Detoxing...

I have been reading this book called Tao for Fertility and it talks about detoxing my body of all the crap thats in it to allow my body to take in new, healthy foods and a new way of life. So after an expensive trip to Whole Foods, I am detoxing this week (attempting to at least). Eating all whole grains, drinking only herb teas (and the occasional Diet Dr.Pepper shhhh) and stretching more... I can honestly say I am feeling ALOT better already. I have more energy and have a different feeling inside. Something to be said about eating healthy.

I went to the Dr. on Tuesday to only be told "you are not going to get pregnant in the next three months so just forget about it". I semi-cussed at the doctor under my breath but then after a few tears were shed she explained that I will need medical help to get pregnant and I will not be able to get the medical help until they can figure out whats going on with my hormone levels. No answers... more tests... and passed onto another doctor. I know we will get pregnant but it might take all our money trying and we will probably pop out like 5 at one time.

I wonder if TLC needs a new reality show.....

what sucks to is that I see all of these mothers come into my office that have like 6 kids and are pregnant with a 7th and they make $8.00/hr and are trying to get government assistance... Thats when I used to get a little bitter. I don't know if they realize what a blessing their children are.

Year End Deadlines...

At work it always seems like the end of the year is what we call "crunch time". We meet about two months out reanalyze all the goals we set for the year and then half arse throw everything together so we can call it completed. On one hand, I think this is great because we can cross it off the list before we get a new set of goals thrown at us. On the other hand, we probably should have spaced all the projects out when we got them- rather then wait until year end. Either way... it becomes a stressful time of year.

On the same lines... I made some personal goals in 2009. Some of them I accomplished and some I did not. The Hubbs and I sat down after scripture study a couple weeks ago and wrote out our goals for 2010- HIS, HERS, and OURS. (I felt like I was back at my missionary days when you would do weekly goal setting-- great concept and not sure why I did not stick with that... add that to my goal list).

One of my goals for 2009 was to make a quilt. That goal got put on the 2010 list but under "finish the quilt". Instead, I decided over the last couple days to apply "crunch time". I finished it and love it. I am a "QUILTER" now. Hooked.

Its not perfect by anymeans... definitly not as great as some of the amazing woman I have blog searched like http://www.crazymomquilts.blogspot.com/ but I am getting there. Just a little more practice.

I loved this backing fabric- I got it at JoAnns ON SALE... its little Dragonflies (I love Dragonflies- in case you did not know)

Domestic Gifts for a semi Domestic Brooke

I think I am spoiled... actually I am. I got everything that I wanted this year for Christmas (except boots with the fur... aka Uggs- but I am still working on that one). This year I got mostly domestic gifts which is what I wanted plus alot of quality time with the Hubbs and family. Love it.

I wanted a sewing maching and picked out this really expensive one... when I came to my senses and realized that I really don't even know how to sew... I decided on this one from Costco

Mom and Dad got me (and the Hubbs) this fancy mixer. I love baking and wanted a nice mixer. This thing is amazing. I highly recommend it.

Every Sunday the Hubbs heres me curse at the Iron... not a great way to start a Sabbath day so he got me this iron. Very much needed. Funny thing... I got him a new ironing board (like he really wanted that).

I also got this external flash for the camera... love it. Haven't mastered it yet but definitly changes up the pictures.

The Hubbs and I got money from his side of the family and used it to buy this pressure canner. We went to the Stake Preparedness fair earlier this year and got motivated to can foods for our food storage.

Its funny when you get older and already have so many things... like I would ever imagine me asking for a pressure canner or a mixer for Christmas- but I am so happy and blessed.

... we also did something different this year with my family. We exchanged gifts but they had to be "AS SEEN ON TV" items... it was quite fun and comical. I got the perfect brownie- Dad got the Sham-Wow, Mom got some fuzz killer thing, Blake Pasta Prado, and Bri got some Dryer ball things. For the extended family we exchanged White Elephant gifts which was fun as well. Look what I got from my cousin Tazia...

It was her favorite stuffed animal she slept with for years... she told her mom "its time someone else loves Cotton Candy (the cats name). Love it.

As you know I have been attempting to make a baby for a while now. All the mattress mambo techniques are not really working for me. For some reason my husbands baby batter is not making a bun in my oven (wow that was alot of cooking lingo in one sentence). I have had the doctors poke and prod on me and I have another appt next week with the hormone doc. I have been frustrated, and sad, and angry, and bitter, and hormonal. I need to just relax.... so alas I am going to come to terms with my inner chi.

