FOOD and FUN in Cali

While in Cali all we did was EAT!! I knew I didn't want to eat places I could eat at home. I wanted to eat at different places I've never had before. And we did :) Our first night there we ate at my favorite sushi place and my mom loved it!! It was amazing. The morning of the transfer we had breakfast at Headlines and man that place was SO good!! My only complaint is that I was really wanting some hash browns and I'm not sure if its a Cali/west coast thing or just what they do but the hash browns were liked sliced potatoes but my mom and I got the healthy omelet and it was so good!

 

After breakfast we headed to the transfer and then back to the hotel after that. Since I was on bed rest for 24 hours we took advantage of room service/the hotel restaurant. We stayed at Hotel Angeleno and those beds were AWESOME!! The room service was great! My mom and I ordered the Chicken Cobb Salad and it was so good!! We also got an appetizer but it wasn't that great(I can't remember what it was called though).

After 24 hours was up I still took it easy. My mom and I went to my new favorite coffee place, Peet's, to have some coffee and breakfast. I am seriously obsessed with that place but we don't have one any where that I know of :( So I took advantage of it while in Cali. After Peet's we headed to a nail salon that I happened to look up the night before. I wanted to find one with good reviews BUT was in our price range not in LA price range. Wynn Nail Spa seemed to have a nice atmosphere and be in a decent price range.. Once we got there we realized they didn't open until later than we expected so we did some sightseeing. It was so neat seeing all the different houses and areas. It was crazy seeing how the houses were painted. I would NEVER paint my house the color some of those houses were but on that house, in that area, in Cali it looked good. Finally we got back to the nail salon and I am so glad we went with that place. They were so friendly and did a great job. I don't remember how much everything cost but it was a good price. My mom and I both got a pedicure, eye brows waxed, my mom got her gel nails redone, and we had tons of laughs. During my pedicure I almost kicked the lady in the face!! And this time it was not due to my extremely ticklish feet! During the pedicure they did lots of foot rubs. BUT during one foot rub she put some liquid on my foot and my foot reacted by pulling away extremely fast. It was a little warm. Not too bad but I was expecting cold so the warm scared the crap out of my foot apparently. Thankfully though I didn't kick her and we all laughed about it.

 

 Some other places we ate at were Danny's for lunch. The service was HORRIBLE! But the food was amazing! The bus boy was the one who took care of us most of the time, the server was not good.

My flight home from Cali was supposed to leave at 10:55pm on Monday well my mom and I decided we would go to the airport that morning and see if we could get me on an earlier flight. Well the ONLY flight that left before my flight was 11:10am so we had to head up there early. Before we headed to the airport we went to get breakfast. Traffic was horrible(DUH! It was Monday morning in LA!!) so we decided to go to a place near the airport. I used google and found a place called Good Stuff and that's where we went. My mom had another omelete but I went with french toast. They were both really good. BUT what was amazing was the fresh squeezed orange juice and the salsa!! That salsa was AMAZING!!!!U.S.. Airways wouldn't allow me to get on an earlier flight because of their rule, the only way you can try and fly stand by on an earlier flight is if the flight is no more than 6 hours before your original flight! Well the ONLY flight before my original flight was 11 1/2 hours before it so we did more sight seeing and more eating. So once we left the airport we went to Pete's again so we could get free wifi and kill time.

After a few hours we headed to the beach to see what we could find around there. Cali beaches are SO cold but so peaceful! Once we started walking away from the beach an older man struck up a conversation with us and towards the end we asked if he knew of any food places near that he would recommend. That's how we found a place called The Counter, its a burger place kind of like which wich. They give you a paper and you mark what kind of burger(beef, turkey, chicken, veggie, ect), bun, sauce, veggies, etc. if you don't know what you want you can go off the menu and just mark what each burger on the menu has. Then they come get the menu and paper from you and go make your burger. MAN I was not expecting such a HUGE burger! But it was amazing!!!

After all the food places we headed to the mall so I could get a backpack to carry the rest of my luggage that I got while in Cali and from my mom.. Out of all the food places I'd have to say my FAVORITE place was Danny's, besides the crappy service. So if any of yall are going to Cali(LA) area you might want to stop by at least one of these places :) Also if you like Sushi you HAVE to try B.A.D. Sushi it seriously is delicious sushi! I've only been to Cali twice but have eaten there 4 times now haha. My mom also loved it. Hope y'all enjoyed my reviews :)

My Muscular Butt!!

I have had an awesome weekend with my mom in Cali.. I don't think we have laughed this much in a long time. We have laughed so much we've peed ourselves(just a little bit though not too much) and also almost vomited because we were laughing, crying, coughing, holding in our pee, etc and it was all just too much for us to handle. So last night it was day 3. Those of y'all that read my blog know what day 3 means.. 2 shots :( my mom has been giving me my shots while here in Cali and she has surprisingly been doing very well. So last night I call her over to do both shots. We get to talking and then get to cracking up, crying, and holding ourselves trying not to pee. Then we both have to go pee. No we need to focus before I'm going to let her put a needle in my butt! Finally I tell her she can give me the shot. Do you know what she does.. Starts COUNTING!! NO I don't think so just DO IT! You can't count.. So then we start to laughing again. And peeing on ourselves. So another 20 minutes go by. And FINALLY its time for us to do the shots again. So she FINALLY pokes me with the needle and I make this noise not a scream or anything just a noise because yes it did hurt and what do I see in the mirror THE NEEDLE!!! SHE PULLED THE NEEDLE OUT!!! Once the needle goes in you do not pull it back out unless you hit a vein or your done!!! So then we start laughing again uncontrollably. Turns out she was playing DARTS WITH MY BUTT!!  She said she went to give me the shot and the needle bounced off my muscular butt! What in the world did she do wrong?? Oh well we tried again and I told her she better not poke me in the same exact spot and she promised she wouldn't because she could see the blood from where she poked me the first time. Awesome mom glad to know.. So finally we were done with both shots. I'm so thankful that was the last time she will be giving me my shot. Because I think I trust Adam more even though my mom and I get some good laughs each night when it becomes shot time haha. I'm sad she is going back to Texas tonight and I'm going back to NC but only a month and a half until Adam, the kids, and I head to Texas for Christmas!! WOW less than 2 months until Christmas! I hope yall are ready or almost ready :) BTW apparently I have to do these shots for another 8 weeks if I'm pregnant!! If not we start all over. So hopefully I'm pregnant and only have 8 weeks left!

