its just making me sad, so here goes a quick photo post of our adventures a few weeks ago.

in keeping with our "lets get out and enjoy this fall weather" we went to ohiopyle a few weekends ago. we both had been working heavily during the week, so it was really nice to get away, even if just for the day. it was a fun drive, even with the bad traffic, and the scenery was amazing. we stopped for coffee and had lunch, then made our way over to "downtown ohiopyle" to do a little hiking. we took sydney with us and she enjoyed herself too!

we crossed bridges:


we walked trails:


we hiked rocks + waterfalls:


i snuggled sydney:


and took closeups of ferns:


a good day was had by all. i doubt we'll get another nice (work-free) weekend anytime soon, so i'm happy that we had the chance for our tiny roadtrip. tomorrow we'll be doing a little road-tripping as we drive up to grove city to meet my mom, sister and nephew for lunch. i haven't seen my mom in quite a few weeks, so i appreciate that we're able to meet halfway on a busy weekend so i can spend some time with her.

tonight we're off to another halloween party, so i've got a little transformation to take care of. in the meantime, enjoy this photo of our last celebrated halloween, in 2006. (last year, well, lets just say there was no celebrating going on...)

as hard as i try, i just can't quit him. or his handlebar mustache. a girl has got to be pretty secure in her femininity to dress as a gay cowboy, but i think i rocked it. a few previous years on flickr as well :)



tonights outfit will be a little more dark. photos to follow.

we'll meet again

1 year can go by both quickly and slowly. its been that kind of year. as i've mentioned before, sometimes its the little things. while i miss my dad every day, sometimes, its one little thing that can hit you like a brick and either bring sadness or a smile. it can be the smell of concord grapes, hearing a song from his funeral on a random tv show, or something totally random that only he and i would know about.

theres this one dream that i repeatedly have had this past year, and this is the closest image i can find that matches how he appears. i'm always sitting in our old living room, in the wooden rocking chair, (maybe 2001-2002 ish) and he walks thru the front door wearing his olive green work clothes carrying a paper bag of groceries. no oxygen, no paleness, just healthy and tan. and the sun is shining.

theres not much i can say about today. just that i miss you terribly daddy.



10.10.2007

-------

We'll meet again, don't know where, don't know when,
But I know we'll meet again, some sunny day.
Keep smiling through, just like you always do,
'Til the blue skies drive the dark clouds far away.

2 years and counting

ah, so young... our first photo taken together, sometime in march 2002, during the first trip home to meet my parents.



on the morning of our wedding, ian had to pick up my dad's tux pants in monroeville and drop them off at our hotel. he also brought a dozen krispy kreme donuts (1 boston creme for me) and a hot tea from starbucks, because i had been nursing a horrible chest cold all week. its the little things. i still have that kk receipt, from 8:45am :)

happy 2 years ian :) here's to many more *clink clink*.

ETA: real anniversary photo to make up for ridiculous other photo.