Going Great

The sonogram today went well. The heart rate had increased to 132 and the baby is measuring 7 weeks, 4 days. The official due date is April 27, 2015. Thanks for your prayers! We could still use more since the low progesterone may or may not be a bad sign, but so far everything is looking great.

Heartbeat

What a nerve-wracking wait in the reception area at the doctor's office today. Although I tried to remain emotionless I was pretty stressed about what was about to happen. How do you prepare yourself for what will either be one of the happiest moments or one of the saddest moments of your adult life? I don't think you really can.

We finally got brought back and the tech said something to the effect of, "Well, let's see what kind of a start we have. Unfortunately you've been through this before." It wasn't sounding positive already. I did appreciate her honesty and her not getting our hopes up. She went ahead and got started and I immediately saw the amniotic fluid. She was zoomed out quite a bit so I couldn't tell if I could see a little white spot or not. Then when she zoomed in closer, I could tell there was definitely something there. She said she could see a flicker of a heartbeat. I was still in disbelief that we were getting positive news. I asked if it was a bad sign that the amniotic sac wasn't perfectly round. She said that didn't cause her any concern at all. She told us that the heart rate was low. It was 105 and the baby was measuring right at 6 weeks, which is about what I expected. As I had suspected due to slight pressure on that side, the baby is on the left side (same as Myelle, but none of the other three pregnancies). She said that the doctors don't get too positive until they see a heart rate of at least 110 so I would need to come back for another scan in a week or two. So right now, we are cautiously optimistic. I think I will remain cautious until we hit about 14-16 weeks just because of the low progesterone. I am SO glad I asked to get put on the supplements last week rather than waiting. They may have saved this pregnancy.

I am finding myself not being as cautious as I would like to though as I keep thinking about the future... where the baby will sleep, what we will need to buy, whether we will find out the gender beforehand (Brett votes yes but I vote no), how we will ever pick out names, what next summer will be like for the other two kids, etc. I am also anxious to tell people (other than the few that read this blog or that I've told in person) but don't want to get the word out and have people congratulating me on the big news as I am miscarrying. It's not that I mind people knowing, but I like to keep track of who I have told or how so that I don't have any of those awkward conversations in the event we get bad news in the upcoming weeks. For now, we will just wait and pray for the second trimester to arrive. Hopefully this extreme fatigue will let up around that time as well!

Pregnant Again

This has been a roller coaster of a week for me. Over the weekend we made a trip to Topeka for a birthday party and while we were there we did some shopping. I grabbed a pair of pregnancy tests at Target, thinking that if my period didn't come over the weekend I better take one. Monday morning I took it and there was a positive line the second the pee hit the stick. I was surprised that it was positive, and shocked that it was such a bold line and showed up so fast. I have never had such a clear result before. So here we are, our 5th pregnancy.

Prior to taking this test, we had sort of assumed that our last pregnancy/miscarriage was just a fluke since we had to do so many fertility treatments to get pregnant with Myelle. We knew it could happen, but weren't really counting on it. When we found out, we were freaking out a little because three kids is a lot different than two. We were thinking about how we would be outnumbered by kids, that they would have to share rooms, how we would all fit in the car, etc. But we were also excited about this unexpected surprise and the fact that we really are able to accomplish something we thought to be impossible - getting pregnant without "trying." We started thinking about how even though it will be hard now, when we are older we will be glad that our family expanded and we welcomed more children than we had planned on having.

My last period was on July 10th, and I am pretty sure I ovulated around August 1st. So as of Monday I would have been 6 weeks 4 days or 5 weeks 3 days depending on which date you go from. I went in for labs Monday afternoon and I got my HCG level back later in the day. The numbers were great, well over 6,000. It was at 9,047 which was high enough that I wouldn't have to get labs drawn again before the ultrasound. As we waited for progesterone levels to come back, we started thinking that this was a "good" pregnancy since the beta was so high and that we would likely be having a baby in 8 months. 

Unfortunately, when I finally got a call about the progesterone results, I found out they were very low. I believe the number was 8.9. From what I've read, anything less than 5 is almost a guaranteed miscarriage, anything less than 10 gives a very small (less than 10%) chance of survival, 14 and above is okay but not great, and the ideal would be well over 20. So we are looking at slim chances of having a healthy pregnancy. The nurse I spoke with said that we would just wait and see what the sonogram shows (which is in a week) and then take progesterone supplements if necessary. I was appalled that we would wait until then and told her that I have been put on progesterone with my past pregnancies. She mentioned that if it was a miscarriage it would prolong the inevitable, but she spoke with the doctor and he wrote me a ($200) prescription. So I started that on Wednesday evening. I still think our chances are slim but I thought it would be best to start the progesterone right away in case there was a chance to save the pregnancy. I think the doctor was probably thinking this pregnancy is over and let's not prolong it. He may be right, but I want to do everything I can for this little one.

