7 weeks in......

Well this post feels a bit like re-run of the wait to meet our baby! Yes we have been here 7 weeks on Tuesday going into our 8th Week!! It's starting to send us all a bit crazy now is all we can do is sit back and wait....We submitted our MN1 application to the British High Commission on 22nd July and then finally received an application number on the 11th August...Yes you heard right...20 days just to get a number for our application...we rang on Friday and was told we still don't even have a case worker....suprise suprise!! If you don't know the MN1 application is for citizenship in the UK and goes with every other person applying to get into the country, no matter what your circumstances. Every day they receive around 800 applications and ours is sat in a pile somewhere. We knew we would be here for around 12 weeks as they originally said on the Foreign Office website, 8 weeks for citizenship and then 4 weeks for passport application.....and now wait for it, the crappest news ever....this has now increased to 3-6 months for citizenship plus 1 month for Passport!! We've contacted the consulate and they do sweet FA! They are no longer in the position to help after its sent to the UK and its completely out of their hands...:(

So don't know what to do really but wait.......no one can expedite the case as we're in a queue with everyone else.

On another completely different note, 28th August has always been quite a good day for us! We moved in to our first apartment in Hong Kong on the 28-08-08 (The chinese for 8 is "ba" which means luck...so lots of luck hopefully!) My ID card in HK is also the 28-08-08 and We came to Delhi for our first "Donation" on the 28-08-10 and the result was our Boy Beau, a year later! So tomorrow is 28-08 and we are hoping that this week brings us a step closer to home!! Our new apartment in Venice is number 4828....again, we met on the 08-04 and our lucky number 28 keeps coming up!!

We are meant to flying home on the 20th September but at the minute I don't see this happening, so we will be looking to change our flights in the next week or two as one of us will have to go back to Florence to pick up our pups and empty our Florence apartment by the 30th September.

What else has happened??? Beau has continued to be a beautiful boy and fun to be with....he still has his umbilical hernia but his colic does not seem to be as bad which has been good for us, as he is now on a four hour eating pattern! Yay!! Adam has been ill again and his Veneer then broke! So we have all been a bit up and down lately but we have to keep our eye on the prize....HOME!!!!!! Michael went to see Doug and chad with Beau last week and really enjoyed the great company and BBQ ribs! Beau loved the copious amount of cuddles!

Here's some cute pics to finish with as he is the thing that keeps us going and the light of our lives.

Long overdue update!!!!!!!

SO MUCH has happened in the last 5 weeks (tomorrow) since Beau was born!!!!!! It's been a rollercoaster of experiences and moments, all part of the rich tapestry of our time in Delhi.

Firstly, huge congratulations to Mark and Kerry on the birth of their beautiful baby girl Cailyn, we're really hoping we get to meet up together with Beau soon! And we really hope Sam and Phil are having a fabulous time back home with Ruby and Zoe!!!

A few days after Beau's birth we received the most lovely, generous parcel of gifts sent from Edward, Paul, Vivian, Aria and Sydney (Faith to Vishwas) and here is Beau with a fabulous selection (clearly enjoying his new outfit!!!) Such a kind and lovely thought, we were so touched and grateful.



A few day's after Beau's birth, we started the process of citizenship application. It's impossible to put into words the frustration of this process. When we did our research on surrogacy, we was perfectly aware that for Brits, no matter what country they work with, the citizenship application is a red-tape-bureaucracy-filled headache. When we sent the MN1 citizenship application from the British High Commission, it has to be sent to the UK via the diplomatic postal service. This only leaves and arrives 2 days a week from/to Delhi, and can take up to 2 weeks for the package to arrive at it's intended destination. So it doesn't take a genius to work out that when the citizenship certificate is issued, a month has been wasted sending the application and waiting for the certificate to arrive, That doesn't even begin to include the time taken to process the application!!!!!!!

When we planned our time in Delhi, we studied closely the British High Commission website on the processes involved in applying for UK citizenship from New Delhi. It strongly suggests 6 weeks (ish minimum) to get the certificate and another 4 weeks to get the passport, then 1-15 days to get the FRRO exit via, so we planned 12 weeks in India.

When we called the Home Office in the UK who process the applications, they say 'Applications take 3 to 6 months', yes you heard that correctly, MONTHS!!!!!!!!! Since sending our application 4 weeks ago, we have only just received an application reference number as it took this long for the application to reach the UK via snail-mail, and get inputed onto their computer system. The next stage is for it to wait in a queue to be allocated a case worker who will assess the application. However, with our application being in the same pile as the 800 applications a day for UK citizenship, we can be assured that this will take weeks to be looked at.