BTW this is more of a spur of the moment blog not really thought out. Also if I'm not to tired tomorrow I will be going to buy a pregnancy test so I can test tomorrow night.. I may wait until Wednesday but either way I will update soon. Some people don't get positives until day 6+ so I wont be to worried if I don't get a positive just yet. It's still early.

My Almost 12 Hour Flight...

Days like today is why I prefer to drive instead of fly. I was raised with 4 brothers and every time we traveled another family member went with us so total we had 7 people going on vacation with us. Instead of spending thousands of dollars just on a flight we drove. Well lately I have been doing a lot of flying and each time I HATE IT! Now before I get any future let me correct myself or else whenever my husband reads this he will leave a comment about it haha. I don’t like driving I like riding along and enjoying the drive. I am not a good long distance driver. I can drive about 4-5 hours and I’m done… For the day. :) Driving makes me so tired and pretty much puts me to sleep but if I’m riding I can stay awake the whole time.

So today I got up at 6am with Adam because he had to leave for work and I wanted to see him before I left. Once he left I got back in bed for about 20 minutes and then started getting ready.. At 7am Brett’s alarm when off and I put him in the shower and then I woke Brynna up about 15 minutes later. Kelly (my friend) picked us up and we dropped the boys off with a friend of ours and headed to the airport. Thankfully the travel agent was able to find me a flight in budget that was out of the Fayetteville Airport that was only 30 minutes away. I got to the airport and for some reason everyone I dealt with was super cranky and just in a foul mood but I didn’t let that get me down. I was on my way to L.A.! Who can have a bad day when going to CALI? Well once we got on our plane they informed us that we were going to be delayed a bit due to weather in Charlotte. We ended up delayed about 30 minutes and then even more. My flight ended up landing in Charlotte at 11:15ish and my second flight was supposed to take off at 11:22. So I got my luggage and RAN to the next flight. Praying that for some random reason the flight was still there. Even though deep down inside I knew it was already gone or the door would be shut. I had to run, in flip flops, from Terminal E all the way to Terminal B and THEN to the end of Terminal B. Once I FINALLY got to my gate I was so excited because I saw people at the desk and the door was open. I was like YES!! I MADE IT! Then realized NOOO!!! It is departing to Atlanta NOT Los Angeles! I MISSED IT :( Instead of walking off and going to the starbucks that was calling my name, I ran up and asked if this was the plane to LAX and she said yes! OH MY GOSH I could have kissed her I was so happy. She said they actually shut the door 10 minutes ago but had to reopen due to all the delayed flights. I was the 2^nd to the last person to get on the flight and they shut the doors right behind us.

About 2-3 hours into the flight rumors started going around about someone getting shot or a shooting happened.. Finally we were told that a TSA agent was shot at the LAX airport!!!! WHAT IN THE WORLD?? I was terrified. I had no idea where my mom was. I had no idea what was happening. I didn’t know how bad LAX was. Was it a crazy person? A terrorist? Was this just the beginning of something worse? No one really knew. So the pilot came on and told us what he could and what was going to happen. Our flight was rerouted to Phoenix, AZ because the LAX airport had been completely shut down. No flights in or out! We ended up landing at the Phoenix airport and thankfully they let us off the plane until they got word that the airport opened back up. I called my mom immediately and turned out she didn’t even leave Dallas yet. The shooting happened before her flight left so they canceled her flight completely. I waited a bit just to see if we were going to leave soon and the flight attendant ended up saying that there was a chance we would not be leaving at all until the morning time!! Well my transfer is scheduled for 9am and I had to be there TONIGHT! So I called the travel agent that booked my flight and talked with her. Right when she was booking a new flight for my mom and me to land in Orange County my mom informed me that they were letting them board her flight in DFW. The travel agent ended up leaving our flight the same and I played the waiting game.
At 1:45pm we were told we would board at 3pm. 2:45pm came and it moved to 4pm. 4pm came and nothing BUT they started boarding other flights to LAX so I waited and waited and WAITED! Finally all flights to LAX were called to board their planes. Instead of going right then I waited 10-15 minutes, I could see my gate from where I was sitting and I waited until the line died down a LOT.

This is not the best picture but behind the people walking towards me, behind them is all the people waiting to get on their planes gate A30-A18 were all flights to LAX and they were boarding all the planes at one time.

