1 Week Later..

The first week was harder than I expected.. From what I remember after my 2 kids I bounced back pretty quickly.. With Brett I had a harder time because he caused some bruising and swelling that made it painful for me to sit, laugh, sneeze, move, etc. But he was also my first. With Brynna I felt amazing after delivery. But this time around was totally different. I was really sore in my stomach area from them pressing down on it trying to get all the blood and clots out. I also hated that I had to go home and pretty much do nothing.. Thankfully I didn't have an infant I was bringing home because how can they send you home with an infant and tell you to relax and do nothing? It's pretty impossible after you have a baby to do nothing. haha. But since I was a surrogate and baby didn't come home with me it was a little easier..












The first few days were the hardest. I was EXHAUSTED but I wanted to go and do things. So we tried... On the 4th since it was only 24 hours after I had been released from the hospital we stayed home and watched the fireworks. We wanted to go watch the fireworks and to a concert but I knew my body wasn't up for it so we bought the kids a few small fireworks that they could do in the back yard and they had a blast. Saturday we ended up taking the kids to chuck e cheese.. About half way through I was pretty much having to hold my head up and force my eyes to stay open I was so exhausted. But the kids had a blast :) That evening we did another fire and just relaxed outside and finished off the s'mores we had left. Sunday I think we relaxed at home but honestly I have no idea haha.

Monday it was time to get back to reality. Adam is in the military and the people he works with knew I was pregnant and most of them knew I was a surrogate so when I went into labor Tuesday night he just gave them a heads up that I had the baby and that he wouldn't be at work on Wednesday. Thursday and Friday they were off but Monday he went back to work. So Monday morning he goes in for PT and they didn't know why he was at work they expected him to be home with me and told him if he wanted to that he could fill out the paperwork and go on paternity leave. Have I ever told y'all how much I really like the people he works with?? If not, let me tell you they are amazing! They have been so supportive and took me being a surrogate WAY better than I expected. AND he never once brought up maternity leave. I know a few surros in the military whose husbands requested maternity leave after their wife delivered a surrobaby and it was denied because it wasn't their baby.. We decided before hand to not even try for paternity leave because he doesn't really work now anyways. He is out processing and is just getting forms signed. He's constantly in and out of the house printing out paperwork, dropping off paperwork, and things like that. Even if he was on paternity leave he'd still have to out process so we could get everything done for us to leave in time. Plus again its not like I have a baby I need help with. Yes with my low blood count and iron I could pass out or hemorrhage again BUT I did good over the weekend and wasn't too worried plus if I noticed I was getting a little tired I'd just sit down and relax for a bit. And if I thought I was hemorrhaging again I'd call him immediately to take me back to the ER. So he was back at work.

Tuesday was a GREAT DAY!!! We finally got answers from the movers.. For those of yall that don't know we are moving soon.. VERY SOON. July 18th is the last day we have in this house.. Well the transportation office and port call have been making this move EXTREMELY stressful. I finally just gave up and was just done with everything and told myself that this was just going to be a horrible PCS and that they were going to make everything as difficult as possible. Which they did. Transportation scheduled the movers for August 5th(YES AUGUST 5th not August 1st) and we have to be out of housing by July 18th.... AWESOME. AND my husband has to be at Fort Sill, OK no later than July 24th.. Well Tuesday we got a call from the movers and they were able to fit us in to pack up our house on the 17th and pick everything up on the 18th!! YAY!! Then we had to schedule our move out inspection and pre inspection. The pre inspection was the following day and thankfully everything went well on that.

