A couple of new videos...

Aiden's Close-up:


Austin's Close-up:

A Slideshow of our friends and family!

Best laid plans...

Well, my original intention was to place a new post every week, usually on Monday. It has now been 2 weeks since my last post. Time flies! And babies grow! So much has happened in the last couple of weeks. Grandmommy & Fred left after staying and helping for a week. We had our second pediatrician's appointment. The boys attended their first pool party at Uncle Wyatt's. We've left the boys with a babysitter for the first time. I've gone back to teaching my classes. And of course, we've taken a lot of pictures.

Since I have taken so long to put up a new post, I'm gonna get right to the pictures. Some of my favorites are from their bath in their Winnie the Pooh and Tigger robes. Too cute!

We've also decided to put up a slideshow of everyone who has come to meet and visit the boys. As I've mentioned before, we are so fortunate to have so many loving and caring friends/family members. Thanks for all the visits!


Austin & Aiden


Aiden at bathtime


Austin at bathtime


Aiden aka Tigger after bathtime


Austin aka Pooh after bathtime

Blood is thicker than water...

Well, the boys are just over 2 weeks old now. Rich just started to go back to work (part-time) today. I go back to teaching my classes next week (Labor Day...so aptly named). The past two weeks have been amazing! We started out looking at each other often asking ourselves if this is really happening! Now we just look at our boys and rejoice that they are indeed finally here and healthy.

We are also so grateful to be surrounded by such an awesome group of friends who are so consistently offering their love and support. There has been a steady stream of friends who have come over to meet Aiden and Austin, and we welcome them all with open arms. The pediatricians have said that having visitors is no problem as long as everyone washes their hands and/or sanitizes them before handling the babies. So, we are not being overly protective, we are just following doctors' orders! They also advise against having too many children visit just yet as they often are "carriers" to a vast array of germs and bacteria.

This week, we are also fortunate enough to have Rich's mom and her fiance visit us from Chicago. There is nothing like having a grandparent to help take a crying baby and have them gently rock them to sleep. Rich's dad and stepmom are also coming to visit in a couple of weeks!

But having Rich's family so far away, and having my family not accepting of my life, makes us realize that the oft said phrase is so true: family is what you make it. And here in Los Angeles, Rich and I are so fortunate and grateful to have some of the most amazing and supportive friends in the world and all of whom we consider family. Aiden and Austin will definitely benefit from such a strong network of loving and supportive uncles and aunts and grandmas!

So here are some more pictures and videos from this past week:

Austin, Tommy, Rich, Aiden



Aiden, Soon-to-be-Step-Granddaddy Fred, Grandmommy Judy, Austin



Aiden chillin' in the swing...



Austin ready to eat...yummy, yummy!



Aiden just swingin'...


Austin just swingin'...

7 days makes one weak...and tired...

Well, the boys are now more than 1 week old. I have to say, at times it has been trying to say the least, but for the most part, the past 7 days have been an amazing experience. From seeing them delivered from the surrogate's womb to the warming table there in the operating room, to spending our first 3 days with them in the hospital, to now having spent the last several days in our home with our two little miracles, Rich and I often look at each other and ask if this is really happening. It still seems somewhat surreal, but then a gurgle or a cry or a poop reminds us that, yes, indeed, it is all real.

I think that we have already happened upon a sort of system that seems to be working amazingly well. We have actually gotten a full night's sleep for the past 4 nights! We put the boys down to sleep around midnight, they wake up for a feeding around 4 or 5am, and then they go back to sleep for about 3 or 4 more hours! With both us off from work right now, we have been getting more sleep than we usually do! Of course, we realize that this could change any day, but for now, we are so thankful for their current schedule and able to enjoy every waking minute with them even more! We also know that there are differing opinions out there in regards to putting newborns on schedules, but for now, this is working for us and we have been assured by nurses and pediatricians that there is absolutely nothing wrong with it. We attribute our surprisingly sleepful nights to feeding breast milk during the day and formula at night, activity during the day, and warm and tight swaddling at night. So far so good!

Well, here are some pictures and even a video of our little bundles of joy. We hope you enjoy them as much as we do!

They're here!

Well, the twins finally arrived! We can't believe after all of the years of researching the process, beginning the process and going through the process, that the process is actually over and our new lives as dads of beautiful, healthy twin boys has begun! Wow!

Aiden Taylor and Austin Riley Vaughn Woelfel were born on Saturday, August 9, 2008 at 11:05pm and 11:06pm, respectively. Rich and I were lucky enough to be present at the delivery. We tried to deliver "naturally" at first, but after two hours of "pushing" (God bless our surrogate - she is amazing!), the doctor finally decided to deliver by c-section.

The hospital staff was awesome. We couldn't have asked for better. Rich and I were allowed to cut the umbilical cord on each of the twins. We were taken into the baby recovery room where the staff gave them their first baths and we were able to give them their first bottles. We watched them make their footprints. We watched them (with a wince!) receive their first immunization and vitamin shots. Then, they took us to our room where we spent our first night together as a family of four!

As you may have read in our first post, the process was a long one. It is an expensive process, so one doesn't enter into it lightly. So I think we probably spent a good 4 years just researching the process and getting our finances in order so that we would be able to do this. We don't recommend anyone trying this without seriously - very, very seriously - wanting to be parents! With that being said, I don't think anyone would ever be able to argue that children brought into a family through this process would not be surrounded by love and raised by parents that would truly want to be parents and give their all to provide the best possible environment to raise a family.