So now we wait. My appointment is a week from yesterday. We will do an ultrasound and find out whether the baby is alive or dead. It's going to be a rough morning for me. This whole ordeal is pretty emotionally draining, and the hormones do not help. I can tell the progesterone is making me even more emotional. Miscarriages are hard. I can't imagine how hard it would be to have multiple in a row when you are actually trying to get pregnant. We were indifferent to having more kids, and it is still awful to think of letting go of a baby you made and will never get to hold in your arms or whisper in their tiny ear how much you love them. Even if we have a good ultrasound next week, we are not out of the woods. A lot of times the progesterone is low because something is wrong with the baby's chromosomes. If that's the case, I will still eventually miscarry (probably around 10-14 weeks). On the other hand, if it is just that my body was not producing enough progesterone and we started supplements early enough, we could end up with a healthy baby in April as long as this sonogram comes back normal. Either way, it's a waiting game. And not a fun one. 

I am trying my best to give it up to God. Leave it in His hands. I know our children are on loan from Him. I know if they never take a breath on Earth, they will be in an even better place waiting for the rest of us. It's just so hard to let go. Something tells me that our baby went to Jesus this morning, but something else tells me to hold onto that glimmer of hope that remains. 

Surprise Miscarriage

This post doesn't exactly fall into the category "Life Beyond the Babies" but it's life, so it's going here. We have had quite an emotional 24+ hours. I'll start out by saying this post is not for everyone, so you may want to stop reading now. I am putting it all out there for a couple of reasons. First, I want a record so that if something like this happens again I have something to compare to. Second, for others out there in blog world who may be going through something similar.

If you've read my other blogs back to when we were trying to conceive our two children, you know that my reproductive system is a little out of whack. The main fertility issue I have to deal with is PCOS. Because of PCOS, I have had times where my menstrual cycle is very irregular. I have gone 9 months between cycles in high school and several months at a time at other points in my life. I honestly don't know when my last cycle was. If I had to guess, I would say around 4 months ago. Finally on Saturday I started bleeding. Unfortunately it didn't stop until today (Wednesday). It seemed like a lot, and there was some considerable clotting but when the intense cramping started yesterday I knew something was wrong. I called the doctor and they wanted me to come in for blood work at the end of the day to check for infection, check my thyroid, and do a pregnancy test. I ended up leaving work around lunch time because the pain was too much to bear in the workplace. On the way, I called to be seen as soon as I could and went in first thing for the blood work.

My appointment was at 2:15, and the hour and a half wait until the appointment time seemed like an eternity. I kept trying to figure out what was wrong. I was pretty sure it was either a miscarriage or something like a fibroid that was getting out of control. After going through my symptoms at the doctor's office, I was told that the pregnancy test was positive. Although I had predicted it, I was floored. How could we have tried so hard to have babies for the past four years to have a surprise pregnancy? I know it happens, but it's not very common in the infertile world I have been accustomed to. I sent Brett a text when I was waiting for the sonogram and he came up to the hospital. We hadn't planned or necessarily "wanted" more kids, but we were both very sad, heartbroken, that we wouldn't be meeting or parenting this tiny child we had made. It's so weird how you can miss something only moments after you find out it existed. Many times since Myelle was born (she was an awful baby) I had said I would cry if I found out I was pregnant. I apparently wasn't lying. I have had a lot of guilt about making that statement. It's true that we would have been overwhelmed, but I know 100% that we would have been more excited than anything. And since having our other kids, we had pledged to God that since He worked with us to get us the two children we have, we would welcome any additional children He blessed us with. We stand by that pledge.

The sonogram was bittersweet. We could see the gestational sac. It was in my right uterus, the same place Kyler had started his life. And the same place where our other angel baby lived for just a few short weeks. The last miscarriage, the sac was one big black circle. It was very defined and round, and absolutely black on the inside. This one was different. The shape wasn't perfectly round (probably because it has started to absorb as part of the miscarriage) and we could see some sort of shadowy thing inside, probably our baby. There was absolutely no heartbeat. And with the bleeding and cramping I had been having, a very high likelihood that this pregnancy was over. The sac measured at about 5 weeks, 5 days. I would guess that it was a little bigger before the miscarriage started, since the sac had started to be absorbed at this point. We also don't know when the baby stopped developing. It could have been a week ago, or it could have been months ago and my body is finally deciding it's time for that little one to move out.