Wednesday I had a chiropractor appointment and boy did that feel great. I think its been about 3 weeks since I last saw the chiropractor and I was in a lot of pain. I felt like such a little kid because before I scheduled my appointment I had to call Adam and see what his schedule was like and make sure he could drive me to my doctors appointment. Wednesday was also 1 week from delivery.. WOW... A week. Surrobaby was officially 1 week old. I couldn't believe 1 week passed by so quickly. How does it do that. Before we know it she will be walking and talking haha. J&J said she is doing great. She had her first doctors appointment and is healthy :)

Emotionally I feel great.. Physically and sometimes mentally I'm exhausted. I don't even want to go back and read my previous blog post because I have a feeling I had a lot of typos in it and probably some bad ones haha. Adam and the kids have been doing great helping me relax and just lay around. I'm up moving more than I was in the beginning but its more my choice and I know not to push myself too hard and to just take it easy. Pumping is going great. I can tell it is also helping my uterus contract and go back down to normal. But I also know that it'll take time for that to go back to normal too. I gave in and bought a belly bandit.. I like it and wished I would have started using it sooner haha.

My last baby bump photo. This was a few days before delivery..



My one week post partum picture.. On the left I'm not
wearing the belly bandit. On the right I am wearing the
belly bandit. Everything is still wiggly but not too bad.

Questions I've been asked lately..

Was it weird to leave the hospital without a baby?
A little bit. I had a few tears(I didn't cry I held them in haha) as I was being wheeled out but it wasn't sad tears it was more wow it's over...

Were you sad?
Not at all.. I was happy for J&J, their daughter, myself, and my family. I was also very proud of myself. I had just given J&J the best gift they could ever receive. And I knew she would be loved by both of them.

How did the kids do and did they get to meet her?
They did great. They got to meet surrobaby and see her with J&J and they knew she was going home with them and not us. And they were perfectly fine with that.

Will you do another surrogacy?
This is one of the hardest question for me to answer I honestly have no idea.. I would love to be medically cleared in 6 weeks and start the matching process all over again but I wont. My body needs time to heal and I want to focus on getting back in shape. I'd love to start running again and doing some fun runs with the family. Plus we're in the process of moving... We are actually moving in just a few days!! AHHH!! And then we will be moving again in 10 weeks.. So I want to focus on that. AND I want to spend time with my family not pregnant. Yea we had fun while I was pregnant but their was some stuff I wanted to do and being pregnant made it a little more complicated haha. I'd like to sit out back and have a few drinks with my husband while the kids are asleep or go ride fun rides at 6 flags with my son, and jump on a trampoline with my kids. Well that's still a little complicated after you have kids haha.. So honestly I have no idea ask me again in about a year or five haha..

Will you continue blogging?
Yes I will. I will continue blogging. I really enjoyed blogging. It wont be as often because things slow down a lot once you deliver but surrogacy will always be a part of my life. BUT I will also blog about our moves, living in Alaska, and if/when I do another journey I will start blogging about that process.. BUT I may just create another blog for our life in Alaska :)

Those of yall that want to read the delivery story its in the previous blog post :)

36 weeks.. WE WILL HAVE A BABY WITHIN THE MONTH!!

When I say "we" what I mean by that is I will be delivering J&J's baby sometime within this next month. As each week passes it gets more and more real. Am I scared, anxious, nervous, excited, etc. like I was with my own children? YES. But it's different. I am so extremely excited to give J&J their very first child. I am scared and nervous because things can go wrong. Even though I have had 2 easy deliveries with no complications, every delivery is different and you just never know. ALSO I'm a planner and I cannot plan anything right now haha. But I keep telling myself it'll all work out in the end... It always does.

Last week my OB had my iron levels checked and they were at 7.4(extremely low) I expected them to check them again this week but they wanted to wait until 37 weeks so next week I will have my iron levels checked again. My blood pressure was a little high again this week but nothing too bad thankfully. I had the group b strep test done and the OB checked to see if I was dilated.. I was HOPING for at least 1cm but nope... Nothing. She is still extremely high and no dilation what so ever :( I know dilation doesn't really mean much but still it was a little depressing that the doctor could barely reach my cervix haha.

How far along: 36 weeks
Total weight gain: 13.5 pounds
Maternity clothes: No new maternity clothes..
Stretch Marks: honestly I have no idea. I know I have stretch marks but I don't know if I have any new ones this pregnancy.
Sleep: Is becoming impossible. I'm either hot, have to pee, cant get comfortable because I want to sleep on my stomach but cant, or I'm not tired haha.
Best moment this week: surrogacy related- having as much energy as I did this past weekend while we were on our little vacation. Not surrogacy related- Getting our new furniture and getting Adams amended orders with me and the kids on it saying we were approved to move to Alaska.
Miss anything: sleeping through the night, not peeing every 5 minutes, WINTER!!!(its so darn hot!)

