Busy Week? Prep Slow Cooker Freezer Meals!

If your home is anything like ours during the week, its chaos. Between my husband and I both working, two kids in school and one child at home (not to mention being pregnant), its really insane most days. I don’t have time to pee, let alone make a nice dinner.

Enter my slow cooker! I have been doing up some slow cooker freezer meals on the weekends to make our weeknights run a bit smoother. I found a months worth of recipes, we chose 7 of our favorites and did them up.

I highly suggest trying a few out!

31 Crockpot Freezer Meals for Busy Weeknights

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source http://www.surrogacyincanada.com/busy-week-prep-slow-cooker-freezer-meals/

Guest Post – A Unique Surrogates Perspective

“Ok. It’s confession time. If you haven’t figured it out yet, I’m going to share a little secret with you- I’m a little different. Quirky, if you will.

My first experience with surrogacy was the classic Phoebe from “Friends” episode.

Heck, I even tried to be just like her and offered to carry a baby for my brother and his wife. That was a little too odd for him as we aren’t one of those super open understanding families. 

“Adoption’ is a term my mother used frequently while my husband and I struggled to become pregnant with our first child. I wasn’t interested. It needed to be ours. 

We bore our frustration in silence, privately. The unsolicited advice was truly overwhelming, and completely unwanted. Seriously- why does everyone feel they have the answer? Or that you want to hear what worked for their cousins nephews aunt… or get referred to as the one without their own child. Pity is just as intolerable as the aforementioned advice.

Fast forward a few years and several children later. We knew our family was complete, but I didn’t feel like I was done having babies. My husband loves me and spoils me horribly. He agreed to my surrogacy journey with only one question that was easily answered by another Surrodad.

Connections were made, and rather quickly I had 2 unsuccessful back to back transfers.

Six months after, success! I was pregnant with a modern miracle courtesy of science…I was pregnant with another mans child! Life goal met!

The parents were estatic, yet cautiously optimistic. Modern medicine isn’t perfect, and they knew things could change in an instant.

 Pregnancy was relatively easy. I wasn’t ill, and having a little extra fluff on my bones made keeping the precious cargo comfy (and concealed) until my husband and I were ready to share our news with others.

Co workers were told (for safety purposes) and a few close friends… Dude, I really wanted that beer, please stop offering, lol.

Basically we thought we would tell people when questions were asked, probably around the 20 week mark. We had too many people close to us with fertility issues of their own. I wasn’t looking to be a jerk, or do the “look at how amazing and selfless I am” thing. I wanted to give someone the opportunity of parenthood so many take for granted.

A few weeks before delivery we told a few key people, knowing not everyone understands. My parents were in this lot. Not my siblings, not my in laws. Need to know basis. More friends, because, a week before delivery tobogganing is not really a great way to spend an afternoon.

A few people at work noticed, but not many. 

We talked about the general stuff, like how many were already at home, blah blah blah, and then-no, they aren’t excited. It isn’t my husbands. Or mine. 

And then the gushing (awkward for me) how amazing! How selfless! Or super awkward “How can you give your baby away?” followed by a simple biology lesson. Education is important. Patience as well.

Some people get it. Some don’t. That’s quite alright.

The parents are beyond happy, and that is what really matters to me.”

– An ANU Surrogate.  <3

The post Guest Post – A Unique Surrogates Perspective appeared first on ANU Fertility Consultants.

source http://www.surrogacyincanada.com/guest-post-unique-surrogates-perspective/

Halloween Cookies!

Halloween is quickly approaching and if your anything like me, you lack in the creativity department.

Have no fear, I’m here to help!

Try these cookies with eyeballs in them, they are sure to be a hit and your kids will think your awesome.

Gooey Monster Eye Cookies

 

The post Halloween Cookies! appeared first on ANU Fertility Consultants.

source http://www.surrogacyincanada.com/halloween-cookies/

What is Labor Like?

I have been obsessed with birth, birthing, pregnancy & babies since as far back as I can remember. One of the first questions I had as a kid was, what does Labor feel like? Why do all these women complain so much? It can’t be *that* bad…they’ve lived through it, so the pain isn’t enough to kill them…so whats the big deal?

I’ll tell you what the big deal is. Those thoughts came from an inexperienced, very naive teenager. My labor experience is two births within a hospital with epidurals for pain management, one midwife-attended home birth with zero drugs and zero interventions and one midwife-attended hospital birth with no drugs for pain management and no interventions.

To summarize, two labors with no pain, two labors with more pain than I would wish on my worst enemy.

So what is Labor like?

I don’t know how to describe it. But I’ll do my best!

If your a first timer, I’m sorry, you might not want to read on. Labor starts off like a walk in a beautiful sunshiny park. You are comfortable, chatty…just kind of annoyed every 10 minutes. Think of it as needing to stop and take a breath every 1o minutes.

**COMMERCIAL BREAK – You know what labor brings you? A little person who likes to shove their fingers into their own poo in a pull up, while touching everything with their grubby, poopy finers. Thats what you get after all that damn hard work! END OF COMMERCIAL** Now back to your regularly scheduled blog post.

Ok. So your on your walk in the park. Soon, your picking up the pace and your stopping for a breather every 5 min, instead of 10 min. That breather now turns into something you have to focus on. Suddenly, a friend from years ago spots you and walks to chat it up. Its the last thing you want to do, so you start sprinting and they start chasing you…now, not only are you sprinting, but you need to stop every 1-2 min to catch your breath and try with all your might, not to kill your friend thats chasing you. Your legs hurts, your stomach hurts, your pretty sure that parts of you considered highly valuable are on fire…and your not catching a decent break. You sprint for a minute, then you breathe for a minute. The cycle continues until you can no longer think, your ability to function completely halts and the *only* thing going through your mind is either: GIVE ME ALL THE DAMN DRUGS YOU CAN FIND IN THIS ENTIRE HOSPITAL or….I AM NEVER DOING THIS SH*T AGAIN. 

The amount of pain the body can withstand without succumbing to death is far beyond what I imagined any human could tolerate. Now, your walk in the park is close to ending. Soon, you see the end of your journey…you can almost touch it….and VOILA! BABY! Your beautiful (or surrogate) baby has arrived and everything you just went through – homicidal thoughts, pain beyond what any human should experience, potentially breaking your partners hand bones…everything – is forgotten. Not joking. It becomes an instant distant memory and the gorgeous eyes staring back, change you. Your life gladly given for theirs, your heart expands with love every time it beats, that little innocent soul in your arms is yours. There is nothing, absolutely nothing, on Earth that compares to the reward waiting for you at the end of your labor journey.

What is labor like? Its like walking (or running) through hell, on a lake of burning charcoals for an undetermined amount of time. Hours or minutes. Sometimes, even days. It sucks.

I’ll be doing it again this March. And hopefully in 2019 for a set of intended parents. I’ll keep doing it as long as I can. Why? Because its worth it. 

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source http://www.surrogacyincanada.com/what-is-labor-like/