Seventeen......

It’s now at the 17 week mark and things are starting to feel real, we know we’re pregnant, we know we are having a girl, and we know she is healthy! We know the birth will be here quicker than we know it!

Things are starting to take shape in the baby’s room; Daniel is painstakingly drawing out and painting two walls in the nursery, spending the amount of time and detail that I’m sure the artists took when painting the ceilings of the Sistine Chapel. It is going to be amazing once he is done.

Daniel’s family is already buying little baby girl outfits showing their excitement for their first grandchild, and all in all everyone is as happy as can be.

Our baby is developing quickly, her bones are developing, she can hold her head erect, and she is making facial movements. She is even starting to hear this week, which the only down side is that we are not there to speak to the surrogates tummy in hopes that our little girl can get accustomed to our voices. We are not complaining though, we know we are lucky to even be going through this process and although we are doing this at a distance we feel like two of the luckiest people in the world right now!

Two Dad's and a Little Girl....

09:21 am Saturday morning we finally received news from our latest ultra sound that took place yesterday and we are happy to announce that it looks like we are having a perfect little baby Girl!!! We are so excited for this news!!

The ultra sound was scheduled to take place yesterday mid morning and we received an update from Sindy stating that the ultra sound would be a little delayed since one of the doctors was called into an emergency delivery. To calm our anxiousness she sent us a few pictures of our surrogate’s baby bump which was a great surprise, since we really have had no contact at all with the surrogate and it was nice to see the person (or at least half of the person) that is carrying our little girl !

The rest of the day we waited by the email to get the ultra sound and soon the day became evening and the evening became morning…..We finally received the email early this morning and suddenly all was well with the world again. The excitement spread throughout our friends and family once the phone calls started happening and now everything seems so real. A baby girl!

It’s exciting to now think that we can finally paint the room and pick out some items knowing that they are for a girl. There will be pinks and purples in a house that is predominantly beige's and browns. A little color never hurt anyone anyhow……

Fifteen......

The past week has been an uneventful week for us, there haven’t been too many updates, except our surrogate has stopped feeling the effects of morning sickness, and has started to have the healthy pregnancy glow that people talk about. This of course was told to us by our doctor Sindy, although we are unable to see these small changes in person but continuing to learn about all updates through email.

The only other thing that happened this week was we had to make our first trimester payment to the hospital in Panama. We have mixed emotions about this since it is a huge amount of money that we have to part with, but it does mean that we are one step (or trimester) closer to having our baby home with us safe and sound….

We follow the progress of our baby day by day by means of a book we have been given by a friend, as well as an IPhone app that I downloaded onto my phone (Baby Pregnancy Tracker); this to us is the only form of visually seeing the advancement of our baby and what is happening on a daily basis. Today marks 15 weeks 2 days, our baby is making lots of movements now, also can move and bend its arms. Our baby is actually making hiccup sounds; they learn this even before they start to breath. Our little baby is growing quickly now, and it is the size of an apple! Imagine that, just not too long ago our baby was the size of a sesame seed.

Next week both Daniel and I will be on pins and needles, this will be the 16^th week ultra sound on Friday and our Doctors say they will probably be able to tell us the gender of our little one. This is where the fun and excitement starts; painting the nursery, picking out decorations, narrowing down our list of names, and finally knowing a lot more about what our baby will be and imagining our lives with our little son or daughter…..

Fourteen......

Week 14 already and we are already in March, soon it will be spring and the anxiousness of going down to Panama for the birth of our baby will be all we can think of!

This past week has been exciting for both Daniel and I, we are feeling more and more confident of being able to start getting things done in preparation for our new one!

We moved out all the furniture in our soon to be nursery and have started looking at colors and patterns we want to put on the walls, all of this of course will be decided on March 16^th when we learn the gender of the baby.

We also had our first shopping experience at the local Babies R Us store…fortunately we had the assistance of some good friends of ours that walked us through the pros and cons of several hundred baby items, and within three hours (yes three hours!) we were able to choose the most kick ass stroller that would make any new parent proud! So proud in fact that we have the stroller sitting up in our bonus room displayed next to our flat panel television like it was a work of art that should be admired at every opportunity.

Our baby is the size of a lemon this week, so small still but has grown so much in the last few weeks. With each week that passes the size will start growing at a faster pace, this is the most important part of the pregnancy. This week also our baby starts practicing to inhale and exhale. It can grasp, squint, frown, and grimace. Pretty soon will be moving and twitching on its own and this is when the surrogate should start feeling all of these movements. This is one part of our process that we will miss, and are envious of other parents that can experience the baby kicking and moving. For us it’s a sacrifice we knew that we would have to make in order to have a baby of our own, and once we hold it for the first time in our arms we won’t feel like we missed a thing!