The doctor's office referred me to an OB to see in Topeka the next morning. We were to have another sonogram and probably a D&C if I hadn't passed everything. When we got home, I did some research online and found that very rarely, a baby does survive something like this. We knew it was beyond a long shot, but if this was truly a miracle baby we didn't want to rule anything out too soon. Since we don't get a lot of vacation and Brett doesn't get sick days, I decided to go to Topeka alone and meet with the OB doctor. Before I left, we had decided not to do the D&C quite yet unless it posed a significant risk to my own health not to. We wanted to give it a couple of days to either confirm or deny the miscarriage. One theory I had was that there was too much lining due to not having a cycle in so long and the bleeding was a way of getting rid of some of that. The internet said that it could have been a blood clot in the uterus that needed to come out or a type of hemorrhage that isn't detrimental to the pregnancy. Another idea was that one side of my uterus was having a period while the other was having a normal pregnancy. Since the baby was only measuring 5 weeks, seeing a heartbeat was not guaranteed even in a normal pregnancy. I won't say we got optimistic, because that's not what happened. But we did have a little hope that we were clinging to, and mostly we didn't want to turn down a gift from God if that's what it was.

This morning I woke up and realized that I had hardly bled overnight. Then I didn't have even a drop of blood by 9:30 when I used the restroom. I wasn't sure what to think. The OB did an exam and we talked about what should happen next. I explained that we didn't want to rush to a D and C and he was fine with that. I had another sonogram. This time, she couldn't find any definitive structures in my uterus. There was a dark spot, but it was not round. It was smooshed up like a pancake. This was a pretty definitive sign that the pregnancy was not viable. A few more tears flowed as that tiny bit of hope faded away. The doctor offered to do bloodwork again today to confirm what we were seeing. I was very happy he did this because it makes it that much more clear and makes it easier to go ahead and let go of that hope, and be at peace with what is happening. I just received the numbers. My HCG decreased from 1279 yesterday to 719 today (this number should double every 24 hours in a viable pregnancy). My progesterone was at 0.4 (5 is low, 14 is ideal in a pregnancy).

The doctor warned me that going that long between cycles is unhealthy and could cause uterine cancer. Since I had told him we didn't necessarily want to become pregnant, he suggested I go on birth control. I'm sure he thought I was a hot mess when I told him I didn't want to go on birth control because we didn't want to completely rule out the chance of having more kids. Like I said, we made a pledge to God, and unless it becomes unhealthy for me or He starts having us multiply like rabbits, we plan to keep that pledge. So the other option is to get back on Metformin and see if that regulates my cycles. If not, then he talked about Femara and possible something like Ovidrel. Sound familiar? That was my fertility cocktail. Hopefully my body will decide to stay regular on its own and none of this will be necessary. Like I said, we don't necessarily want to become pregnant. We just aren't going to do anything to stop it.

Unfortunately, this isn't all over yet. I still have to miscarry. All the cramping I had yesterday was just due to some clotting. I'm a little concerned about what the actual miscarriage is going to feel like. With my last one, I had a D and C done before any bleeding had started. And my kids were both C-sections with no labor. So this is all new territory to me. Plus, since the pregnancy was on my right side, which is my smaller cervix, I have a feeling it's not going to be too pleasant. My biggest concern is that I have to go back to work and it could happen there. Since I don't know exactly when it will happen, I don't have much choice. I can't just stay home for a week or so and wait. So I guess we will go on with life as usual for now and just wait and see what happens next in this crazy little thing called life.

Goodbye, little one. You are so loved, even if we didn't know you were here until you were already gone. We wish there was something we could have done to change the outcome. We would do anything to have you here with us. You and the sibling that went before you will always hold a special place in our hearts. Love you!

3/26/14 Update: I passed what they call the "products of conception" on the 24th. It was actually not very painful at all which was a nice surprise. The cramping last week was tremendously worse. My labs came back today with a HCG level of 44, so I will have to go in Monday to get it tested again. Hopefully it goes to zero so I can avoid a D and C or additional ultrasounds. I am not looking forward to the bills now that my insurance doesn't cover nearly what it did with my old job.

4/2/14 Update: I had another blood draw today and my HCG is at 8. The OB-GYN I saw wants it to be lower so I will go back in another week to have it tested again. They said this would be the last time. I have not been bleeding hardly at all for the past week so hopefully my levels do go down enough to get them comfortable releasing me from care.

