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The different views and opinions on surrogate motherhood are as vast as those on abortion. Everyone has their views and ideas of the social and ethical issues related to surrogate motherhood. Let's look into some of these issues and what the different sides think about it all. Is it morally correct to rent your body? Some would argue that renting your body to have a baby is hand in hand with renting it out for sex. You are being paid for the use of your body. On the other side, pro surrogates would say that this is an unfair comparison, as sex for money is seen to be dirty and having a baby to help someone who can't is a pure thing. What does religion say about the ethics of surrogate motherhood? Roman Catholicism and Islam forbid it. The Roman Catholics refer to the story of Sarah, wife of Abraham, in the bible. She was barren and gave her maid Hagar to her husband so that she could bare them a child. Abraham impregnated her through copulation. In the end Sarah got jealous, Hagar didn't want to give the baby up and she and the child were thrown out. Not a good ending. In Islam the belief is simple; a woman should bare only her husband's children. How does being born from a surrogate mother affect the child when it grows up? What does a person say when asked, who is your mother? Some people argue that being born from another woman can confuse a child and cause it to have issues as an adult; have feelings of confusion on the subject. The pro surrogates will say that there are many stories of successful children born of surrogate mothers that don't have these problems. It is simply explained to the child. The parents were unable to have children so they took each part of the child from the parents and put it in a surrogate to be born. Can a surrogate mother truly consent to the taking of the child after it is born? This is a major issue. Before gestational surrogating, it was only through artificial insemination of the father's sperm that a surro

The history of surrogate motherhood goes back to biblical times. In fact, some people say it dates back to Sarah and Abraham. Certain people say that it started even before them, and that it is only recorded about Abraham because he was written about in the Bible. In many countries, surrogacy has been around since before records. Many cultures have belief systems that abide with the rules of surrogacy and those that do not agree can be thrown out of their families. Numerous religions and civilizations will actually celebrate the surrogate mothers, for their good deeds and service to others. During the 1980's surrogate mothers were used by the gay community to build their families, then, it was frowned upon by society. The American Indians were the first ones to truly begin the surrogate mother history in this part of the world. So we are looking back to the 1899's for the beginning of this part of the story. If an Indian woman was found to be infertile, then her husband would go to the chief of his tribe and ask for help. He would then be sent to see the medicine man, who would give the wife certain herbal concoctions. Then, after the witch doctor said nothing could be done to help his wife, the husband would go to see the chief. He would be allowed to take another woman and make her pregnant, hopefully, so that he would be able to father a son to carry on his tribe. The barren wife would have no relations with the child. He would stay with his birth mother. The American Indians were not the only civilization to use surrogate mothers to carry on the family name and bloodline. Back in recent European history it has been heard of, especially in Spain for kings to take in several surrogate mothers until he was born a son. The surrogate mother of the child would then become nanny to all of the royal children. The children would believe themselves to be genetically related to the king and queen. Never knowing the truth. Obviously, things like this were kept secret, bec

Yesterday, we returned from our gluttonous trip to our local Carvel ice cream shop on a euphoric sugar high. Oh yeah...The Daily Kool family has officially kicked off our celebration of National Ice Cream Month! Needless to say, we were in a fabulous mood when we walked through our front door. Of course, so was our lovable dog, Pepper...we may have mentioned him a few hundred times or so in our previous blog posts. Well, Pepper (as usual) was beside himself with joy when we came home, wagging his tail a mile a minute to show how excited he was to see us. We're telling you, there's not much that beats the feeling of unconditional love from a furry friend. Wait a minute...did we say unconditional? Because when Pepper got closer to lick our faces (hey, he's a French poodle, after all), he literally took a giant sniff of our ice cream breath and reeled back from each of us in indignant shock. Okay, we realize we're attributing human characteristics to our dog (doesn't everybody?). But seriously, you should have seen the accusatory look on his face before he pointedly turned his doggie butt on us and walked away to pout on his bed. Yep, Pepper's big brown eyes can really bring on the guilt. No doubt about it, our dog wanted to be a part of July's National Ice Cream Month holiday.

Surrogate motherhood history dates back to biblical times, some say it all started with Sarah and Abraham, others say it was around even before them, just they were the only ones recorded about it because of Abraham being in the bible. In countries all over the world the history of surrogate mothers dates back further than we can recall. Many cultures beliefs include surrogacy as a way of life, and those who don't abide by it are banned from their families. Many religions and cultures today believe the surrogates themselves are martyrs for their beliefs; their good deeds and overall intentions go unnoticed by many. In the 1980's the gay community took on the use of surrogates to form families for themselves; which was frowned upon then. If you really look at the history of surrogacy, aside from biblical times, it really began in the late 1800's with the Indians (which are just one culture.) If an Indian woman was found to be baron, the husband would go to the chief and inform the chief of this problem. The chief would then advise the husband to counsel with the witch doctor/ medicine man. After several attempts with medicine if the woman was still found to be baron, the chief would allow for the husband to consort with another female who was baron so that the husband would have a son to carry on his tribe; surrogacy then was not in vitro, rather, the male would have to have relations with the other female… the wife would have no biological ties to the child. But the Indians were not the only culture to use surrogacy as a means to carry on the family name. It's been known about throughout Europe and Spain and other such places. Kings would often bring in several surrogates until one bore him a son, then the surrogates would be kept as nannies to the child; the child would believe the King and Queen were its biological parents and know nothing about its genetic ties to the nanny. Often things of this matter were kept in close regard because if such thing

I thought that somebody had died. I called home. My Mom answered and I asked, "What's wrong?" As I held the phone tightly to my ear, I could not believe what she was saying. My youngest sister had been raped. "This can't be happening" is all I kept saying to myself. Anger, rage, confusion, and a rush of emotions overtook me. Violence against women had abruptly altered my life.