 Movement: Oh yea.
Food cravings: McDonalds breakfast, ice, watermelon(I have a love hate relationship with watermelon, I love eating watermelon but I hate cutting it up haha)
Anything make you sick: Normally no but yesterday as I'm sitting in gymnastics these people start talking about how miserable they were during the beginning of their pregnancy. For some reason seeing a pregnant women makes everyone start to talk about when they were pregnant right in front of that pregnant women... But they start talking about morning sickness and vomiting. I'm sorry but SHUT IT! If you make me vomit I'm going to turn around and make sure it lands on YOU!
Have you started to show yet: yes
Gender: It's a girl!

The cankles don't look too
bad in this picture but my
right ankle always swells
more than my left.

Labor signs: I have BH daily. Sometimes they are a little worse than others..
Belly button in or out: In/flat
What has your mood been: frustrated at the military, tired, uncomfortable haha
Looking forward to: delivering surrobaby :)
Any issues: I'm severly anemic and my feet swelling has been horrible! And extremely uncomfortable. They got HUGE this past weekend but now that we got our new couches I have been able to prop them up a lot so that's helped.
Baby is the size of: a large cantelope

Upcoming Dates:
June 26th- OB appointment
June 29th- Adams Birthday
July 16th- DUE DATE!
July 20th- We move(hopefully)



Our new couches in our living room. I'm not posting our bedroom furniture
until we get to Alaska and get the new bedding put on it.

Also if you'd like to read about our trip to outer banks this past weekend you can click here and it'll take you to the blog post about it.

Primitive Camping While Pregnant..

This weekend Adam had a long weekend and I knew I wanted to go to the beach. We only live 2-3 hours from the beach and pretty soon we will be having a BIG change of scenery so I want to enjoy the beach life as much as possible. So I had to decide WHICH beach. We have so many beaches to choose from. I knew I didn't want to go to Myrtle, nothing against myrtle beaches BUT we have already been to Myrtle 4 times and I wanted to experience a different beach. So I ended up picking the Wilmington area. A lot of people recommended some places to stay and one of them was a camp ground. Now I know what your thinking. I was thinking the same thing. Camping at 32 1/2 weeks pregnant....... ARE YOU CRAZY? Ummm... Maybe.. Just a little. BUT I kept looking for hotels just in case I found one for a decent price. Every day I kept going back to the camp grounds and looking more into camping. Brett has been begging to go camping so I thought it'd be perfect to do camping and the beach at the same time. So I brought it up to Adam and we decided to do the camping and beach. And we planned our weekend at Fort Fisher camping grounds and Kure Beach.

I did LOTS of research and I mean LOTS!! What to eat while camping because if we were going camping we were doing it right. What to take to cook and drink. Fun camping activities. And things to do in the area so that away Monday on our way home we could stop at a few places and enjoy more of the area. I also called my dad to get his camping advice. He gave me lots of good tips and advice about primitive camping. My MAIN issue with the whole camping thing was no electricity and the toilets being far away.. When I say far away what I mean is it's not 5 steps from my bed. I'm 8 months pregnant I get up NUMEROUS times a night to pee.. And I am not an outdoors person that can just "pop-a-squat" when I need to pee. Even if I was how in the world do you do that at 8 months pregnant???? I'd probably end up falling over and landing in my pee or peeing on myself and waking everyone up. Can you imagine looking out your tent to this really pregnant woman, shorts to ankle, rolling back and fourth, scream and crying, in her pee!! Yea that's what I imagine when I think about popping a squat pregnant or not pregnant.