Yep, Back to Work

Well, I got the job offer this morning. It's what I was wanting so I guess I'm going back to work. I will work 32 hours/week (that's the magic number to get benefits). I will work in the office Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays and probably work a partial day from home on Wednesdays... basically whatever it takes to get the hours in. It's going to be a big change for our family so I am a little worried about that. Hopefully there will be enough time to get meals planned and prepared, get the lawn mowed and chores done, and still have enough time to enjoy these little kids that are growing up too fast. I do feel like I need somewhat of a break from kids 24/7 though and I hope that my patience with Kyler improves with this change. He is becoming more and more difficult lately - terrible 3's I guess. It will probably be good for Myelle too. She is quite the Mama's girl. I'm sure going to miss them though!

Now I just need to get some things lined up before heading back to work (my tentative start date is Tuesday). First thing is child care. My mom will be taking care of them most of the time. She has a job at the local library a couple days each week (Mondays and Wednesday afternoons) which is what is dictating my work schedule. We are going to try to get a high school girl or someone else to take care of the kids over the summer so that my mom isn't tied down as much and she can help out at the library and do her own thing. I also need to get the house in order and be sure to have plenty of food around and prepared in advance so it can just be heated up for the kiddos.

The biggest thing I am looking forward to is not having to worry about every penny we spend. We will have enough income to remodel the house as well as buy the things we really want or need. We can start making more charitable contributions the way we used to. And we can once again actively contribute to our retirement rather than doing the bare minimum.

Hopefully I am making the right choice by going back to work. It's one of those things that sort of just happened so I am taking that as it was meant to be.

Back to Work?

In a strange and unexpected sequence of events, I found myself at a job interview this morning. A couple months ago I got a call from a recruiter who works with a former co-worker of mine. He was working on a controller position at a publicly traded company about 30 miles from Seneca. My experience is in tax so I wasn't qualified for that job, but I knew someone who was. A high school friend of mine was an auditor at a big accounting firm in Kansas City and we had talked before about her wanting to move back but there were no good jobs. The dots connected and she was hired. Now, she is in the position to hire someone and asked me if I would be interested.

When I stopped working for GT, I didn't think I would start working for someone else. I wanted to be my own boss and not have to worry about doing "busy work" just to stay chargeable or working certain hours or asking for time off or getting handed work that I wasn't interested in doing. So I started doing tax returns during busy season, hoping to jump start my business. I enjoyed doing the returns but as I started to look into additional services, I found that work to be much less desirable. There were issues with having to buy software, being tied down, and competing with the prices and services of other accountants in the area. The way people are doing business here is not what I'm used to after working for a big firm.

While I love staying home with my kids for the most part, I am finding myself to be a little frustrated. I think it's a combination of not having a lot of adult interaction, having a difficult baby (although she is much better now), not feeling like I am valued for my contributions, not using my brain, and wanting to financially contribute. So if I can work out a part time arrangement and negotiate the salary to my liking, I will probably take this job. Right now we are spending everything Brett is making so we will never be able to get ahead at this rate. It would be nice to have some additional income so that we can maintain the lifestyle we are used to and not worry about buying things we want or going places/doing things we enjoy. We are also remodeling our basement which will eliminate most of our savings so this will help with that and also help us save to remodel the kitchen and bathroom.

I will miss being around the kids all the time. And it will be especially hard for Myelle and I since I have not left her for more than a few hours at a time and she has only taken a couple of bottles (and not willingly). But when I think back working while Kyler was younger, I still feel like I had plenty of time with him and we had and still have a great relationship.

In the end, I still need to see the offer and make a decision. But I think it is a good opportunity. Hopefully the company will grown and allow my career to grow along with it. And if it doesn't pan out, I'm not really out anything. I will just have some more time with the kids. I am still a little shocked that I am even considering going back to work after trying to quit my old job for about 3 years. I need to learn to never say never, because as soon as I get my mind set, something happens to change it.

Try This Oatmeal!

I am not a huge oatmeal fan. When I try to make it, it's always sticky and has a bad texture. And I never had any better luck with the packets. But for some reason, I picked these BetterOats blueberry muffin flavored packets up a couple of weeks ago. And they were awesome! Five pouches come in a box and they run from $1.50 to $2 per box around here. I just microwave them and they turn out great. Super easy and would be perfect to take to work (if I still needed to do that). Anyway, if you're looking for a healthy, yummy, easy, hot, pretty cheap, and light breakfast you gotta pick some of these up!

