Maternal blood screening results & telling my son..

 The nurse called today to let us know the 2nd part of the maternal blood screening results were in and that everything came back with clear margins:

1:10,000 for Downs
1:200 or <.5% for Spina Bifida

 I also finally told my son today about the babies. He will be 6 in September so I waited until I felt it was safe to tell him. My oldest has known since we matched and the youngest, well she's too young to know any better. Although she has been rubbing my belly lately. Anyway we are a foster home for a local boxer rescue and we have always told our son that we take care of them until they are adopted and find their forever homes. That's about the closest I could think of he could relate to surrogacy. I explained Carrie having CF and that her lungs couldn't handle pregnancy so that we were carrying her babies for her until they were read to come out and go home with her. At 1st he was like WAIT..2 more babies in our family?? And I explained more how no they were Carrie's babies and will go home with her and their Daddy. I think there was a sigh of relief there from him..LOL And after I finished my spiel his response was "so that's kinda weird"..
 Not quite what I was expecting but he seems content with the explanation he got : ) My oldest was only 3-4 during the last journey but I guess with the whole girls maturing faster then boys thing she just caught onto the whole process very easily.

The Queen of My Castle

Looks like I'm going to be outnumbered in our house... We are gonna be the proud parents to TWO bouncing baby BOYS come the end of October!! I have to admit I was a little shocked when the u/s tech looked at baby B and said "Definitely another BOY, wouldn't you agree Dr. Tabor?!" My husband was beaming, as I'm sure any man would after finding out he was going to have two sons. We had absolutely no preference on whether we wanted boys, girls or one of each but I do believe that I was meant to raise little boys. Playing in the dirt, hunting and fishing are what I was raised doing and I can't wait to share that with our boys.

On Tuesday we headed out and went to pick up Stacey for our big 'gender reveal' appointment... I was so excited to see Stacey and spend a little time together. She also brought her photo album of her first surrogacy journey along with her for me to look at, which was amazing. I can't wait until she starts taking belly pictures of this journey so everyone can see her progress as our little boys grow! Once we were called back and they started the ultrasound, Craig and I were once again mesmerized by the sight of our little guys happy and VERY active. The u/s tech had no problems getting the boys to 'reveal' themselves for us. The only thing she had trouble with was getting Baby B to hold still long enough for measurements... Once his brother stopped kicking him in the head :-/it was smooth sailing. Man, already fighting in the womb! Both boys are measuring perfectly at 5 oz and everything is looking great.

Craig and I are going to spend our weekend shopping for furniture, bedding and a paint color for the nursery :) So excited to get things started in there!

Here are a few pics from the u/s... Craig and I are going to pull some still photos from the DVD of the u/s that we have and I will post them when I get a chance :)

Baby A-- Definitely a BOY!

Baby B-- Also definitely a BOY!

Am I psychic or what??

  Go back and read my entry from 12/20/10..how crazy is that?? So now I have to stick with the dream and these 2 be bigger then L&W were!! I had another dream 2 nights ago that my water broke and we were just a couple days over 36wks. I called Carrie and we just started talking, then I was like "oh yeah my water broke...". I kept thinking we better hurry and get to the hospital before contractions start..PLEASE!! That was all that I remember but thought it was funny : )

Frogs & Snails and Puppy Dog Tails..

  That's what little boys are made of! You got it! Once again I am carrying twin boys!!
I am still a bit in shock that one isn't a girl as sick as I have been but what matters is that both look perfectly heathly! IP's got a DVD of the entire sono too : )
  All measurements were right on track and several were measuring bigger. They appear to have big heads and one has a big ol belly..LOL One HR was 152 but hopefully Carrie can tell you the other. They both weigh perfectly at 5oz! All parts of the brain, organs, heart chambers etc looked perfect. Twin A was repeatedly kicking B in the head.. I think IP's are going to have their hands full with these 2 : )
  I will let Carrie share pics of the boys. We go back at 20wks the end of June. Wow the 1/2 way mark is coming up fast!!

Stats:
BP: 102/65
Weight gain since last visit: 4lbs
Total weight gain: 4lbs
 

15 weeks tomorrow :)

Well, tomorrow we will be 15 weeks :) Stacey seems to be doing a little better and not feeling quite so 'ick' all the time. She is continuing to be upbeat and determined to take care of our little ones until she can hand them over to us when they are done 'cooking'.

On Friday, Craig and I took off to South Padre Island for a little vacation with my family. Probably the last vacation that we will have as just the two of us :) Stacey and I chit chat or text back and forth everyday and that didn't change just because we were on vacation... Early this week, Stacey let me know that we had hit a milestone--Our little ones were officially on the move and she was able to feel them kicking and wiggling! We are so excited!! We can't wait until they are big enough and strong enough for us to feel in her belly!

We are really looking forward to next week... Tuesday is our big ultrasound and hopefully we will be able to find out the genders of the babies!! Hopefully they will be cooperative and let us get a good look :)

On another note, we received a package in the mail from our IVF clinic which included a dvd of all the pictures from our journey as well as two birth announcement cards that they want us to mail back to them when the babies get here. It is so amazing that we have photos of our munchkins from the earliest stages... The first cell division after fertilization! Here are some of the pictures... ENJOY!

Embryo 1 Day 1

Embryo 1 Day 3

Embryo 1 Day 5

Embryo 2 Day 1

Embryo 2 Day 3

Embryo 2 Day 5

The 2nd trimester!!

  We've made it into the 2nd trimester!! Now if only all these preggo email updates I get were a little more accurate for me. It's rather depressing to read how good I should be feeling now..sickness going away or gone, etc. I still feel like crap :\ All day, everyday.. I know my day will come but would sure be nice to be now! LOL.
  Just over 2 weeks to go for our big u/s to find out genders!! They said we'll go over facial features, organs, etc as well so sounds like we will get to see the little ones for quite a while that day : )
 

A few pics :)

Here are few pictures of the munchkins from today. I may be biased but I do believe they may be the cutest babies ever!!! The top picture is on Baby B and the bottom is Baby A. Baby A was sucking on one hand and holding on tight to his/her umbilical cord :) You can see Baby B's little butt and legs in Baby A's picture as well.

Both babies were VERY active during the u/s today which made for an interesting time trying to get them in the correct position to do the nuchal fold measurements.

Yay for Stacey making it to the end of the first trimester!! We couldn't be happier right now. Craig and I didn't know it was possible to love these little ones this much already!!!