Thursday we went and bought the camping items we needed that we didn't have. Friday we(I) spent cleaning and getting all our stuff together while Adam went fishing with a friend. Friday evening Adam packed up the van while I ran to the store and grabbed some last minute items. Saturday morning Adam did the color run with some of the guys he works with and by noon we were off.. We were all so excited and I was a bit nervous. All I kept thinking about was no electricity.... No close toilets.. Oh what joy. BUT I found out some friends of ours were also going to the same camping area as us and was excited about that. The reason I was bummed about the no electricity was because I needed a plug to blow up our air mattress.. I was NOT sleeping on the ground with just a few blankets. I am a stomach sleeper. Yes at 8 months pregnant I STILL sleep on my stomach. It is the only way I can sleep. I don't sleep completely on my stomach. It's a weird sideways stomach position. No it doesn't hurt me or the baby. It is the only way I can sleep. BUT I cannot sleep that way on hard ground because it's extremely painful. I also can't sleep on my back because I feel like I'm being suffocated from the inside when I do, and sleeping on my side hurts my back.


Saturday when we got there we set up camp and got everything organized as best as possible. Then I was on a mission to find an outlet to blow up my air mattress. I found one in the locker rooms but was trying to see if I could find one closer. Surprisingly right next to my tent was this metal box that looked like it could be for an outlet so I asked Adam to open it and check. Sure enough IT WAS! I have never been so happy to find a plug before :) After we got everything set up the adults played corn hole while the kids played soccer. For dinner that night Adam made some delicious burgers. Then we waited for the sun to go down and headed to the beach to look for crabs.  I think we were to the point of giving up and they finally found some..

Sunday morning I woke up around 4:30am... It may have been earlier it may have been a bit later but I know it was before 5am and I know it was before the sun came up. The reason I woke up was because I had to pee.. I tried anything and everything to fall back asleep because I was NOT walking to the restroom by myself and getting attacked by a deer or kidnapped! I even had a moment of weakness and considered popping a squat but just couldn't bring myself to even try.. So I laid in the bed with my eyes closed and NOTHING! I honestly have no idea how I didn't pee myself. When the sun finally came up I got out of my tent and walked to the restroom to pee.. Little did I know I actually was about to have the runs. AWESOME!! Camping at 8 months pregnant, no close restrooms, a weak bladder, and NOW I HAVE THE RUNS!! Last time I went camping was EXACTLY 3 years prior and guess what, I had the runs then too.. BUT I pretty much OD'ed on pepto on the way to our campsite and it helped a lot. BUT guess what you cannot take while pregnant?? PEPTO! Thankfully it wasn't too bad but that morning I ended up clogging the toilet!! SERIOUSLY! I am in this disgusting restroom just laughing at myself wondering WHY DID I THINK CAMPING WAS A GOOD IDEA??? And then a knock on the door!! I just clogged 1 of 2 toilets for the tent camping area we were in. AND whoever was knocking on the door would see my face and know I CLOGGED THE TOILET!! NOOOO!!!! Then I saw the plunger. I tried everything possible to unclog that toilet and it did not work. I am the worst when it comes to plunging a toilet. I have no idea what I'd do if the kids flooded the toilet while Adam was gone. Thankfully though everything went down except for a few pieces of toilet paper. I walk out and its the lady camping next to us with her 2 little boys. Hopefully since she has kids of her own she understands you cant always control it. Before this pregnancy I NEVER went number 2 in public but this pregnancy has done things to me that I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy haha.

I head back to our tent and everyone slowly starts to wake up and I decided to start on breakfast. I made eggs mixed with sausage on the grill :) The group of people we knew that we were camping by were heading back home today but we were spending the day at the beach and spending the night one more night. So they packed up and we all had to wait until 9am whenever reception opened. Once reception opened they headed home and we headed to the beach.