We were finally all on the plane and the door was shut. Well then we find out we are stuck waiting for another hour. An hour turns into an hour and a half and then an hour and 45 minutes! I was thankful though that we could still use our electronic devices. So while I waited I started typing up a blog post and texted Adam for a bit. I am bummed that today didn’t turn out quite like I wanted it too but I am extremely thankful that my mom and I were not at the LAX airport whenever the shooting happened. Even though my whole day was spent flying and my plans were ruined I met and talked with some great people today that I will probably never see again. I got some AWESOME coffee and everything worked out :) I have a heavy heart for the family members of the TSA agent who was killed today at the LAX airport and I will be praying for them. I am also praying for the people who were injured. I am also thankful that they only had 1 casualty and that things didn’t end up worse. I still haven’t seen the news but it seems like they acted quickly and were able to save a lot of lives and capture the shooter.
My mom landed in LAX before I took off in the plane but we took off about 10 minutes after she landed. They were not letting vehicles in the airport so we had to take a bus to the rental car place. She ended up going right away to get the car and I was to meet her there. When I finally landed at LAX I went to baggage claim and didn't even wait to see if my suitcase was there. I just had this feeling it didn't make it. Heck I barely made it I double they had enough time to get my suitcase and move it to my plane. Turns out I was correct and my suitcase was on the next plane coming from Charlotte that also happened to land in Phoenix so I waited. AND WAITED(this day has been full of waiting cant you tell haha).

Turns out the plane was at LAX but was waiting on the tarmac and they had no idea when it'd get to a gate. So I told them I was starving and I'd come pick it up tomorrow. Thankfully I was smart and also took a carry on bag also and in my carry on I had transfer day clothes, a pair of pj's, my toothbrush, my laptop, the medications I have to take, and a dinner outfit for dinner last night(we didn't end up changing we just went straight to dinner because we were starving). So I was fine. The other things I knew my mom would have so I was finally done with flying and airports haha. FREEDOM!! Or so I thought. I still had to wait for the shuttle to go to enterprise to rent our car because due to the shooting they were not allowing vehicles into the airport but thankfully that part didn't take too long. Tomorrow I will update about the transfer. Wish me luck :)

OUCH!!! I Think My Husband Is Switching My Shots With Tranquilizers!!

So my shots were starting to get a little easier and I have learned a few things over time to make it less painful. I quit using the band aids the pharmacy sent me because those things hurt worse taking off than the shot actually hurt. I also warm up the liquid in the vial before I get the shot. I keep it in my bra for about 30 minutes to warm it up so it wont be as thick when injected. We have always massaged it afterwards to help the liquid move around and not make my butt "lumpy" haha.

Monday it was time to begin my second shot! I was so not excited about this but it has to be done. I got everything out and prepared it while Adam put the kids to bed. BUT what made this day even worse was that I was not only starting my second shot but it was also day 3 which means I will be doing the 1st shot(my 1st shot I started I only do it every 3 days). NOOO!!! So I had to do 2 shots on Monday. We decided to do them both in the same butt check instead of one in each cheek. I psyched myself out and kept freaking out like always BUT surprisingly whenever I let him give me the shot neither hurt that bad and it was quick and much easier than expected. I was so proud of myself. That night I started talking with another surrogate who is doing the same medication cycle that I'm doing and we were questioning things and comes to find out I read the instructions WRONG!!! For my delestrogen shot(every 3 days) I only take .2cc which is very little. For my progesterone shot I only did .1cc which is TINY!! But then was informed I read the calendar wrong instead of .1cc it was supposed to be 1 WHOLE cc!!!! I was freaking out! 1cc no way that can't be right! But turns out it was. Now let me tell you 1cc is MUCH more painful than .1cc. My butt cheek is STILL in pain and sitting on the toilet is almost impossible. I honestly have no idea how to make the progesterone shots better. But look on the bright side at least I don't have to do these things the WHOLE pregnancy :)  My biggest fear about the shots is him hitting a vein and having to redo the shot(before you inject the liquid you check for blood in the needle and if blood comes in the needle you know you have hit a vein and have to redo the shot)

We now have all mine and my moms travel stuff booked for the transfer! She will land in L.A. are few minutes before me and she will leave L.A. at 7pm and I will leave at 11pm(the joys of living on the east coast). But I am extremely thankful that this time that travel was able to book me a flight flying out of Fayetteville airport instead of Raleigh. I can't believe I will be leaving in 2 days! Adam starts a class that he cannot miss on the 1st so he won't be able to take me to the airport but I have an awesome friend here who will be taking me and picking me up once I get back. That's all for now about the surrogacy I will have LOTS more this weekend while I'm on bed rest :)

So now I have a question for yall. Are any of yall dressing up with your kids this year? If so what? And what are your kids dressing up as? The kids, Adam, and I went to a Halloween party this past weekend and had a blast. I think our costumes turned out great. I wished we could have done a family theme but we let the kids pick their costumes and my plan was Adam and I would match costumes but in the end Adam matched Brynna and I matched Brett. Here's a few pictures from the party

Brett wanted to be a blue Power Ranger so I was the pink Power Ranger. I added the tutu because the costume was pretty much a body suit and I just felt naked wearing it the way it was so I made a tutu.

Brynna wanted to be little red riding hood and I made her tutu dress but not the hood part. Daddy was the lumberjack who saves little red riding hood and her grandma from the wolf. Brynna has this wolf stuffed animal she carries every where with her and it was the big bad wolf.

Here is the back of Brynna's costume. BTW she has her arm around my friends son. It was the cutest thing ever.

Here is our family picture of our costumes :)

 Also if you have missed any of my blog post or if this is your first time read about it you can click here and get updated :) Hope you enjoy.

Kayla

You've Got To Take The Good With The Bad..

So Adam went to Florida for 2 weeks and what I didn't realize was 2 weeks is the longest the kids and I have been by ourselves.. Whenever Adam was in basic(10-11 weeks) and ait(4 weeks) the kids and I lived with my Gigi(grandma) and whenever he was in Korea before we moved with him we stayed living with her. So we were never alone. Adam has been gone before but I think the longest he has been gone is 5 days at the most and I think the furthest he's ever gone was an hour or 2 away and this time it was like 9 hours!! Now for those of y'all that are thinking he's in the military get use to it. Yes I know that but so far we have been lucky and he has not deployed yet(no I don't count Korea as a deployment because it's not a deployment, he doesn't have a deployment patch from it and there are military families living in South Korea with their spouse so no it's not a deployment in my book it's an overseas duty station lol). So I am counting this as practice and in my opinion we've been doing pretty good :).