So in the mean time, the wait and worry continues... but we remain hopeful that our application lands in the hands of someone who realizes we need to return to our lives and work as quickly as possible. Hopefully in a week or 2 we might be lucky enough to have a case worker allocated, so we will keep you posted!!!!

A great friend from Hong Kong came to Delhi to visit us an see Beau last week, so we took this as an opportunity to travel to Jaipur for some culture and a change of scenery. We LOVED Jaipur!!!!!!! And Jaipur seemed to love Beau, he got so much attention, (all good I'm glad to say).



Jaipur is such a lovely city full of contradictions, hectic but charming, gritty but extremely pretty, definitely one of the most fascinating and rewarding trips we've been on and so wonderful that it was part of our India Odyssey.







(Love this pic of a dog and a monkey haha!)



Adam recently became victim to some form of stomach bug and ended up having a whole day in hospital on various drips. After 2 or 3 days he was right as rain again!

However hard our application process might be, we are still very much enjoying our time in India. We find that Delhi is a city where, although the pleasures are not immediately obvious, the city can take you pleasantly by surprise, whether it's the genuine warmth of it's people, a wonderful meal, people becoming really friendly when you return to the same shops or restaurants, some great shopping (which might not be immediately obvious, but great when you finally hunt it down!) and as crazy and chaotic it's reputation might be, we find it can be surprisingly relaxing. For us, Delhi was not love at first sight, it's a place that grabs your heart over time, and like a great friendship just gets better and stronger with time.

Hoping to meet up with Doug and Chad very soon!!!!!!!!

A whole week old!

Well our boy Beau is a whole week old today!

He is feeding well, sleeping well and in general being a very good baby! We know this probably won't keep up but we can hope :)
We submitted our application for registration as a British Citizen on Friday so we now need to wait 6 weeks to see if it all goes through, we then have to apply for a UK passport which then takes a further 4 weeks! It all seems a very long time but we are trying not to think of the amount of days waiting but instead concentrating on spending quality family time with our boy.

Adam turned 30 yesterday and we had a very pampered day, body massage, body wraps, pedicures, manicures, facials, scalp massage followed by chinese food! We took it in turns to look after Beau and then when we were both wrapped up, the staff helped us feed and change our boy. The staff at VY lodging and some guests threw a little party for Adam with food and drinks which was great and then we had a night nurse for the first time which was most welcomed and managed to get a whole nights sleep! We still woke when he cried but it was nice to have the help on hand and the sleep was much welcomed!

We've been here 2 weeks now and have about 10 more to go! So lots of time to blog and upload pictures!

Beau Huckleberry is Home (Well Hotel at least!)

Our baby Beau has been discharged from hospital after only 1 evening, total of 27 hours!! Amazing as we thought it might be 2-3 days!! He is back in our apartment and eating, pooping and sicking to his hearts content! Here's a few more pics with eyes finally open....

It's a...

BOY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Beau Huckleberry Allton-Nee

Born 9:39am

6lb 3oz / 2.85kg

Words can't express the overwhelming joy, tears and the love that fills our hearts. This photo was taken by the Doctor literally seconds after his heel prick hence the distress!!! There isn't a word that adequately describes the sheer brilliance of today.

The anxious wait continues...

After a few agonizing days of apprehension and anxious waiting, it looks like our SM has been booked in for a C-Section tomorrow morning (Sunday 17th) at 9am.

We're not entirely sure if the hospital aimed for a natural birth as the dates of cervical sweep and then gel induction 48 hours later may have lead to a natural birth some time today or possibly yesterday. It probably would have alleviated a huge deal of stress and worry if we had just fixed the 17th as a C-Section and been able to focus all our hope and energy on this date.

But at least some of the doubt and worry is shifting and we can focus it on tomorrow morning. If anything changes, we'll keep you posted. We're hoping and praying that this week of anxiety and worry will soon turn to happiness and joy. In the meantime, ENORMOUS thanks to everyone who has sent their warm wishes and kind messages, we hugely appreciate this!!!

Final Scan Pic...

As much as we'd be liking to show you a photo of our baby outside the womb, here's a lovely pic that the hospital have just sent us from this morning's scan. He/she is looking quite peaceful and relaxed to us, not showing any expression of any desire to leave the comfort of where they are right now...