We get to the beach and find a perfect spot. Close enough to the beach but not too close. Or so we thought. Everyone puts sunscreen on and the kids go running to the water. We have been to the beach 4 times and they love playing in the water. They know not to go too far but to still enjoy it. This beach was NOTHING like what they have experienced before. The waves were rough and the current was strong. They were slamming people down and taking

them under. Brynna was SITTING on the sand. The water came up and flipped her over. I brought both kids up and explained that they could play in the water BUT they did not need to go in too deep. Or they'd have to sit out because the water was a little more dangerous this time. Did they listen. Nope. So we decided to just sit and watch and sure enough they learned quick. Brynna gave us a little scare and I took off running!! She didn't realize that even though she wasn't that deep the waves were high and it pushed her down, she did some turns and flips under water and I grabbed her out of the water. After that I made her play in the sand right beside us. While at the beach both kids had to pee.. What do you do when you need to pee at the beach?? YOU PEE IN THE OCEAN! All the animals do it so why can't we? Neither kid understood that EVERYONE pees in the ocean. Brynna kept trying to but the waves would push her over before she could get it to come out. I thought the kids were going to let their bladders burst instead of peeing in the ocean. But FINALLY they both peed in the ocean and turns out so did the little boy next to us and the little girl that Brett and Brynna were playing in the sand with. Yea she peed in the ocean too. And they ALL announced it to the world. Finally we decided to head back to the camp site take showers, do some fishing, and start dinner.

 

My main complaint about the whole camp site out of everything was the lack of showers and lack of restrooms. They had a community shower by our camping area and it had 2 shower heads but only 1 worked.. Thankfully we got their first and didn't have to wait but by the time we got out their were 2 people waiting and by the time we left the locker room their were 6 people waiting. After showers we headed to the fishing pier and Adam did some fishing. The kids and I headed back before Adam and we started to get all the dinner stuff ready. We had chili dogs with baked beans for dinner and it was so good! After dinner we started to pack up so that in the morning we wouldn't have too much to pack. Then we made s'mores and headed off to bed. For the first time in a LONG time I didn't get up in the middle of the night to pee!! It was amazing!

 

Monday morning we had muffins and donuts while we finished packing up the car and then headed off.. We decided to skip the beach that day and took the kids to a Children's Museum and they had a BLAST! I think they liked the museum better than the beach.. It really was such a fun and cute place. We spent about 2 hours at the museum and then stopped at Nick's Diner in Wilmington for lunch. After lunch we walked down the street a couple blocks and got ice cream at Kilwin's. The line at Kilwin's was long but it went fast and was worth the wait.





My left ankle isn't too swollen here but
my right one was swollen

After that it was time to head home. Within 10 minutes both kids were out and stayed asleep for about 75% of the drive. On the drive home my feet felt a little weird. I take a look down and they were HUGE! I could not believe how swollen my ankles/cankles were. With my previous 2 pregnancies I never had cankles BUT I also wasn't due mid summer. Apparently heat=swelling. So YAY! I get to enjoy the cankles this pregnancy. The swelling has gone down a lot and I have a little shape but they aren't my NORMAL ankles! Finally we got back to Fayetteville and had to run a few errands before we could go home for good. But once we got home we unpacked, showered, and called it a night! We were exhausted! I don't know how I woke up this morning and I have no idea how I didn't take a nap today but we had a GREAT weekend and honestly I really enjoyed camping. We will probably go back before we move. Which means I will be camping again while pregnant. But hopefully we figured out my stomach issues and this time I will just have to deal with the late night peeing :)

It's Almost Show Time!

Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday were busy days of talking with the agency, the clinic, and waiting. Lots of waiting. Wednesday I got an estimated schedule BUT I was told that J&J were trying to move the date by a few days. Which would actually work out better for me. So we had to wait until Thursday to know for sure. I waited for the email to get the new dates and they decided to keep them the same. So for now as long as nothing changes the transfer will be sometime between November 1st-3rd. I will fly to Los Angeles the day before transfer and then fly home probably 2-3 days later. So I could be in LA a total of 4-5 days. I am hoping that the transfer is either on the 2nd or 3rd because if it is on the 1st I will miss Halloween. I know Halloween may not be a big deal to most people but this year I made my daughters Halloween costume. This year is also the first year my husband is going to be able to go trick or treating with us. Every year he has been working or gone and next year he may not be here for Halloween either so I have really been excited for this Halloween. BUT if I have to miss Halloween I am just thankful that Adam will be able to be with the kids and enjoy Halloween with them.