Instead of being hermits and staying indoors, because getting out with 2 little ones can be pretty hectic by yourself, we have had fun. Brynna and I went grocery shopping and to hobby lobby to get all the supplies needed to make her Halloween costume. She is going to be little red riding hood. I did order the hood/jacket part because I'm not that crafty yet. This is my first tutu thing to ever make and I must say I'm proud of it :) I will be cutting the ties shorter this was just to see how it fit. I can't wait to see how it looks all put together though.

We also had a dinner date with some friends of ours. We went to eat at sonic and then had a movie night at their house. Today I had an frg coffee and a friend down the street kept the kids. They only live a couple houses down from us, normally we just walk over there and today the kids really wanted to walk. Well I wanted to drive because it was super hot out and I just wanted to drop them off and head to the meeting. So I decided I'd let the kids walk and I'd drive next to them. They thought they were so grown up and it was so funny watching them walk "alone".


I have realize that good and bad things will always happen when daddy has to leave. One day one I locked myself out of the bathroom which honestly isn't thatbig of a deal but normally Adam unlocks the doors whenever we look ourselves out haha. Finally 6 days later I decided to go get the key and unlock it. Day 2 Boidoe pooped in the house and normally I make up some lame excuse as to why Adam needs to clean it haha. But I knew if I left it there for 12 days and waited for Adam to get home to clean it that my house would probably really stink so I decided to suck it up and clean it. Another bad thing is the spiders decided now that Adam has left they will all come out and torture me!! They don't live long because I find a shoe and kill them while screaming haha. But some good things are my groceries last a LOT longer. The gas also last a lot longer, the car was only driven like 5 times the whole 2 weeks. I have more room in the bed. And I don't have to work around Adams schedule I can go and do as I please. Now don't get me wrong I miss him when he's gone and I'd rather him be home than be gone but I'm getting better about him being gone. Even though I don't think it's getting easier on the kiddos. The first night they did great but after that it went down hill. If they got to talk on the phone with him or leave him a voicemail they do much better. Here is Brynna one night having a break down about daddy being gone.

This morning when I woke up and checked my email I had an email from J&J and I was so happy to read that the schedule/calendar is being worked on. So I should get the schedule this week and I'm so excited to finally have a transfer date. Which really if you think about it this process really hasn't taken that long. We were matched the end of July and should be transferring in November!! I'm so excited to be going back to Cali. if any of y'all ever go to L.A. and y'all like sushi go to a place called B.A.D. Sushi they are seriously amazing and I can't wait to go back.

"You've got to take the good with the bad, smile with the sad, love what you've got, and remember what you had. Always forgive, but never forget. Learn from mistakes, but never regret."
- Unknown


Kayla

My 30 Hour LA Visit

I had an AWESOME time in LA. It was amazing. I completely forgot that it gets chilly there in the evening but thankfully it wasn't too bad.

Thursday morning I dropped the kids off with Kelly, a friend of ours who lives down the street, and headed to the Raleigh airport. For those of yall that dont know Kelly was one of the first 3 people I told about me wanting to be a surrogate(she may not even know this haha) I had to tell a few people and use them as references. Well one had to be near me and not be my husband. Kelly and I had just recently started hanging out with the kids and she was NORMAL! I have met other normal people but its very rare to come by haha. I liked hanging out with her and the kids liked her kids. I didn't want her to take it badly and not want to ever hang out again. Thankfully she took it great and offered to help anytime I needed it. I didn't want to abuse her offer but I REALLY needed someone to keep the kids while I went to LA. Adam was warned ahead of time he'd be in the field and I have no family here. I thought about interviewing people asap but was really nervous about some random person watching my kids for 2-3 days(I was leaving Thursday morning and wouldn't be home until Saturday morning. Adam was told he would be home Friday but you never know with the military he could of came home Sunday for all we knew haha) these kids are my life. I already knew I trusted her and the she has a son the same age as Brett and Brynna doesn't care as long as she's with Brett. PLUS she also has a baby and Brynna LOVES babies. Finally I asked her and SHE SAID YES! This took a huge weight off my shoulders but still made me super nervous. Not because I didn't trust her but because of what I was trusting her with. My babies. This was the first time Brett and Brynna have ever stayed overnight with ANYONE other than family. And I will show you the picture she sent me the first night that shows how the sleepover went. Another girl I know that lives across the street from us(I don't want to post her name because I don't know if she wants me to or not) offered to watch Boidoe for me while I was gone. She didn't know why I was leaving because I hadn't made it public yet but they were both HUGE lifesavers and helped out tremendously. Just because it wasn't my kids doesn't mean I would say yes to anyone who wanted to help with Boidoe. I needed to trust this person in my house. I had a few people offer but I was giving someone a key to come into my home without me there. And also Boidoe is our 3rd child if yall haven't noticed on facebook :) haha. So I wanted to give a BIG thank you to both of them :) Now back to the LA trip.

As you can tell they had a great time :)

My flight left at 11am but I had to leave at 7am to get there on time. Well I could of left about 8am but thankfully I left by 7:30 because what I didn't know was that the highway I PLANNED on taking was shut down and I had to go back and take a different route. Finally got to the airport and got on the plane..

