Two Dad Family

Posted by: axp | June 24, 2011

There Are Two Other Aussie Couples In Our Hotel With Twins Via Surrogacy

The three latest sets of Aussie twins: Thomas, Alice, Alexandra, Karlia, Layla & Timothy

Yep, there are two other couples in our hotel (and I’m guessing Mumbai) who have just become parents to twins via Surrogacy in Mumbai. It’s just wonderful being here with them. We’ve been out to dinner a few times with the six children, and not surprisingly, the kids are all on their best behaviour. Aussies are such socialites

I’m sure you can imagine the looks we get as traipse through the hotel grounds with six babies. Strangers can’t help but come up and “ohh…” and “ahh…” over all the kids. You can’t blame them.

There are only a few days between the birth of each set of twins, so we’re sharing lots of tips on how to get through everything, including night feeds, baby supplies, hotel issues, citizenship documentation etc.

Alice even shared a NICU room with two of the other Aussie girls who were also a little premature. It was their first sleepover, and I’m sure they spent the night gossiping about the boys over in the other NICU ward.

UPDATE: We pulled all the latest Aussie twins together yesterday for a photo shoot … photo is attached. They’re such professionals already!

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Posted in Stage 5: Coming Home | Tags: Australia, Twins

Posted by: axp | June 24, 2011

Tom and Alice Apply For Australian Citizenship

Documentation for Australian Citizenship

As Tom and Alice were not born in Australia, they are not automatically Australian Citizens. Therefore, we must submit an application to request that the Australian Government grants them citizenship as they are descendants of Australians.

It’s a pretty detailed application process, but there are no complaints here. When you travel around a little you realise how wonderful Australia is, and so I don’t mind a process with a bit of rigour.

After a week and a half of collecting documents, we finally submitted our applications to the Australian High Commission today. It was like we were back in university, rushing to put the final touches on our little project and binding everything together before submitting it for review.
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Our Trip To India Is Actually Our Babymoon

Daddy & Alice, two cool cucumbers

We’ve been in India for one week now, and lots has happened. We moved out of Intensive Care on Wednesday, then moved out of the hospital ward yesterday. So we are now in a hotel room, going through the Citizenship, Passport and Exit Visa process.

Life with the kids has already started to somewhat resemble a routine, and it’s a little more mangeable than we first thought. They sleep most of the day, which is probably natures way on easing us first timers into parenthood, and they don’t cry too much. The process is pretty straight forward and is follows:
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Posted in Stage 5: Coming Home | Tags: Babymoon, India, Newborn Routine

Posted by: axp | June 18, 2011

A Photo of Thomas and Alice

Presenting … Thomas and Alice (Thomas on the left). This is them as they arrived into our hospital room, all wrapped up like the stork himself had brought them.

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Posted in Stage 5: Coming Home

Posted by: axp | June 17, 2011

Day 5 of the Newborns

Firstly, let’s get one thing straight. The blog you’ve known up until now might have been detailed and well considered, but that was before the kids arrived. Who has time to blog anymore?! Here is a bullet point post:
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Posted in Stage 5: Coming Home | Tags: New Parents, Newborns

Posted by: axp | June 17, 2011

The 42 Hour Dash to India

It all started at 6am Sunday 12th June. Ralph and I woke to see an email that our doctors had sent overnight saying “Please call as soon as you get this message. We have planned an emergency delivery for the morning.” And so began the longest journey we’d ever taken, a full 42 hours straight to get us to Mumbai and our little bundles of joy.

We had actually planned to have lunch that day with my family, so at first we thought the twins were going to be born while we were with the family, which seemed nice. I couldn’t imagine we’d get a flight sooner. I called my sister and asked her if Ralph’s family could join us, which she agreed to. And so the plans were laid, we would all meet at my sisters house.
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Posted in Stage 5: Coming Home | Tags: Chilean Ash Cloud, First Time Parents

Posted by: axp | June 14, 2011

Welcome Thomas and Alice

At 3:01pm on the 12th June (Melbourne Time), Thomas Anthony and Alice Elizabeth made their way into the world. They are strong, healthy and absolutely gorgeous. Things are a little hectic right now but we are by their side and making our way through the process to come back to Australia.

Sometimes impossible dreams really can come true.

14 Comments

Posted in Stage 5: Coming Home | Tags: Birth