Forty Sixty Dinner Party

This month my parents will have been married for forty years and my mother will have been alive for sixty years.  To celebrate this milestone (achievement) my parents engaged a private chef to cook for us all on Saturday evening at our house.

It was a night of tiny crab cakes, pulled pork on bite sized cheddar biscuits, green salad, scallops, fillets, and a dessert trio.  It was an elegant, interesting evening.

My parents and our nieces spent the weekend with us while my brother, uncle, and grandfather crashed for one night.  It was lovely to have a house full of some of the crazy people I love.

It's a nice reminder that what matters most in life are the relationships you have with the people you love.  Nothing else really matters.

Dinner Party

Via my Instagram

Six Weeks Two Days

Today we're at six weeks and two days.  Morgan, our gestational surrogate, is reporting that she's "sea sick" most of the day, tired in the afternoons, and craving steaks and pickles.  I am sorry Morgan is feeling nauseated, since I don't want her to experience discomfort; however, the changes in her body are keeping the pregnancy real.  As in, this is really happening!  It's reassuring to hear stories of her pregnancy woes, since it means our boy(s) are growing.

On Friday, the day before seven weeks, we will have our first sonogram to determine if one or both of the embryos are growing inside her sacred womb.  I'm both excited and nervous.

I'm nervous enough that I have to ask myself: Is it possible that something physically changing in me too?  Ever since our doctor transferred two embryos into Morgan I've become hyperaware of stories of miscarriages, stillbirths, and wombs going empty.   I've become my late grandmother Peaches: worry, worry, worry!  On Saturday night I kept having a dream that our doctor couldn't find anything in Morgan's womb.  It was a ridiculous dream.

I was speaking to my father this weekend about my newly discovered craziness.

Me: I'm sure I'll stop worrying once we hit 20 weeks, right?  No wait...I'm sure I'll stop worrying once they arrive, right?

My father:  No, you'll worry about them the rest of your life.

Me: That's what everyone keeps telling me!

I want to know...

...is it wrong on Wednesday nights when I'm at home alone (my husband travels for business) or when I'm at a hotel alone (sometimes I travel for business) I like to watch QVC's In the Kitchen with David?  I work.  David keeps me company.

Ashley Longshore

I'm pretty sure we all need an Ashley Longshore on our walls.  Unfortunately art requires cash, and I am also pretty sure I will never have cash again after making these baby(ies).  These future child(ren) will expect to be fed, clothed, and educated.  My husband's mother recently informed my husband that, ahem, children are expensive raise, and then she asked if we were still saving money!  (Love it!)

During the teenage years when our kids act out, I'm going to yell things like: "I could have purchased an Ashley Longshore!"

QOTD

"Judge Orlando Garcia gave Texas an Aug. 24 deadline to recognize same-sex marriages on death and birth certificates."

-via KUT.org

Baby Love

After confirmation of our pregnancy Cousin Sarah and her family sent us our first baby gift.  Hooray for milestones! In the card Cousin Sarah proclaimed she loves us both to pieces and she can't wait to love and adore our precious children.  What a lovely thought!  It's going to be fun to raise our children within our circle of family and friends.  Hopefully, Cousin Sarah's crew can help make our children more worldly since Cousin Sarah's crew split their time between Texas and Eastern Europe.

Another token of wisdom Cousin Sarah, mother of three, said to us: relax while you can!  Now that type of advice concerns me a little bit, because I'm starting to see a trend.  This is the most common type of advice parents give us once they learn we're expecting.  For example, our friend Adam, father of two, said we should enjoy sleeping for the next 8 months.  My husband's sister, mother of two, told us to enjoy our freedom while it last.

Apparently kids wreck your relaxing, sleeping, and freeing (?) schedule!  

I'm assured the journey of fatherhood and the havoc to my schedule is worthwhile by my BFF Del, father of two,  because he told us there is a type of love that only parents can experience/understand.   He said childless individuals will never understand the powerful type of love mothers and fathers have for their children.  He is joyful that my husband and I will understand that type of love in 2016!