Yup I got the VERY back of the plane. It was extremely LOUD! And to top it off there was no window? You know whenever you get on the plane or get your ticket and your like YES WINDOW SEAT? I don't know about you but I love the window seat. Then you get back to your seat at the VERY back of the plane and guess what Sorry about your bad luck we had a budget cut and couldn't afford a window for this row? BUT you get to enjoy the wonderful smell of human pee and crap. Hope you enjoy your flight. As soon as we landed for my second flight I went to the delta desk and asked to change my seat for the second flight. They only had one option available. It was only like 8 seats up but I didn't care haha. My second flight I tried sleeping but it just didn't work out. When I sleep I'm a mouth breather and I sleep with my mouth completely open. It's far from cute. And every time I'd start to doze off I felt my jaw drop open and I'd wake back up. So for the rest of the flight I played games.

I felt so old doing crosswords and drinking coffee but this flight was kicking my butt and I needed something to keep me awake. The coffee was disgusting but I just dealt with it. I NEEDED COFFEE!  

I played candy crush A LOT on this flight and even during the trip because I had a lot of down time. Well GUESS WHAT? I still have not passed this darn level. I even paid $2 extra to try and pass it and NOPE! (BTW don't tell Adam about me paying money for a game haha)

I finally got to the airport and the super shuttle picked me up and took me to my hotel. OMG TRAFFIC WAS HORRIBLE! I have only been to LA once and it was years ago we didn't really stop we just drove through. So I was glad I did not get a rental car. I got to the hotel and at first was a little disappointed. I thought it was an outside hotel. You know like those cheap motel/hotels where the doors are OUTSIDE and it just seems cheap and scary. Well once I really looked around I realized that it was an indoor hotel its just that the breakfast area was in the center of the hotel and that they had that open. It's hard to explain haha. 

I got to my room and was ready for bed but also starving. I knew I really wanted sushi but I also didn't want to go too far so I decided I'd just walk down the street and see what I found. Well as I was walking out the door I decided to ask the people at the front desk and they recommended a place called BAD Sushi and it was about 1/2 a mile walk but I was fine with that

The Sushi was AMAZING! And then I treated myself to some ice cream afterwards.

The next morning I woke up and got breakfast then got ready for the day.

Breakfast was okay. The coffee wasn't all that great but I'm picky when it comes to coffee so thats to be expected. It was better than the airplane coffee though haha. The chocolate muffin was good and the eggs were okay.. The cinnamon roll was a little too sweet. All in all I had a good, stay customer service was great and the people were really friendly. 

Friday afternoon around 11ish I finished packing and getting ready and at 11:45am they called for me a taxi to take my to my appointment. I got in the taxi and he asked me for the address I gave him the address and it took him a minute to figure out where it was. I didn't want him to know I was not from Cali so I told him it's about 5 minutes away(I mapped it on my iphone before we left) and he laughed and said "more like 20" then I realized CRAP I'm in LA not Fayetteville! LA traffic SUCKS! It was horrible! Thankfully it only took about 15 minutes but that was a $10 taxi ride and we only drove 2 miles! So I finally got to the appointment around noon and my appointment was at 12:30 so what did I do while I was there facebook, instagram, and took pictures. This office was GORGEOUS! Like I wanted to live bring my blanket and just move in haha. 

YES I had to make it EXTRA LARGE so you could see all the gorgeous details! It had 2 flat screen tvs, a pretty bench that is not pictured, Some coffee thing that I was too scared to use it made all different types of drinks, these 2 neat bench/seating things, and a bunch of pretty chairs. Oh and those pretty flowers. Just everything was gorgeous. Now lets move on haha.

So I got called back to the Doctors office. He had a bunch of questions. Do I smoke? No. Do I drink? On occasiona. Where do I live? Fayetteville. How many times I've been pregnant? Twice. How many children do I have? 2. Have I had an IUD? Yes. CRAP! I did not want him to ask me this. I already knew what would happen if he asked me this. WHY DID HE HAVE TO ASK THIS?? Well if you have had an IUD you have to go through something called a Mock Cycle? What is a Mock Cycle you ask? It is where you go through all of the pain and suffering for the transfer BUT you don't really do the transfer. The reason they do this is because say if my uterus has scarring from the IUD then my body would not react correctly to the mock cycle and they would not approve me to be a surrogate yet. So he gave me the prescriptions for the mock cycle medications and the instructions on what to do. I was so bummed out this was extra time and money being spent to see if I was going to be approved or not. I seriously wanted to cry. BUT I sucked it up and dealt with it. Then we went into a room and I had to have a ultrasound to check my uterine lining, ovaries, and just see how my baby making parts looked. His exact words were, "Well you know how I told you, you needed a mock cycle??" "Forget I ever said that." I was so confused and terrified? What was wrong? Was I pregnant? Did the IUD screw up my uterus THAT MUCH? WHAT? So all I can say was Oh no whats wrong? And he said, "Your uterine lining is perfect." YAY!! NO MOCK CYCLE!!! I was so excited! GO KAYLA AND MY SUPER BABY MAKING PARTS! After that I had to have my blood pressure checked. My blood pressure is normally 110/70 even pregnant my blood pressure is never over 120/80. The night before I started thinking to myself watch my blood pressure go high during the screening and them disqualify me for my stupid blood pressure. Well they checked my blood pressure and GUESS WHAT? It was 141/82? WHAT THE HECK! I was literally freaking out. I kept telling the nurse how my blood pressure had NEVER EVER been that high. So she checked it on the other arm. It went up to something like 144/84 or something like that. I was freaking out. Didn't understand why it was so high. So she told me to quit thinking about it, they would do the rest of the screening and someone else would check it. So I had my blood drawn.

