What a year

I just realized today that almost exactly a year ago we started TTC. Matt and I were talking about it when I was driving him to work and I couldn't help but smile when I thought about how excited and happy I was about finally TTC back then. But it still makes me sad to think that the happiness only lasted a couple of months, after that it wasn't the same. I always tried to stay hopeful that I would conceive soon, but I also always had in my mind, "I should be this far along, I should be doing this, I should be feeling this..." It isn't nearly the same as TTC before a m/c. It's also crazy to think about everything that's happened in a year. A lot of bad things, but a lot of good things too. At this point I don't say that I wouldn't have changed a thing. A lot of this past year has been a living hell that I wouldn't wish on anyone, no matter how much of a character development it was. On a positive note, I think the best thing that happened was that I became even more aware of what so many other women go through. I feel that I can be even more sympathetic. And that's never a bad thing.

To completely change the subject, we did so much cleaning and organizing this weekend! Matt was amazing, he helped out a lot. I couldn't have done it without him. We completely cleaned up the office, got rid of a lot of stuff that was taking up floor space. For the past month and a half we've had 4 office chairs in there!! Matt received 2 from a giveaway his office held back in January when they got new chairs. I really wanted to get seat covers or cushions before we started using them (because they attract cat hairs more than our other chairs!). So we haven't been using the new ones, the kitties have. We finally went ahead and started using the new ones even though I haven't been able to find seat cushions (we went to 4 different stores looking for them...no luck). Needless to say, the kittens are NOT happy about this change. They liked having their own chairs when we were both at our computers! We also took out the 2 cat beds that were on the floor that the cats never use anymore. What a big difference!

We also bought a new vacuum cleaner. For the past couple of months our old one has gone downhill. It was a cheap one to begin with, more like a dorm room vacuum than a whole house vacuum. The new one was worth every penny. It cleans so much better...so this is what it's like to have really clean floors! We bought some shelves for one of the closets and have been able to straighten up the living room and utility room with the new storage space. Matt cleaned the entire utility room yesterday. Amazing difference! Once again, he got everything off the floors. Even the kitties' food and water is up on the counter in there to get it off the floor.

We still have a lot to do, especially straightening up our bedroom and the nursery, but we're going to get there! It's so encouraging to already have more room and more order. We went to Good.will yesterday and got rid of a lot of stuff that's been sitting around the past couple of months. We had to borrow my sister's SUV to haul it all off! I didn't take before pictures (mainly because I was so embarrassed at the state it was in), but I did take after pictures to show off!

The closet at the end of the hall with the new shelves:


The office:


The kitty space (know what that spray bottle is for? lol And don't ask me why the CDs are on the scratching post too... there's nowhere else to put them so for now that's where they go):



My space (I was in the middle of writing this post when I took the picture):

The utility room (with Firefly in front of the food dishes of course):