A friend of mine recommended The Tao for Fertility which is a book written by a Chinese doctor. The Western medicine technique is to take lots of hormone pills and whatnot- Eastern medicine teaches to meditate, eat healthy, herbs, acupunture all of those things. Heck its cheaper then the western way and I figure it can't hurt to try.

So in the new year, The Hubbs and I are going to go and get him tested to make sure his swimmers are swimming and if everything tests out okay, I think I am going to apply some of these Chinese ideas. I need some balance, some harmony, some positive energy, some chi. I have found that this baby making (or lack of) has caused me to be negative about my work and everything else around me.

so we shall see... I will know more after the new year. 2010 will be a great year.

Love the Fam....

I love my family. We are small in numbers but we still have fun and I know that I can turn to my parents and brother at any time for anything. This Christmas is fun because Blake has his own house and The Hubbs and I moved closer to my parents and brother. We all now live within 5 miles of each other. Yesterday my mom wanted to start a new tradition. We had appetizers at Blakes house, the Sunday meal at their house, then dessert and games at our house. It was alot of fun.

Blake bought a house a couple months ago... its super nice.

Mom and Dad at their house...

Me and the Hubbs wishing all a MERRY CHRISTMAS

Safety

I was thinking the other day about getting a gun (don't tell my mother and mom if your reading this... forget I said that).

Monday morning around 5:00 AM (which is exactly 65 minutes before my alarm clock) I was awoken by Sampson (my rottie) barking. It was not the soft, sweet "I'm hungry" bark but the serious, deep "somethings going on" bark. Then we heard gun shots. Now don't get scared- they were not in our backyard or in our house but definitly near by. So close that the Hubbs made me lay on the floor in fear of flying bullets. We heard a total of 15 shots then, there were sirens, and then 4 more shots and then nothing.

I have not seen anything in the paper or on the news about the gun shots- I am not sure what happened but what I do know is some crazy person was shooting their gun ALOT at 5:00 in the morning (not a fun way to start the MONDAY MORNING).

So then I was thinking- I have this false sense of security. Besides my super macho husband and my diamond eating cocker spaniel (who bites), what kind of protection do we have in our house. Yes we lock the doors but that doesn't mean anything. If someone wanted to break in, they could. Yes the dogs would alert us but what if... (I may watch to much SVU).

So here comes my dilemma- how do we protect ourselves? The Hubbs wants us to get PepperSpray. I suggested a gun but he was not so thrilled with the idea... probably because I can't even walk straight so my gunshots are probably doomed. Plus you hear about gun accidents and whatnot. My parents never had a gun (that I know of) and I do not know why I feel the need for protection but I was scared the other day. For the first time, I walked to my car a little fearful. At any time something could happen.

The church teaches us to prepare for bad days- we do food storage to prepare for disasters or economic problems. We save money to prepare for the future. But what do we do to prepare for someone breaking into our house or hijacking our car. What do we do to make our false sense of safety not false??

Update on the ring....

If you read my post regarding my dog getting hungry, eating me ring, swallowing my diamond, finding my diamond in her poo, and that whole fiascal then I have an update for you. If you did not read that post... go read it. Its quite a humorous "that only happens on TV" types of story.

Anyways- so I came home from work yesterday and was all excited to take my super clean and sanitized diamond and the teeth marked setting back to Jared's (ahhhh he went to Jareds) and get an estimate on the fixing of the ring and turn it into my insurance and have the ring fixed in 5-7 days. Or so I thought.

I came home, got the diamond and was looking at it when I noticed that there was a chip missing from the side of the diamond. What?? Diamonds don't break. Flip... this dog has a super jaw and crazy teeth if she can break a diamond.

The Hubbs was pissed, I was laughing because seriously?!... can anything else go wrong in this mess. Damn Dog.

The nice Assistant General Manager at Jareds was soooo nice. He said "at least you have the diamond". So Jareds has a "lifetime guarentee on all diamonds" and as long as you get it inspected every 6 months, they will replace and fix rings and whatnot. He said they could shave down and recut MY diamond but it would be significantly smaller or they could just send it out and get me a new one at the same cut and clarity. BUT it will take 10-12 weeks before I have my ring back. UGHHHH! So all in all... I guess it turned out okay. I did not need to use my insurance, I do have the diamond back, and its gonna get fixed by the nice people at Jareds.