I HATE getting blood drawn. My veins SUCK. I mean literally SUCK! Do you see a vein there? Nope! NOTHING! Thankfully they could faintly see the vein and only had to poke me once. The first nurse didn't want to do it because she didn't want to chance me having to get poked more than once. THANK GOD! Because that would of been a record breaker! Even though my veins are most of the time not visible I have only been poked once every time I have had to give blood. Now bad to getting my blood pressure taken again. HOPEFULLY for the last time.. A new nurse checked it and this time it was.... DRUM ROLL PLEASE.....  150/90!!!!!!!!!!!! ARE YOU FREAKING KIDDING ME! Was I dying? So the doctor came in and told me to lay down for a little bit and he would personally come check it... 30 minutes later he came back and check it manually and THANK YOU JESUS IT WAS BACK TO NORMAL! 104/74 or something like that I don't remember it was just NORMAL! 

YAY! I was able to leave the clinic now and go get something to eat. Last time I ate was breakfast around 8:30am and it was now 3:30pm! I WAS STARVING! So I started walking right across the street was this cute pizza joint and on the sign it said it was healthy. Healthy pizza? Sure why not haha. I got a veggie pizza to make myself feel a little better about it :) and it was delicious! I mean really really good. A lot better than pizza hut and papa johns ;) 

\

After I was done with pizza I thought about calling for a taxi to take me to the mall or something but instead remembered I saw a massage place down the street.. It wasn't really down the street it was like a mile away but I still decided to walk. It felt great out and I just wanted to see what all was around the area since I would end up going back in a few months. So I walked, and walked, and WALKED. It seemed like it took forever but I finally got there. I was SO excited to get a massage it had been months since I last had a massage. I planned on getting one on vacation but it was like $280 for Adam and I to get a massage at the condo so we decided thanks but no thanks. This place in Cali was only $45 for an hour. She told me to get undressed. I was only expecting a back massage so I took off my shirt and bra and kept my pants on. She laughed and told me to take everything off. So I took everything off but my panties. I cover up and lay down and she came back in. The first thing she did was pull my panties ALL the way off my butt! I was a little freaked out but I REALLY wanted this massage! She covered me up with towels and massage first on top of towels. I was like PLEASE dont let this be what she does the WHOLE HOUR! Where is the lotion and the skin to skin I want a real massage. 5 minutes go by and nothing. FINALLY she takes the towels off and gets the lotion! You don't know how excited this got me! My back has been killing me lately and she could tell once she went to work haha. That massage was AWESOME! I was a little uncomfortable and at times WAITING for her finger to go up my butt or something and that would of crossed the line. I would of grabbed my clothes and bag and ran out of the place BUTT NAKED! Not even kidding. The massage went great and I got over the fact that God and the massage therapist could see my butt for the whole hour massage. BTW WHILE I was getting this massage my phone kept ringing. I had it on silent but it still vibrates. I secretly charged it while I was getting the massage. I was using their outlets because my phone only had 8% left. I thought it was Adam but before I went into the massage place I text him and told him I was leaving the phone behind a counter to charge and not to call me because I wouldn't hear it. So I didn't know why he was calling. I think my phone vibrated like 10 different times. And it was not short vibrates they were long and loud -___- So once I was done and got dressed I looked at my phone. I had 6 missed calls and 2 text from MY MOM! I called her back and the first thing she says is "I thought you were kidnapped! Why didn't you answer my calls?" I told her mom I was getting a massage and you kept trying to interrupt me! She was like your in another state far away don't scare me like that! I didn't understand why you told Adam you were putting your phone behind a counter what counter were you using? You could of been kidnapped Kayla! I was like MOM I didn't put it behind a counter I just wanted to wait until AFTER the massage to tell Adam haha. But I was busted about half way through. I paid for the massage with my card and we have a joint account so he checked out account when my mom started to worry and that's when he realized that I wasn't kidnapped I was just getting a massage.. BUSTED! But whenever he realized that it was a 1 hour FULL body massage for just $45 he didn't care haha. Plus it could of been worse. 

I COULD OF BEEN KIDNAPPED! ;)

After that I headed back to the hotel. It was about another mile walk but I was in no rush. During that walk I saw about 8 different homeless people and seriously wanted to feed every single one of them. If I would of passed an atm or something I would of pulled out cash for each of them. It seriously broke my heart.. I have seen homeless people before but nothing like this. Once I got to my hotel I still had another 2 hours to kill. So I headed to BAD Sushi again! If yall can't tell. I'm in love with Sushi and this place is AMAZING! I plan on going back to this place whenever I go back to Cali for the transfer. This time I took my time walking and looked at all the different stores that were near it. I found a place called Blick or something like that. It was an art store and I almost didn't go in. But I saw these ugly cute stuffed animals in the window and decided to spend a few minutes in there to see if I found anything for the kids. I found something called a munny for Brett and got Brynna the ugly cute stuffed animal.

 If you must know what a munny is I have no idea. They have different kinds and colors. I got the iron man one because Bretts room is the avengers and it matched his room theme. Brett was so excited to put all the stickers on it whenever I gave it to him. Whenever I got back I will probably get a few more because he loved them.

I honestly had no idea what to get Brynna but she loves stuffed animals and loves pink so I got her this ugly cute stuffed thing. And she loved it! 