Baby Shower Thank you Cards are themed way of saying Thank you to all the guests that helped you make party a great success. 

Baby shower favours a great way of saying thank you to your guests for attending the Baby Shower party, Christening or Baby Naming Day event. Either Select from our Handmade favours ready to present to your guests or if you would like to make up your own favors then select from our DIY section.

At home we push hard for things like civility, manners and general cleanliness. The things that they wouldn't do themselves unless pushed, like bathe, say please, and eat well...

James (Age 9) loves to sing. If he was from our parents generation they would say he knows the grooves in the record. He sings the songs he loves so much that he grows tired of them. Rather than find new songs to sing...

Summer is here and you know what that means? Young children who have two months of unstructured time to be creative and independent. How great it is when on day two of summer vacation they turn to you and say...

My children attend a Charter School with all the positives and negatives that come with it. Dress code, lots of homework, and strict discipline are the norm. Needless to say James (Age 9) has a close relationship with the Principal...

We keep saying time and again that being a parent is not an easy task. Running after your little tot to avoid a fall, making him eat his food, giving a proper bath and keeping a close watch on your kid making sure that

More and more research unveils the importance of parenting skills in a baby's first year of life. As the old saying goes, experience is the best teacher and many new parents would certainly agree. The same adage may apply to infants as well, as a new study found 10 month old babies were already able to apply lessons learned.

Whooping cough (say: hoop-ing kof) - also called pertussis (say: pur-tuh-sus) - is one of those illnesses. It's a bacterial infection of the respiratory system, which includes your lungs and breathing tubes. Whooping cough got its name because kids who had it would cough a lot, and in between coughs, they'd make a "whoop" sound when they tried to get a breath.

There are pros and cons to both sides of this argument. With the private arrangement, you will first of all need to find your surrogate mother. This is usually much easier done through an agency, as all surrogate mothers to be will have been screened and will have gone through a comprehensive health screening. Also, all of the surrogate mothers with an agency will have had psychological screenings to guarantee the fact that they will be able to deal with the very strong emotions that will be coursing around their bodies during the pregnancy. Unless, of course, your surrogate mother is a relative or close friend of the family in which case it would seem to be a lot easier. Ethics, moral code and emotions will still loom large in all of the concerned parties worlds. So it would still be wise to involve an attorney and legal contracts so that everyone knows exactly where they stand, and what is expected of them. In most countries and states legal and binding contracts written up by attorneys, are needed by the parents to be anyway. As they are going to have to be legally adopting the child everything, will need to be written clearly and legally about the birth and how it came about. Very often during the pregnancy the doctors and nurses will need to know why there are two women, one pregnant, the other not, and very often two fathers who are so interested in this one child. If you have gone through an agency, they will be able to advise you on what to do and say in this situation. If you are sorting out surrogacy arrangements privately then yes but if anything unexpected should happen and you are unable to deal with the problems there is a reasonable chance you will end up wishing you had gone to the agency. Agencies do have trained professionals that can help you with all of the different issues that are involved in surrogacy. From the emotional feeling of all parties, the majority of agencies will have counselors who can help you work your way through any difficul

Okay, we admit it. We are not big water drinkers, and never have been. Trust us...we've given ourselves lectures time and time again about the importance of drinking the requisite eight glasses of water a day, but who are we kidding? We can barely choke down two glasses, and that's with living in hot and humid Florida. While we take responsibility for our irresponsibility just as much as the next person (yeah, right), we wholeheartedly blame the Coca Cola company for our lack of commitment to healthy drinking. How dare they make Coke taste so darn good? We have been obsessed with Coke (the real stuff, not that diet stuff) for as long as we can remember. Scoff all you want, but our Coca Cola addiction has caused a real problem in our household. Our kids are at the age when "do as I say, not as I do" doesn't hold water (had to get that pun in). It's our job as parents to teach our children healthy eating and drinking habits, and the best way to do this is by example. But, we really don't like water. We've tried it all...tap water, filtered water, bottled water (whew, there are a lot of brands out there!), cold water, room temperature water, water with lemon (and/or lime). No matter what we do, the results are the same...blah, blah, blah. Are we prime examples of mature and responsible adults or what?

What better way to celebrate the end of our National Ice Cream Month week-long feature than with cake? Or should we say cupcakes? The Daily Kool family is headed out to a friend's house for dinner together tonight...of course, we're in charge of the dessert (we have a bit of a reputation). Since there's going to be a pretty large group of kids at the house, we thought it might be fun to do something a little different for them.

Here at The Daily Kool, our arms are getting quite the workout this summer...well, at least one arm, anyway. Our kids have been having one playdate after another at the house, and we've been doling out ice cream scoops practically by the dozen each day. Dig, twirl, release...dig, twirl release. Such is our life. It's amazing how one single perfect scoop of ice cream just seems to brighten a child's day...wait a minute, did we say perfect? A lofty, yet often elusive goal, we know. But apparently (and we've just recently learned this, mind you), a dish or cone of ice cream just tastes better to a kid if it has that professional, ice cream parlor look. Go figure, but kudos are important in the world of parenthood...we'll take what we can get. Pretty shallow of us, isn't it?

Nothing says summer quite like an ice cream cone. Some of our best childhood memories include strolling down the boardwalk by the beach with our parents, eating ice cream cones while watching the ocean waves crash against the shore. We could never quite understand how anyone could dishonor the sanctity of ice cream by eating it out of a cup. Good thing we've never quite grown up...as adults, we still love our ice cream cones, even when the sticky mess drips down the side of our arms. Waffle cones help us stay a bit cleaner...not that we care much. We just love them because they are so darned yummy!