(Sorry for sounding like a commercial... but this is one of few products I have bought to try and they ended up totally exceeding my expectations. When I got home and unpacked them I sort of wondered why I had bought these, thinking they would eventually end up in the trash.)

The End of an Era

I gave my letter of resignation yesterday and the great thing is I'm not looking back. I think this is finally the right time to quit my job for good. It was a great job in terms of pay, benefits, and flexibility. However, it was a dead end for me in terms of being able to be promoted since I was working remotely and it wasn't what I really wanted to be doing anymore now that we have moved and my life is filled with two littles.

I started applying for jobs in the fall of 2006 as I was wrapping up my final semester of graduate school. I had tons and tons of interviews. Most of them were Kansas City firms since that's where Brett was but I also interviewed for a couple of other places just in case I wasn't marketable in KC. I didn't know if I wanted to do tax or audit, I just knew I wanted to be in public accounting so that I wasn't doing the same thing day after day. I received quite a few offers and had it narrowed down to a couple. GT paid slightly more so I decided to go that route. And I am so glad I did.

The offer from GT was with their tax department. I started January 2007. The first few busy seasons (and many times even not during busy season) were crazy. Lots of hours, challenging work, and learning to work with all different kinds of people. Brett and I got married in May 2008 and I was promoted to senior associate August 2008. The long hours continued but Brett's job was equally busy so we worked hard and played hard. 

In April 2009 I started seeing a fertility doctor so that we could start a family. Unbelievably, my insurance through GT covered infertility which has saved us a lot of money over the years and without it who knows if we would have ever had children. I think God was definitely at work putting everything together just right for our family. In May 2010 Kyler was born. I was pretty undecided about whether I should go back to work or stay home with him. There weren't many flexible work arrangement success stories in my office at that time so I didn't think part-time was a real option. I decided to go in and give my two weeks notice. My boss at that time convinced me to stay on and try working a reduced schedule. I decided to try working three days per week.

Our goal after having Kyler was to move back to Seneca before he started school. Since we both grew up in small towns and in small schools, we thought it just felt right. Since this was the goal, we decided to go back to the fertility doctor in October 2010, just five months after Kyler was born. Our first treatment cycle was in February 2011. Brett was actively searching for jobs in the Seneca area and we decided to go ahead and put our house on the market in case it took a while to sell. It didn't. Our house sold in May 2011, I got pregnant and miscarried that summer while we were living in an apartment, and Brett accepted a position in Sabetha in September 2011. 

So off I went again to give my two weeks notice. This time I thought we were at the end of the road since I would be two hours away from the nearest GT office. I was wrong. My boss offered up the suggestion of working remotely from Seneca so I decided to give it a try. We lived with my parents for a few months until we purchased a small house in October 2011, fixed it up, and moved in around the holidays that year. From September 2011 to March 2012, I traveled to Kansas City several times each month (many months I would have to make three trips in a week) to continue fertility treatment. It was a trying time and I really thought hard about giving up but Brett convinced me to keep at it. Finally, we got pregnant again in March and this time it looked like a viable pregnancy.

We purchased a bigger and much more permanent home in June 2012 and moved in August. We plan to stay in this house until our kids are out of high school, maybe even longer. We found some great renters for our smaller house and are updating our current house little by little. In December 2012, we welcomed Myelle into the world. My current boss has offered to keep me on at GT many times but during my maternity leave I have not missed my job at all. Plus, there are some pretty big changes going on (like using a shared services center in India to prepare the returns) that I'm not entirely sure I'm up to. I sent in my letter of resignation yesterday and am completely at peace with my decision.

So this is goodbye to fertility/OB appointments in Kansas City as well as my job at GT. I have been long awaiting this new lifestyle and can't wait to see what the future holds!

Clorox Splashless Bleach

Don't buy this. I don't know what it is, but I don't think it's bleach. I have had a couple of jugs of bleach in my cleaning cabinet for a while now. One was a really old off-brand one that was left in the previous house we bought. I used it first to get rid of it. The second was one I picked up at Target and was Clorox brand but I hadn't really used it much. I don't think I realized it when I picked it up but later noticed that it was "splashless." I thought that was fine since once in a while I will find a bleach spot on a dark piece of clothing I'm wearing when cleaning or laundering.

