Half-way There and Gender Update!!!

Whoo! 20 weeks and 1 day, we are half way there!!!
I actually have a feeling we hit our half-way mark a few weeks ago, but for the purpose of calculation... :)

How have things been this last month? Pretty great!!
Sickness is COOOMPLEEEETELY gone! Not even a little here or there. So happy about that.
I feel more energetic, but do get fatigued easily if I don't watch myself. The only thing I have to really complain about, is that my appetite hasn't come back yet. Not really sure what that is about. I'm not *worried* yet, but I would like to have a normal pregnant appetite, so I can make sure I gain the amount of weight I need. I'm gaining, just very slowly. Midwife isn't worried, we still have about 20 weeks to go. Plenty of time to gain what I need, but...I would like to WANT to eat.

Other than that, everything is pretty boring around here. Which is a great thing as far as pregnancy is concerned! This has been the best pregnancy I have had. When carrying my children, each pregnancy I had something happen to cause a scare at one point or another. Everything always turned out ok, but there were scares along the way. There hasn't been any of that with this one, and I'm not complaining one bit! haha

I have been able to feel little bean moving around for a little while, but it was never hard enough to feel on the outside. Not quite a week ago, I started to be able to feel little "bumps" on the outside. :) Go figure it would start when the guys weren't here. :-/ But it's pretty cool the little bean can be felt on the outside now!

So far, this journey has been so amazing. I really consider us to be very lucky. We haven't heard of a lot of first time surrogacy journeys going as great and smooth as ours. Now we have had our bumps along the way, but they haven't been major and they haven't been among each other. I'm just so continually grateful for matching with Doug and Charles, and for them being as great as they are. This journey wouldn't be the same with another couple. I'm a lucky surrogate!!

Speaking of those wonderful dads-to-be. We had our ultrasound on the 17th of this month. They came down and stayed for a few days so we all could spend some time together. It really was a wonderful visit!!

The ultrasound itself was fantastic!! I wish I would have known about this option a long time ago! We went to a private practice Sonographer that my Midwife recommended. It was such a different experience than having them with ultrasound techs at the Dr office or hospital. She didn't rush at all, we were there for almost an hour! She was so incredibly sweet and patient. She kept encouraging the guys to ask whatever questions they had, and she explained everything we were looking at, very thoroughly. You could tell she cared. Plus, she not only gave us a FULL report of how everything looked, she even SHOWED the guys the report! I have never seen that happen before. It always has to be reviewed by the care provider, then the care provider will give the report to the patient, leaving parents to wait and wonder how their baby is doing. If I every have to have ultrasounds again in the future...I will be going there! OH! AND she put the entire thing on DVD for them, and gave them a TON of pictures!! I mean a ton! The room was huge, with several chairs, and two large flat screen TV's; it was pretty cool! My husband and our 3 children all went, so there was plenty room for all of us. My kids (especially) my daughter, are very interested in pregnancy and how the baby grows, so I was very glad they got to attend, and the Sonographer was so great; they got to really get a good understanding of what was going on in my belly. It was a great experience for all of us.

Later after the ultrasound, we met up with both of my doulas. This was the guys first meeting with them. That was a fantastic meeting. Full of many laughs and lots of great info and learning. You could really tell the guys were really interested in the labor process and what the doulas could do for all of us, including once the baby is born. Of course, this being a surrogacy, things will be slightly different than with traditional couples at birth. So we had discussions about how everything would be handled with baby at birth; ex: where baby would be placed immediately straight from the womb, immediate skin-to-skin, how THEY could bond with baby right after birth with skin-to-skin, nursing/immediate nursing after birth, etc. The doulas were so great at providing them with evidence based info about the options and we all were talking openly about what we all thought was best for baby and myself for recovery after birth. Conversations like that are so great. (just another reason I'm so lucky to have these guys for IPs)

This baby is going to have such a great start at a great life! We have so many wonderful people supporting all of us and we all have great communication!

So blessed.

Doug and Q hanging out waiting for time to meet the doulas.

Buddies!



Ok, moving on to what I know lots of people are so anxious to hear. (Many of you that are close with us have already heard)
We had planned to find out what the guys were having. At the beginning of the ultrasound, the Sonographer told us she was going to start at the head and work down the body, checking out everything she needed to check and what we were interested in. Well, this little bean was just making it way too hard to wait for the gender reveal! lol. I believe the Sonographer's words were, "Well I was going to wait, but he's just making it too easy!" haha!!

That's right, Doug and Charles are having a BOY!!!!!!!!! Let me tell you what, this little boy was very proud to show it too! I saw his little penis before she announced it! She was trying to go around it, but he just wasn't having it! haha I think he wanted his daddies to know they are having a boy. :)

I'm so excited for them!!!

Such a sweet little profile.

His little arm rest on his head.

His little legs. He was sitting with his ankles crossed and his hands behind his head, like he was reclined back relaxing. It was so cute!!!! (she couldn't get the whole thing on the picture)

A boy. Doug and Charles are having a boy. A son! Aaaaaaaaaah!!! :-D

So for the rest of our weekend, we had an appointment with my Midwife, they got to hear the heart beat and talk to her about what they had on their minds. We went out to dinner...Charles mentioned wanting Red Lobster...that was music to this pregnant lady's ears!! I had been wanting crab so bad for the past month! haha I definitely had an appetite then! I stuffed myself on a pound of snow crab...man was I miserable afterwards...but it was worth it! Thanks for that Charles!!! :) A preggo and her food = pure happiness. ;)

Then Saturday we all went and spent a day at Worlds and Oceans of fun on Saturday! It was a blast!! Doug really wanted to visit Planet Snoopy (he loves Peanuts). It was really neat!! They had a little boutique and the guys did their first bit of baby shopping! LOL Oh that was funny! Charles came out of there carrying 5 big bags of cool Peanut baby stuff! haha They got a great start! I love seeing their excitement, and I'm so glad we get to be a part of it. :)

This is where Doug and Charles bought the baby stuff.

Snoopy's #1 fan!

Had to get one of the hubby...he always tries to hide from the camera. :)

Doug, Charles, hubby, and the two oldest kiddos getting wet!

All in all, it was a fabulous time, I'm glad they were able to stay for a few days.
They will be down again in August. I'm already excited for that visit!! We will be doing the maternity shoot at that visit also.
By then, they will be able to feel the baby move! I can't wait for them to feel their son kicking around. Every little thing they can experience, helps it be more real to them, and helps them be more of a part of their son growing and developing. It is so important to me they get as much of that as they can. So much exciting stuff coming up!!!