Ultrasound and meeting our SM

We met with Shilpi at Dr Jolly's ultrasound clinic at lunchtime today. We were both amazed how busy the place is, the waiting room was packed. This was the first time we met our SM. Whilst we were sat down waiting, Shilpi led our SM to the back of the clinic to prepare for the scan. On first sight, our SM didn't look too happy, (we are sure she is hot, bothered, tired etc so this is totally understandable) and all sorts of thoughts ran through our heads. We were then called into the ultrasound room. When we were introduced, we found her to be very warm with a lovely glowing smile (exactly like the warm smile, bordering on a cheeky grin that we first saw in her photo 9 months ago, that made us say 'Absolutely! This is our wonderful SM, horray!!!!!!!!!"

Dr Jolly is also very warm, cheerful and one of those people with a real air of being distinguished. He explained really well all the magical images we saw on the monitor, what he was looking at and what it all meant.

It crossed our minds and we spoke about on many occasions what it must feel like to finally meet our SM. Would we cry, be overcome with emotion, would we burst into tears when we saw an ultrasound for ourselves? We was actually just struck with awe, almost silent, amazed and transfixed with the miracle of what we were seeing, and overcome with the most sincere gratitude for what our amazing SM is actually doing for us. To see our baby on the monitor, knowing that in maybe hours or at most a few days, we get to hold them and shower them with love was simply amazing. And we left knowing that the petite lady, with a much smaller bump than we imagined, with her lovely warm smile will have our deepest gratitude and respect until the day we die.

Watch this space for just a little longer...

We both arrived in Delhi very late on Tuesday night and got to our accommodation a little past 1am Wednesday morning. We met with Dr Shivani this evening (loving the new offices btw!!!) Our SM had a membrane sweep this morning, so anything can (or might not) happen in the coming hours/days.

If nothing happens within 2 days, on Friday morning our SM will be given the gel/medical induction, and if nothing still happens quickly enough, we're looking at C-section Saturday or Sunday at the latest.

Our last trip to Delhi was incredibly short and we didn't really have much time to get a feel for the place (half the trip was spent on the journey to and from Agra). We took a quick trip to M-Block Market this morning, pleasantly surprised with the quality and price of the baby goods on offer, and to us, the products in Mothercare are really rather nice, no different from back home. The prices are almost like-for-like compared to Mothercare in Europe which is good.

So unless our SM goes into spontaneous labour, our next update will be after meeting her tomorrow lunchtime and seeing the final ultrasound before the birth. We had Thursday or Friday in our minds as the predicted day of our babies birth, but whats a couple more days of waiting on a journey as exciting as this one?

The Final Countdown...

Where on earth has the last 35-ish weeks gone?

We are in a final few days of preparation before we head to Delhi. We both planned to travel together (of course) on Tuesday 12th from Italy arriving in Delhi about 11:30pm so arriving at our accommodation in the very early hours of the 13th. Unfortunately, one of us has to go the very long way round, Italy to China, quick work meeting then China to Delhi (talk about 'popping into the office') but we'll both arrive within hours of each other.

Dr Shivani is planning to perform a membrane sweep on the 13th July, we will then be meeting Dr Shivani at 7pm on the 13th for an update. Our SM will be given 2 days from then to see if she goes into natural labour, then if not she will be taken to hospital to be induced. So it looks like fatherhood is little over a week away!

With all our baby shopping, we have tried to be as neutral as possible, but (maybe we are just shopping in the wrong cities) there is a massive void in the neutral department, everything is either solidly blue/boy or pink/girl... getting all our clothes out we did realize that much of the neutral still falls on a slightly boyish side, and we have a complete void of especially girly clothes. So yesterday we did a bit of top-up-girl-shopping so we are prepared to have some lovely clothes whatever the sex (and huge surprise) we get in Delhi.

In the mean time, we are playing what seem silly games on the 'boy or girl' front. We have decided the name for him or her already. When we are out, we might hear a song mentioning the girl's name and get excited thinking 'it's a sign!!!!!'. But then we will quickly spot or hear something with the boy's name, and we realize we are just being plain stupid.

So not it looks like it is time to start packing, this is one scenario where we definitely won't be doing our last minute packing shouting 'the taxi will be here in half an hour!!!!!'

So now, we just hope and pray that the next week brings a safe, healthy birth for our baby and simply wonderful god-sent SM.