This week I noticed my dish rags were starting to stink so I figured I would soak them in bleach before washing them to get the smell out. I left them in their bleach/water bucket longer than I meant to and was afraid they would be ruined since bleach tends to be hard on fabric if you use too much or soak for too long. But in reality, my bucket stunk worse than when I put the rags into it. I checked the bleach to see what the deal was and it didn't even smell like bleach - not even a little bit. At first I thought maybe it was too old and sort of went bad. Then I noticed the jug said it wasn't to be used as a disinfectant. That seemed really odd so I looked it up and apparently the stuff is nothing like bleach. One person said it didn't even take the color out of clothes she was bleach-painting.

Anyway, if you want bleach, don't get this. I don't even know if it works well as a cleaner. It sure made my dish rags stinky and they are now soaking in vinegar since I'm out of regular bleach. So I'm not sure what it would be good for. Nice one Clorox, you got me.

An Update on Life in Seneca

We have been contemplating for the past 2.5 years what I should do about my job. I have "quit" three times but am still employed there. Basically they need me, they pay well, they have great benefits, and they are super flexible for me. So it has been extremely difficult to pull the plug. Oh, and they are pretty persuasive and open to new ideas in terms of said flexibility. Anyway, I thought we were settled on me quitting after my upcoming maternity leave until Brett has started questioning that decision over the past couple of days. So I went back through this blog to see if that offered up any clarity on the situation. It didn't. But here is where we are at right now in life...

Almost two years ago, Brett and I were both working in Kansas City at what I would call pretty decent paying jobs. If we got that salary here, they would be very high paying jobs. Unfortunately, with those paychecks comes a lot of responsibility, hours, work, and sacrifice. We were miserable and felt like we were focused on all the wrong things. Brett was traveling 30-50% of the time and I was working such long hours that we had to put Kyler in full time daycare during the worst weeks of busy season even though I was working "part-time." So we sold our house, Brett got a new job, we moved to Seneca, and I started working remotely.

I cannot tell you how much things have changed since we moved here and got settled. Brett's new job is night and day compared to his old one. Most days he leaves the house around 7:30 and is home by 5:30 or 6:00 in the evenings. Once in a while it is a little later but if he needs to be home earlier he almost always can be. He has had to travel one time since he's been there (which has been over a year now). And it was only for a week. My job is also a lot different since I started working remotely. I can actually work the hours I'm supposed to for the most part and don't get stuck in the office out of guilt or pressure. The house is usually picked up and often times even clean as long as I'm not out of town for doctor appointments or work. The laundry is done and most nights dinner is prepared. Kyler has had a lot more evenings at the park or just enjoying family time whereas before one of us was always working while the other was on baby duty. Things are just nicer, more relaxing, and more family-friendly.

Financially, we are still much the same as we were before even though Brett took a considerable pay decrease (my pay has stayed relatively the same since I was already part-time before moving). Our mortgage payment is at least $500 less than it was before. We are saving at least that amount on child care as well. I don't have to pay for parking and we go out to lunch much less frequently. There aren't a ton of places to eat so we save a lot going out to dinner too. The places we do eat are generally a lot less expensive and having drinks at the bar is much less expensive than in Kansas City. Groceries are probably the only thing that we are spending more on since I was shopping at Aldi in Kansas City. And once the baby is here and I don't have to drive to doctor appointments in Kansas City anymore, our fuel bill will probably go down as well.

There are also other benefits to our move. First and foremost is child care. My mom has been taking care of Kyler since October when she sold her day care center (which he went to before that). That is really nice for when I need to attend a call or training on a day off or have a call outside of regular business hours. Plus, even if we had to have Kyler back in daycare, it would be considerably cheaper than in Kansas City and we know the people who would be taking care of him. Another nice thing is that everything is super close. So to get to a friend's house or meeting at a restaurant takes a few minutes rather than a minimum 20 minutes of driving. We live about a block away from one of the bars so I don't even have to worry about Brett driving home after Thirsty Thursday. I haven't really missed the convenience of shopping either. I'm not a big shopper in the first place but I can get most of what I need here in town. For other things, I have a Target debit card so I get free shipping and 5% off when I use that. And most other places also have shipping discounts if I really need something and can't wait until the next time we are in the city. One of the best things is grocery shopping. Here I never have to carry my stuff out to my car. They always have someone do it so all I have to do is buckle the kids in the car and unload once we get home.

All in all, the move has been a great change of pace and allows us a lot more quality family time and less stress. At this point I would not trade it back to our "old" lives for anything. I would say the worst things are not seeing our "KC friends" and not having as many options for places to go out for dining, bars, and entertainment. Brett would also add beer variety to that list. :)