A child's prayer

I have to say that I love love love looking at pictures of Vanessa's fat belly and our ultrasound picture on her blog. I'm willing to bet that I'll be on her blog more than anyone else : )

My little Kiera (5) said the prayer at dinner last night. "...and Heavenly Father, please please PLEASE PLEASE help us to get a baby in our family. Give that baby to the doctor so he can put it in Vanessa's tummy and she can drive for a long drive in the car to Illinois and give that baby to us....."
I explained the process or surrogacy to Kiera back before the transfer and have not mentioned a word about it since. She remembers. We are waiting to tell her until we are further along... it is just too long to wait for muchkins.

Vanessa is wrong about one thing in her blog post. She said she imagined that this pregnancy is probably taking forever for S. and myself. Not so. We always comment to each other on how crazy fast it is all going. One must understand our background though: We've waited for 2 years to get this pregnancy...that is a lot of hard waiting. It is a line that never moves.... this is easy waiting because we are at least moving forward! Also, the biggest factor making this pregnancy speed by is the fact every day of my pregnancies felt like a week (very literally). Some days I was bad enough I wanted to die. And I'm not saying that for some sort of dramatic blog affect. I really did-- I was hospitalized on suicide watch. I don't exaggerate a bit when I say that it felt like my first pregnancy lasted about 5 years (my second maybe 3). This pregnancy is flying by. Baby will be here before we know it!

We are so very excited! I'm so excited to go and touch Vanessa's pregnant belly; to see him/her move on an ultrasound and know a gender. This is all a miracle and such a dream come true.

Cute pregnant lady.

Cute picture hu? you'd never know she was pregnant. She says she's at that awkward stage where she is a bit fat but not looking pregnant yet. We've entered the 2nd trimester!!!
I stole this picture of her off of facebook and reposted it. I feel like I'm stalking her....

The pictures idea

I had a thought a few days ago. Pictures to document this journey. What is the "norm" on taking pictures with a surrogate? I feel after my journey through the surrogacy world thus far that the normal way of doing things is that surrogate and intended parents have a very business like relationship. Vanessa and I are far closer than that. I would love to have pictures to document this journey forever. Professional pictures though? Do people do that? should we do that? Is that cheesy?
 I go to Google to answer all of life's questions (Well, those questions that are not answered through prayer- either Google or prayer right?) These were the only pictures that google had of intended parents and surrogates together during pregnancy.

Icky and terribly cheesy!

Ok I guess, but not very personal.  Does not capture the miracle that surrogacy is.  Does not capture love.

Obviously this is a picture of a woman in India.  Indian Surrogates are very common.  From what I know, intended parents only get to meet the surrogate twice and don't have a relationship with her.  Lack of faces in this picture might have been mandatory for cultural or privacy reasons, but it sure is impersonal.

This picture is probably just an advertisement.  My guess is that this is not truly a surrogate and intended mother.  It is, however, a cute/happy picture.

I had to include this although this is off subject.  I just have to say that I am so excited for this moment in our lives!!!  

Holy cold.  And it makes the intended mother look so selfish.  "don't want to ruin my perfect body.  Her body is meant for pumping out babies-- my body is made to be perfect"

Cute picture.  Again, I'm thinking this is not an actual surrogate and intended mother.  

Seems like a very cold and selfish looking picture.  "we'll just sit here looking pretty while you grow our baby.  Let us know when you are done!"

Can you believe that that is the extent of pictures on the internet?  I talked to Vanessa tonight and we decided we'll get some professional pictures taken.  Nothing cheesy, just sentimental and something to remember this wonderful journey by.  If you have any good ideas for us, let us know!

Best gift ever

Vanessa gave me the best Christmas gift ever.  

I won't get too specific about the $ situation of our surrogacy in case Vanessa (or Clark) cares.  So lets just say I owe them varying amounts of money for different things at different times of the month.  Vanessa called me a week before Christmas and 1 day before I owed her a chunk of change.  She told me to not send the money to her, and instead to use that money for Christmas for my family.  She also told me to eliminate one of the other payments I owed her in the future and to use the money instead to come out  to Utah for the 20-week formal ultrasound.  (I accepted the elimination of the 1 payment, but not both).  I could not believe it.   What a great gift!  I've being going back and forth on going to Utah for the ultrasound. I've absolutely wanted to go. But I couldn't justify it when we are so tight with money right now.  It is hard not being a part of the pregnancy and having it be so far away from me (but not as hard as other things-- I'm not complaining).  I really want to go out for the ultrasound...and now I can and I will.  I'm so excited!  

In contrast to her wonderful gift to me, I got her a custom made maternity shirt.  I bought it back when we were having triplets.  Therefore it will be way too big for her.  It mentions on the shirt that she is carrying surrogate triplets. So yep, now it is a too-big and an factually incorrect shirt.  I'm sure Vanessa would post about it, but she probably doesn't want to embarrass me, so I'll go ahead and embarrass myself.  But, I have some great gift ideas for the future with which to redeem myself.  

Almost down to 200 days!!

PS-- I have to put a plug in for Clark (Vanessa's husband).  He has started hosting a show on Mitt Romney Radio.  I think it is pretty awesome.  http://www.blogtalkradio.com/mittromneyradio/2011/12/31/mitt-romney-radio--clark-amundson--123011   Fridays 9pm EST