Once I was done with getting them these things I went and ate sushi and headed back to the hotel to wait for my shuttle. I got to my hotel probably 10 minutes before my pick up window started. My pick up window was from 7:30-7:45pm. The guy didn't get there until 8pm! I wasn't that worried UNTIL I realized holy crap we are picking up other people! PLEASE DON'T MAKE ME MISS THIS FLIGHT! I WANT TO GO HOME! Thankfully it was only one other person after me and we headed to the airport. It was 3 girls in the car along with the male driver and what do girls do? We talk haha. One of the girls and I were flying delta and the other girl was flying Korean Air. Turns out she was flying back home to Korea! A lot of yall may not know but about 11 months ago I moved back home from Korea. Adam was stationed in Korea for a year and the kids and I ended up moving there with him part of the time he was there. It was so neat meeting with someone who did kind of the exact opposite and moved from Korea to the US. She asked me how I liked it and I told her I LOVED IT! I asked her how she liked it and she said it was different but she really enjoyed it. She told me thank you for liking her country and I told her I was glad she enjoyed it here. It was so neat meeting here. SO I HAD to take a picture with her. She was so sweet and more than happy to take a picture with me.

Not the best picture but it was night time and I was using my front facing iphone camera and its not always the greatest. I got to my area printed out my boarding pass, got through security with no issues. Then got to my gate, sat down, and charged my phone. All the charging docks at the airport were taken so me being the rebel I am I sat down by an outlet that was not marked for charging purposes. Yep, I know.. I'm hardcore :) 

My flight was supposed to take off at 10pm. Do flights EVER take off on time??? NO! This did not make me happy. I was already exhausted. It was 1am North Carolina time. And I'm normally in bed and asleep before 11pm at home. They finally had us all loaded around 10:30 and we finally took off! This was the MOST uncomfortable plane ride! You know that massage I had earlier.. I needed another one. But just the butt massage part. My butt was SO numb and uncomfortable. It was miserable. I'm fine with tight spaces but the seat needed a LOT more cushion. I'd fall asleep for a few minutes and wake right back up. It was not a good sleep like I was expecting.. BUT on a good note. I sat 4 rows back from first class so I was considered at the FRONT of the plane. AND I got a window seat!! BIG BALLA!! I was so excited. Also I HAD A WINDOW. You remember at the beginning of this blog where I said my row did NOT have a window seat because I was the VERY last row of the plane. Well this time I got the window seat AND a window. I was pretty excited about that :) 

My plane landed at 6am North Carolina time. And they could not get me off that plane fast enough.. I was so uncomfortable, exhausted, I STUNK, and I needed sleep! But I was not cranky. I was still super friendly to everyone. Thats my southern hospitality in me :) So I got in my car turned on pandora and JAMMED OUT! I mean hardcore. My volume was on 30+ it ranged haha. Those of yall that think 30 isn't that loud.. Well in my car... IT IS! It only goes up to 40. I think? But I seriously JAMMED OUT! The whole way home. If I didn't know a song. O well I acted like I did. If I knew a song I sang it loud and proud like I was singing on stage for thousands to hear. THE WHOLE WAY HOME! I sang and sang and sang. That is what I do when I drive tired. Because if I don't sing. I chance falling asleep. And I did not want to do that. So I SANG! BTW it wasn't a short trip it was about 1 1/2 hours. I got home and guess what. I DIDN'T HAVE A HOUSE KEY! I gave one house key to the dog sitter and Adam had the spare. So I called Adam and thankfully he answered on the first try. I got home a little after 8am and crashed out. 

I was miserably tired but I MADE IT! Yes this is me after a 4-5 hour flight and about a 2 hour drive on about 3 hours of sleep! I don't look that bad do I haha.

I honestly have no clue if EVERYTHING is in here and right now I don't want to go back through and proof read. I'm so darn lazy haha. I will go back and reread it in a few days. My blog post will VERY rarely ever be this long because I'm not a fan of long blog post. But there was a lot that went on in those 30 hours it was hard to make this post short. So I hope you enjoyed reading it.

Kayla

Kayla, What In The World Were You Doing In Cali?

I thought about just keeping this blog private but decided this will be my way to I guess let everyone else that matters know. I also thought about not posting anything about it on facebook but it was awkward telling people not to post anything about it my facebook. This will become a big part of my life soon, it kind of already is and soon people will start asking questions. I know I live 1000 miles away from home but its weird being secretive. I didn't want to publicly announce on facebook so instead I was like how about I make a blog post about it and the people who want to really know will click on the blog post and actually read it. The people that don't care don't have to read it. So here it is..

Thursday morning I left for Los Angeles and a lot of people were wondering why I was there so this will be my "coming out" blog post to all the people that don't know yet.. Most of my close friends and family know. But it's getting to the point where I'm tired of having to feel like I have to hide it. I know not everyone is going to be understanding and not everyone will agree with what I'm doing it and I'm okay with that. My dad and my gigi aren't completely on board with it and don't agree with it and I'm okay with that. They told me why they wouldn't do it and why they think I shouldn't do it. I know they will still love me no matter what and I'm thankful for that. I know people will be vocal about how they feel about it and REALLY disagree and again I'm okay with that. If you want to delete me as a facebook or instagram friend okay that's fine with me. Well here goes nothing! I am going through the process to be a GESTATIONAL surrogate. The reason I put gestational in cap locks is because there are 2 types of surrogates a traditional(which I will never do) and a gestational which is the one I am doing. If you want to know the difference google it. One day I may make a blog post about it because it seems a lot of people do not know the difference and that seems to be why a lot of people don't agree with surrogacy.