What have I learned from this whole ordeal... this is a ring- yes it was expensive, yes I loved it, yes it was a nice gift from my husband to let me know he wanted to marry me but its just a ring. We are healthy (sorta), we have a home (sorta), we have great families, we have each other, we have jobs, we are blessed. It's just a ring....

and in 10-12 weeks will be back on my finger. (hehe).

Some more photography practice...

Just another day.... whatever

This was a very INTERESTING day... I have been knitting alot lately and well its difficult to knit with my wedding rings on (rings = my band and my engagement ring). I took them off and placed them next to the couch on a little table. I woke up this morning a little sluggish and as I was leaving for work, I went to the little table only to find that my diamond ring was missing. I thought the Hubbs moved the ring because he thought it might fall into the couch or something along those lines so I checked with the Hubbs and he said he didn't move it but that he woke up in the middle of the night because our dog Bailey was chewing on something hard. I thought to myself "no way would the dog eat my wedding ring" but sure enough we found the ring outside with little teeth marks all over it and the prongs bent back... WITH NO DIAMOND!!

The Hubbs was convinced that she either ATE IT or it fell out of the ring as Bailey carried it around the house. Seriously?!?


I made an appt with the vet to do an xray to see if the diamond was inside her- the diamond was 1.5 carats so we thought it would be able to be seen on an xray but the vet said he saw nothing. We locked Bailey up in the bathroom for the day until after we got off work and then searched the house high and low on the "Great Diamond Search". I called the insurance and luckily I took out a seperate policy on the ring since it was worth quite a bit of money. Insurance said they would cover for lost diamonds (thank goodness) and the agent couldn't help but laugh when I told him that we thought the dog may have eaten it.

So to spare you all the gross details... my ring was found and it WAS eaten by Bailey. Now most items I would not be willing to search poo over but this WAS my diamond and it WAS worth close to $10,000 so pretty much her poo became the prized item of the day.

Here is my diamond all nice, clean, and SANITIZED

And here is the "Great Diamond Thief"

She's a brutal Cocker Spanial

just a little rant...

I am trying to be positive I swear... I am trying to not get discouraged... trying to not count the days... trying to smile, stay busy, not think about it, enjoy the moments BUT its so difficult. Throughout the day I am faced with the reminder that I am not pregnant and probably won't get pregnant anytime in the near future. I went to my doctor- he said that I have high testosterone (uhhhh my response... "like a boy testosterone- have no fear- I am not a boy). So then I get referred to a specialist. Well when I called to book my appt today- she says "we aren't seeing anyone until Feb" my response... "are you flippin kidding me?" so... after some pouting and kicking and screaming (its the testosterone that does that) I got myself another appointment with a different doctor for the end of December.

When I got married I thought it would be this like super easy thing to get pregnant. I imagined getting "knocked up" on my wedding night and popping out babies left and right. After one month, then two, then 5, then 12, lots of prego tests, lots of ovulation sticks- I am left with lots of heartache and frustration and still no baby. Guess my plan and idea was different then Heavenly Fathers and I am here with no baby and alot of frustration. The Hubbs is amazing at keeping me calm, reminding me of my blessings, not letting me get depressed but then I see all of my friends (total 14 friends are prego right now) with their glow and their excitement and I want that. I know I should not be that way but maybe just maybe a special stork will bring me a baby for Christmas. I know it will work its way out... it may cost us alot of money and maybe we will pop out like 6 at one time but it will happen. My dad said we won't be Jon and Kate plus 8- but instead will be Brooke and Brian are Broke!!

Busy Bee

I have been attempting to keep myself overly occupied lately. Every night I come home and have some sort of project I want to work on. I feel very blessed that I have a husband that allows me to explore my creativity and change my "passion" each week to something new. I am currently knitting a scarf (I L.O.V.E. knitting now that I have figured out how to do it right handed.... I am left handed in case you did not know)- I also made some super cute non-super saturday crafts because my ward did not have one this year. I have been borrowing my friends children to practice my photography on because I have no children of my own. Its just been busy busy and I know its gonna get even busier as it gets closer to Christmas.

Here are some photos of my friends children that I have borrowed...

This is Carson.... super CUTE

I borrowed another friends children as well and will post there pics once I finish editing. Fun times.

In other notes... I have appts with the specialist this next week to find out what the heck is going on with my body and why I can't seem to get prego. Fingers crossed and say some prayers we can figure things out.