Need a Snow Shovel???

Mommy works at Home Depot ... selling snow shovels.
(However, the school now thinks that Mommy's a special type of dancer…)



I'm not sure if you need to live in the Northwest to find this cartoon especially funny, but it sure helps! We actually broke our snow shovel this winter on the ice that was hiding underneath the snow...

It's been a heck of a winter!

Celebrate!!!

Woo Hoo! I am now employed again! I start Monday in the benefits office of the University of Idaho. I think my official title is a 'Benefit Services Technician'. It's so funny because I actually applied for this position the first week of September. When I never heard anything I figured I wasn't up for the position. Then two weeks ago I get a phone call and an email asking me to come in for an interview this past Thursday. I interviewed with the benefits staff, environmental services, facilities, and payroll people, all for this one job. It was a little intimidating.

I got the impression during my interview that things went well and sure enough yesterday afternoon, they called and offered me the position starting Monday! At the highest starting pay rate for the position!! It's still a bit of a pay cut from what I was used to, but really we moved up here knowing that cost of living was lower and that I would be making a lower wage so I'm fine with it.

For 7+ years now I've worked on the insurance broker side of the business, now I'm moving over to the employer side. I'm pretty excited about that. I think it will present a whole new set of challenges, and opportunities.

What did we do to celebrate? Well, since I haven't had a proper paycheck in like 4 months, we plan on celebrating after the holidays, after we get a couple of paychecks!

Something to be Thankful For

Have you ever been in a car accident? Well, I was in my first really large accident on Monday. Besides being super sore, I'm fine and so is Mike, which when you look at the pictures you will agree is pretty amazing. Mike and I hit some ice on the road early Monday morning on our way to Spokane, the car slid off the road, then went off the embankment, rolled at least three times and came to rest on hits top.

Mike was actually able to climb right out of the car and then help me, which was good because I was a little bit more banged up. The ER doctor said my X-Rays all came back clear and we just had superficial scrapes... I am so amazed.

I remember as soon as the car started to slide thinking 'oh s*^t this is not good'. I knew we were going to roll but the funny thing was I wasn't scared. There was no 'life flashing before eyes' episode, I just remember knowing that we had to hold on and get through it.

We were so lucky to have help immediately after the crash, Thank you Jose whoever you are! And thank you to Matt, the volunteer firefighter who actually drove his truck down the embankment and out in to the field to help us. Thank you to my mom for driving up to Spokane and picking us up, and taking care of us these past couple of days. And lastly, thank you to whoever invented the seat belt!

The Big Game!

Saturday was the BIG GAME, Idaho vs. Boise State. It's a pretty big deal around here. We bought our tickets weeks ago, the game was sold out, we were wearing black we were ready. We were there to support the University of Idaho while they went up against #9 Nationally Ranked Boise State!!! There were people in Blue and Orange all over town, the Bronco's had invaded Moscow.

Game started out amazing!! On the very first play after the kickoff, it appeared that an Idaho player had been brought down right on the edge of the field by a Bronco, but then wait... he was still running... running all the way down the field, TOUCHDOWN IDAHO!!! We couldn't believe it, and neither could the other team!! Sure enough he was never actually down, he just rolled over another guy and kept running, Idaho scored and they scored first!!! they were actually leading!!!

The crowd was going crazy! So much fun... that really didn't last all that long. Idaho kept it close up to half time, it was Idaho 10 Boise 17 at the half, then the 3rd quarter happened, it was not pretty!!! Boise showed why they are ranked #9 in the nation. At least we had a good quarter though.

We were really glad that we got to go since Mike will only be here this fall and next fall, then he'll be graduating in May of 2010. Next year they will play in Boise, so we saw it while we could!