I have put a LOT of thought into becoming a surrogate. Done a lot of research. Spoke with a lot of other surrogates who had good and bad experiences. I played with the thought for awhile and then one day brought it up to Adam, he was NOT on board at first. I mean he didn't even want to discuss it. Let's just say I was far from happy(he had to make his own sandwich for dinner that night haha). I wrote him a letter explaining why I wanted to do it and why I felt so passionate about it and then let the idea go. I had already began speaking with a few agencies, not to begin the process but to just get more information about their agencies. One night I planned on emailing the agencies and telling them thank you for their time but right now I was not ready to go forward with surrogacy. That afternoon he came home for lunch and all he said was, "I'm on board." I was like WHAT? He said, "I support you 100%" my face lit up like a Christmas tree. I did not want to become a surrogate unless I had Adams approval and support. This was not changing my hair color, getting my nose pierced, or anything that could be "temporary" this is a 12-24 month commitment and sometimes even a life long commitment. I mean I know that this will not be our child but this experience will change us for the rest of our life and I did not want to start this journey on a bad note with my husband. This was a commitment we BOTH had to make and be in together. So I decided on an agency and we went forward. We had to speak with social workers and I had to take some type of personality test and you can read about both of those experiences here and here. We were also paired with a set of IP's(Intended Parents) that ended up denying us and you can read about that here. But then we got paired with a new set of IP's and we were super excited whenever we got their profile. You can read about our experience when we skyped them here. Adam has been awesome during this whole experience and I know he will be great during the rest of it. We are both really excited about this experience.

So now to answer your question. Why was I in Cali? I had to go to a fertility clinic to be screened and the doctor there had to clear me to be a surrogate. I left Thursday morning and came home Friday night but landed in North Carolina Saturday EARLY morning -___- I really enjoyed the trip it was my first time since my girls trip to NYC to actually get away. But I really liked that this trip was just ME! It was very relaxing. I was really hoping Adam could go but he had to be in the field for work while I was gone. Tomorrow I will post the blog about my trip to Cali. I'm too lazy right now and tired. I only got about 5 hours of sleep and it was not 5 hours together it was 30 minutes here, 10 minutes there, 30 minutes again, 2 hours, and you get the picture right haha. If I didn't tell you I was going to be a surrogate before this post don't feel bad. I only told like a handful of people mainly my parents, my 2 best friends, a really good friend of mine here at Bragg, and that's about it.. I have way too much family to tell EVERY one of y'all. Plus I don't really have everyone's phone number anymore. It doesn't mean your not important. I still love all of y'all it just got overwhelming trying to tell EVERYONE. I guess that's it for now.
*If you would like to keep up with my journey you look over to the right and either follow me if you have a google account or blog or you can follow by email and whenever I post a blog you will get an email of it and can follow me that way. Also if you'd like to read my other blog posts you can click the my blog title at the top of the page.

Kayla
(If their are typos, I used the wrong there/their/they're, your/you're, or whatever else please forgive me I'm exhausted but can't go back to sleep until tonight so I decided to update my blog)


WOW! This is a quick edit. I did not realize how many views I'd actually get. Since I never publicly posted my blog anywhere I only got a few views from my surrogate friends I follow and that follow me. I think the most views I got in a day were probably around 20. It keeps slowly going up and is over 450 now but I was expecting maybe 100 views so whenever I realized I hit way over 100 I was amazed. Thank yall for viewing my blog :)

I Should Be Asleep..

BUT I'm going to update instead.. I know if I don't update now then whenever I get back from my mini trip to Cali I will have a LONG overdue and I'm not a fan of super long blogs. So what has been going on? I got our final contract. I didn't ask for many changes. Just a few and in my opinion they weren't outrageous. So most of them were approved. The one that wasn't I was okay with it just because we are only trying for one baby and they change had to deal with if I got pregnant with multiples. My next journey if I do a next journey I will change a few more things just in case I get paired with IP's(intended parents) who want to try for multiples. So now we have the final contract in hand and I have signed all of my spots BUT Adam left Monday morning and he has to sign to. So we wont be able to mail off the contract until Saturday whenever he gets back. I feel like I signed my life away. Their were 38 pages in the contract! I had to print out 2 contracts and will be faxing a copy and mailing both copies so I had to sign 16 times! But its for the legal part of the surrogacy to protect me, the IP's, and the child. I can't imagine someone being a surrogate without a contract.

Since Adam is in the field for a week training I will be going to this appointment by myself. I was kind of bummed out about it at first BUT also a little excited. I am able to have ME time with no kids and no hubby. Don't get me wrong I LOVE my kids and husband and love spending time with them but sometimes you need time to yourself. BTW at the ripe ole age of 22 I will be flying by myself for the first time. I have done tons of flying but never on my own. Always with family or friends. I'm a little nervous flying on my own but at least I will maybe get to sleep haha. But its times like these I wish we lived a little bit closer to family. Normally I'd have my mom, Adams dad, or my Gigi(my grandma) keep the kiddos if Adam was working or not home BUT now that we live 18+ hours away its not that easy. Thankfully I have met a good friend recently and my son and her son are the same age and she offered to help in the beginning whenever I told her I was going to be a surrogate. So whenever Adam got the news that he wasn't going to be here I asked her for a HUGE favor and she said yes. So the kids will be staying with her either until Friday whenever Adam gets back or Saturday whenever I get back(this is only if Adam doesn't come back Friday you never really know when they will be home until they are home). This will be the first time I have ever left the kids over night with someone that is not family =0 but I trust her :) now lets hope the kids don't scare her and make her run hahahaha. Well its 10:30pm here so I need to get some sleep. I will be waking up at 6am,probably should wake up earlier but if I wake up BEFORE 6am I don't know if I will be able to function the rest of the day haha. I guess thats all for now. I will update more Saturday or Sunday depending on how I'm functioning. I forgot to mention my flight LEAVES Cali at 10pm and LANDS in NC at 5AM!!!!!! But its only a 3 hour flight! Thats CRAZY! Darn time changes. Well I'm off to get my beauty sleep :)