Here are a few pictures of our amazing boys!

In the beginning...

Well, we have been meaning to start a blog about the creation of our family for a long time now. As usual for me, I'm a little late in getting started. If you know me, then you already knew that about me. We joke that if the twins are late, then they take after me. If they are early, then they take after Rich. Anyway, we want to create this blog so that we can easily share our story and pictures with our family and friends. However, in addition, we hope that by making our story public, we can make creating a family through the surrogacy process that much easier for anyone who wishes to do so.

To begin, let me back up even a little further. Rich and I have been together for over 6 1/2 years. We began our relationship on December 9, 2001. Rich is a lawyer. I am an actor and an indoor cycling (spinning) instructor. We started talking about the possibility of having kids in the first year or two of our relationship. Fortunately, we were on the same page in regards to having children. For something I thought impossible for me after having come to terms with my sexuality, I was so excited to even think about the possibility of having kids someday.

As time went on, the talk of starting our family became more serious. We began the research necessary to determine exactly how we could go about doing this. We both agreed that we wanted to have our own children, so surrogacy was the path that we chose. Our first step was to attend a resource fair at the Pop Luck Club in West Hollywood. This is an amazing organization which I highly recommend to anyone interested in learning about all options to gay parents in regards to starting a family.

Over the next few years, we read more about surrogacy and egg donation. We agreed that we wanted to obtain eggs from a donor and then have a different woman, a surrogate, carry the baby or babies for us. Yes, we were even considering twins at this time. I always wanted twins. Growing up, I often wished I was a twin. Well, when dealing with egg donation and surrogacy, the possibility of having twins is definitely increased.

We began to research surrogate agencies and egg donation agencies. One of my indoor cycling clients referred me and Rich to Will Halm who was one of the founders of Growing Generations, one of the foremost surrogate agencies in the world. We decided to go with Growing Generations for our surrogate agency. They are based in Los Angeles. We chose A Perfect Match, based in San Diego, for our egg donor agency. The wait for a surrogate match would be up to 6 months. During that time, we chose our egg donor from the online profiles of A Perfect Match. This can be an overwhelming task. It is rather surreal to know that you are basically choosing half of the genetic makeup of your child or children. No pressure here! You get to see pictures of the donor and her family as well as her grades and medical history. You even get to see her family history up to 3 generations! This is really amazing. You get to know if her grandparents are still living, their ages, and if they have passed away, you get to learn how old they were when they died and of what cause. This is so not a light choice to make. Knowing all of this makes the decision somewhat easier!

After Growing Generations found a potential surrogate for us, we met her and her husband. This meeting is necessary because you have to determine if you are all in agreement as to how the surrogacy will proceed. You have to discuss all the possibilities - good and bad. If everyone is in agreement and your personalities click, then the process begins. Rich and I were so fortunate to find our surrogate. She is married and has two children. They do not want anymore children of their own. They live just outside of Oakland, CA. She is very good at being pregnant and her deliveries were very easy for her. This is something at which she is good! And she has two adorable kids - a five year old boy and a 2 year old girl. It is very obvious that she is a good mother!

So, we now have the egg donor and the surrogate. The next step is to get the two women on the same cycle. The egg donor is stimulated to provide as many eggs as possible. Then, the eggs are collected and fertilized in vitro. This is where Rich and I make our contribution (if you know what I mean!) The embryos are grown for 3-5 days before they are placed into the surrogate. The strongest, most viable embryos are selected of course.

We made our first embryo transfer in September. We transferred 3 embryos. Unfortunately, none of them took. It would be a month or two before we could try again. We went through the process again and this time transferred 4 embryos in December. We were successful! 2 embryos successfully attached themselves to the uterine wall of the surrogate! We found out the week before Christmas that we were pregnant! We found out just before New Year's that we were pregnant with fraternal twins! Yay!

Rich and I were fortunate enough to attend the 8-week ultrasound. It was amazing! Being able to see the teeny tiny lives inside of the surrogates womb is truly a miracle...a marvel of modern science! Here is a picture the babies at 8 weeks:

And here is a video from the 8-week ultrasound where you can actually see the heartbeat! (the little girl's voice in the background is our surrogate's 2 year old daughter...so cute!):



Rich and I were also lucky enough to attend the 20-week and 32-week ultrasounds as well. At the 20-week ultrasound, we found out that we were having twin boys!

Here is our favorite video from the 32-week ultrasound. It shows one of the babies (Baby A) with his hand in his mouth. He then takes his hand out of his mouth and appears to chew. Amazing!



Well, we are currently at week 36. The full term, 40-week due date is August 23rd. However, twins are almost always early. For the past several months, we were under the impression that the expected due date for our twins was at 37 weeks on July 31st. Recently, our surrogate's OB suggested that the expected due date could be at 38 weeks on August 10th. This past week, the doctor suggested that they could even go full term! The twins seem to be healthy and in great condition and position. So unless something changes, we may not get to meet our boys for almost a month! Well, the longer they stay inside the womb the better for both health and developmental reasons. But I have to say, we could certainly use the extra time to get the nursery in better order! So, this is how we got to where we are today. This is the first chapter (long overdue)! I tried not to write too much, but I hope this enlightens you to the path that Rich and I have traveled thus far. It has been an exciting journey...and the journey has only just begun!