Well, as anyone can probably tell, things are on hold for the moment. I had pretty much decided that we would continue with the still trying to start a family, I thought, well I'll get a job soon and I'm so tall if we actually suceeded I won't be showing anytime soon anyway, but then a few obsticles popped up. First of all the Cryobank, wasn't really comfortable with the idea that I was self employed (which I was when I filled out the paperwork), we had to send them a copy of last years tax returns just to prove that we have the ability to support a child. Which I guess is probably a good thing. But then they were still requiring a large deposit for their services, which I'm a little confused about since we pay for everything up front... but needless to say, we don't have a lot of extra floating around to put down a deposit and pay for their services up front.

Then, I got 'the letter' I've been waiting for. Since May when I lost my health insurance through my former employer I've been paying my COBRA premium's out of my own pocket. Since my old employer was a small company my premiums were based on my relatively young age, so they were low. Well, as of January 1st I will no longer be eligible for those low rates, and my premiums will jump up to $557 per month, just for me!!! I will be joined the ranks of the not only the unemployed but also the uninsured.

I just can't in good concious purposely get pregnant when I know that I may not have health insurance to cover the delivery and birth. We are on hold. Oh well, it's alright. We'll get there someday!

What to do?

Well, the job didn't come through, and it seemed a little bit sketchy to me the way the whole thing went down. One minute I was scheduled to come in and interview asap then they said they didn't hear back from my references, which I know is not true, then it was put on hold, then I got a letter saying the position was filled. Whatever I guess.

So, now here I am a month later from when we first decided to use donor insemination to get pregnant. The paperwork was sent into the cryobank, but I realized I hadn't heard back from them. I called and they said they sent me an email? I never received one I'm pretty sure, even went through my spam file. Anyway, so I sent the additional information that they needed and hopefully I'll hear back soon. But, even if I do, I'm not sure about starting treatment this cycle?

Here's why I'm not sure, I'm officially unemployed at the moment. It's not like we don't have any income to pay bills and live off of (unemployment insurance), but should we be going into further debt and possibly bringing a child into this world when I don't have a job? I'm confident that I can find one, I'm just not sure how soon. This isn't the best job market right now, you know? I have health insurance, for now, that I pay for, but I know it's going to be changing come January 1 and I don't know how much its going to cost at that point, yikes!

The plus to going through treatments now, versus when I'm employed is that I can drive up to Spokane with no problems, I don't have to come up with some story for an employer on why I'm late to work that day. If I had a job, then when I had to go in for an ultrasound on day (Cycle Day) 12, I would be late getting back to work. Then if all was well at my ultrasound, I would have to go back up to Spokane the very next day. Can you call in sick/late two days in row with a new job? I certainly wouldn't want to tell them I was trying to get pregnant.

Also there is the fact that I'm not getting any younger. If I got pregnant right away I'd still be 34 by the time the baby is born. And fertility just gets worse the older I get. As the doctor said, at my age, I just may want to make it work...

You know, when I was 29 and we started trying to get pregnant, I never in my wildest dreams thought that I would be 34, still not have children or at the very least be pregnant. It just doesn't seem right you know?

Ouch!

Well, not to much new on the fertility side of things. I had to go and have 6 vials of blood drawn yesterday. Mike and I both need to be tested for different diseases, namely HIV & Hepatitis A,B, & C. Then I have to be tested for all sorts of other things, CMV, blood type & RH factor, Rubella, and a bunch of others. Apparently this is required by the FDA in order to do donor insemination.

The CMV is kind of interesting, apparently it's a virus that's similar to Chicken Pox and the different Herpes viruses in that once you have contracted the virus it can lay dormant in your system. They test for an antibody to see if you've ever had it. The sperm donors are also tested as well. And when you are going through the "menu" of donors it specifies whether or not they are positive. If they are positive, then I would have to be positive as well in order to use that donor. Crazy huh? So I have to wait and see if I'm positive since that would limit our selections even more.

On the job front - keep your fingers crossed. A possible employer is running my background check right now, and hopefully I'll be able to go in and meet with the hiring director by the end of the week. This probably sounds crazy, but it will be nice to get up in the morning, get ready and head off to the office again. I kind of miss the interaction with people each day. I'm not always the most out going person, so it's been a little hard meeting lots of people here. I'll keep you updated!