Well Thursday we got the estimated dates and Thursday I was told that I would receive a package on Friday with all of my meds I will have to take, and they emailed me a cycle schedule. I start my first shot(delestrogen) Sunday or Monday depending on when AF(Aunt Flow) comes. Also if AF doesn't come by Sunday morning I have to go get blood work done at my local monitoring clinic, which is not local at all. It is 1 1/2 hours away. The joys of not living in or near a big city. Even though in my opinion Fayetteville is a big city. Friday I stayed home most of the day waiting and waiting for that package. By 2pm nothing. So I walked down the street to a friends house. We only live like 7 houses down but you can see my house from her house and the FedEx truck passes her house to get to mine. So I knew I'd see it heading to my house. At 3pm I received a phone call from the pharmacy that was mailing the package asking if they could mail it to me Monday.. Umm.. WHAT? I have been waiting for a package that was not even mailed haha. But I explained to them that I needed the meds ASAP because I would have to start them by Sunday or Monday. Thankfully they overnight them and they mailed them that day instead of waiting so I would receive them by Saturday. Well we have been planning to go to a place called Hubb's Corn Maze with a some friends and their kids and guess which day we were going. Saturday. I decided we would still go to the corn maze but PRAY that it came before we left. We weren't planning on leaving until around 12:30 so it should come before then. Plus it didn't need a signature like I thought it did so they would leave the package.
It's funny how things work out... Whenever we were getting in the car to leave the FedEx truck turned down our street and thankfully had the package I needed. So my nerves were put to rest.. Those of y'all that live in NC I really recommend Hubb's Corn Maze my kids(5 and 3 1/2) had a blast and my husband and I also liked it.

This is the jump pillow and they loved it. Brynna face planted but thankfully it didn't hurt.

Both kids loved the slides(daddy did too haha)

Then was time for the corn maze. I have never been to a corn maze before it was really neat. I'm not good at reading maps, I like technology and just listening to my GPS give me directions but it was fun reading the map and finding all the checkpoints.

After the corn maze we let the kids play for a bit and then headed home. We did dinner at a friends house and the kids were going to spend the night afterwards. Well since they only live a few houses down we went home first bathed the kids and then headed over. Adam went first because I still had to get Brynna dressed and he was going to grill his burgers. We were about 5 minutes behind him and whenever I walked in the door everyone yelled SURPRISE! I was not expecting a surprise party. They played it off good. Brynna was even surprised. Kelly made me a cake and it was GOOD!! This is my first birthday away from home and things like that make being away from home a little bit easier.

 

Since AF still had not come we had to be up early to head to the monitoring clinic an hour and a half away. I had to be there at 8:30am but since it was on a Sunday the fertility clinic called me on Friday and told me to call the clinic on Sunday before I drove there to make sure they were open(I'm not sure why they didn't check before they put it on my schedule but o well). So Sunday morning I woke up and AF still had not made her appearance!! So I called the monitoring clinic and no answer plus it said they were closed on Saturday and Sunday on their message. Which meant that I would now have to go Monday morning unless AF decided to finally show. Thankfully a few hours later she finally did and now I wont have to make the drive until the end of next week. I will have blood work and a sonogram to check my lining to make sure it is good to go for transfer. 

Sunday I also went through and made sure everything I needed was in the package and ready to go on Monday. Plus I also wanted to see what I was going to be getting stuck with. I'm going to make Adam give me my shots and I'll probably cry hahaha. I haven't had a shot in 2 1/2 years and that shot was PAINFUL!! I still remember how bad that thing hurt. So lets hope this one isn't as bad because I will be doing it every 3 DAYS!!

Look at how huge the needles on the right are they are 18 1/2 gauge needles. Thankfully those are not the needles I will be injecting myself with. Those are just the ones that I will be using to put the medicine in the syringe. The green needles on the left are the ones I will be injecting myself with(23 1/2 gauge needles)

 

 

Look at these horse pills! Goodness I wonder if I am allowed to cut them in half? I have been swallowing pills for years and have never had an issue with swallowing pills but big pills like this I am not a fan with. I always cut my prenatal pills in half whenever I was pregnant with my kids so hopefully I can do the same with these. 

