I took it in person on my cell phone, but this is probably still the best photo I’ve ever seen.

I did share our teeny, yet immense news last week on standard social media, but I wanted to wait to scrape my words together more effectively before writing a blog post. I actually made a little video announcement, but I don’t pay for a fancy enough blog site to post it more widely here like I did on Facebook.

After more than five and a half years of fighting our way over, under, and/or through obstacles of every variety and intensity, The Electrician and I are going to be parents.

Our twins are expected to arrive by Pelican early in 2019.

Twins. Two beautiful little humans will be joining our family. As utterly thrilled as we are, I’ll be forthcoming and admit there are times that it still doesn’t seem quite real, that we should be granted a blessing of this immensity, but it’s really, honestly happening. We are referring to our babies as “The Sprouts” for now; I like the sense of new life and great potential in their nicknames.

I will share the story in more detail in an upcoming post, but for now, I will let all the people in our (seemingly vast) cheering section know the basic information.

Auntie Pelican remains, as always, one of the most generous, determined, and admirable people we know. We are grateful that she is experiencing a healthy pregnancy so far, with the exception of some rather impressive nausea a short while back. She is encouraged and supported by her loving husband through this quest in so many ways. If you met Auntie Pelican and knew how remarkable she is, you wouldn’t be surprised that she is well-matched with her awesome spouse. Sometimes, it stings that our babies don’t get to grow under our immediate roof; however, Auntie and Uncle Pelican are such incredible people to care for our twins until they can come home to us and we know are immersed in love.

Today marks 11 weeks, 2 days of this pregnancy. I’m still anxious here and there, particularly after losing our PiP this winter. All we can do is remain hopeful, positive, and steadfast in our goals to meet our children. I am resolute that I will be a momma and that these sweet little sprouts will continue to grow stronger.

The babies are fraternal twins. Fraternal twin pregnancies are safer in several ways, especially for the babies, since they have separate amniotic sacs and placentas. It’s rather like living in two separate halves of a duplex rather than being immediate roommates. At last week’s ultrasound, Twin A had a heartbeat of 170 beats per minute, and was grooving around, while Twin B was more relaxed with a heart going 161 beats per minute.

This pregnancy is the joyful result of our first embryo transfer to Auntie Pelican’s uterus. As a team, we decided to transfer two embryos. Both those gorgeous, wee blastocysts implanted and have been growing beautifully. For those of you just tuning in, our embryos are the result of a petri party where the only guests were my eggs and my husband’s swim team, so we are expecting twins that are our genetic offspring. Hooray, science!

We don’t know their genders yet; it’s simply too early to determine those little details. Auntie and Uncle Pelican’s children are convinced it’s a boy and a girl. I’m hoping that, whatever their chromosomes are, they have their daddy’s eyes.

So, here we are. Our official full-term due date is February 10, but we’re aware twins rarely gestate all the way to 40 weeks since they run out of real estate before that point.

Our house and our hearts are so full of joy that they’re barely holding at the seams. As always, we are so grateful to everyone who has supported us. We’ve been so fortunate to have amazing humans in our corner from day one of this quest.

I will keep sharing news as we have it. For now, please know that everyone is healthy and there are wonderful things ahead for us all. Thank you for your love and support.