I guess tomorrow I will update with how painful or painless the shots were and how long it took me to get the balls to let Adam give me a shot haha.

Back To Reality I Go.... Do I Have To???

Well we have been on a week long vacation with the family, my mom, younger brother, my mom best friend(who is really like my aunt, she was there whenever I was born), her 2 kids, and it was a BLAST! We stayed at North Beach Plantation and it was AMAZING! We were upgraded from a 3 bedroom to a 4 bedroom just because(I wasn't going to complain it didn't cost us anymore than the 3 bedroom). I would recommend them in a heartbeat. My only complaint is their customer service wasn't too great. It wasn't bad but it wasn't the best. It was a HUGE condo area that had a choice between houses or hotel type condos. The houses were not right on the beach so we decided on the hotel condo and we did not have any regrets.

It had 2 kiddie pools that were like 1 1/2 feet deep, a 3 foot pool that was great because Brett could touch but he could also swim in it, a pool with a swim up bar that was also 3 feet deep but it was adult only with little tables in the water, another pool that went to about 5 feet that the older kids liked, 3 hot tubs, 2 other pools that started out 3 feet but went to about 4 feet, and another pool that we actually didn't get it so I'm not sure how deep it was haha. 

Then the beach was right outside the gate from the resort. It was so peaceful at night just relaxing on the balcony and listening to the waves crash and some nights we were able to watch fireworks go off on the beach. We also got to pop fireworks ourselves and the kids loved the sparklers and bottle rockets or whatever they were called. 

 

 

We went to a place called Broadway that we should of went to before our last evening there but we still enjoyed it. If you ever go to Myrtle or North Myrtle Beach I recommend going there with or without kids. TAKE CASH! They have ATMS but still just take cash

The kids were AWESOME(all the kids were awesome, not just mine)! Brynna wasn't a fan of the water at the beach but she enjoyed playing in the sand. She was a little afraid of the waves(her words not mine) but the last day she did great jumping in the waves. Brett loved the beach(water, sand, waves, and everything else). Adam was stung by a jelly fish in the beach on day 2 or 3. Thankfully it wasn't too bad but you could kind of see the red lines of where he was stung. He wasn't for sure if it was a jelly fish because the water wasn't too clear while we were there but he was around a few people whenever it happened and they agreed it was probably a jelly fish. I ended up also dropping my phone in the ocean while taking pictures. Typically ME! haha. Did I mention that I have an iPhone 5? Thankfully I have an otterbox and keep it on my phone at all times. It was only in the water for 1/2 a second and it hit mainly sand but thank you otterbox for saving my iPhone :) BUT since the otterbox saved my phone from the ocean the ocean stole Adams ray ban sunglasses which were not cheap. You win some you lose some haha. The last day we were there he wore his ray bans in the ocean and the waves were hitting hard and coming one right after the other and somehow they were on his face one second and gone the next. He tried to scoop them up but missed them and they were gone like that. So I guess those will go on his Christmas wish list? 

Adam and I also got a date night with a guy that he works with and the guys girlfriend. It was nice getting a night out as husband and wife.

Overall we had a great week. It was so much fun we asked to stay an extra night and at first they had no open rooms available and it was completely booked full but the last night we were there we called to ask one more time if we could extend our stay and guess what??? A ROOM OPENED UP! It was only a 3 bedroom but it was just for one night so it worked out great in the end.. And we got to enjoy one more day and night at the beach!! We had a great time but now it is time to go back to reality. Adam goes back to work on Monday and its back to reality. Time to prepare for our screening appointment in California the beginning of next month and continue our surrogacy journey. We emailed with the IF's over the past week and it was great hearing from them. I cant wait to meet them and start the real part of the journey(signing contracts/making it official) and then GETTING PREGNANT(I cannot wait to tell them that I am officially pregnant I think that will be the best part besides the delivery). Well that's all for now.

Kayla