Gifts of love delivered just six weeks apart, baby brothers Hugo and Spencer Harley are the children their parents desperately wanted, but feared they could never have. The little boys arrived thanks to the kindness of two separate surrogate mothers – one their biological aunt and the other, their 52-year-old grandmother.
“It’s crazy, like having an instant family,” proud father Jonathon “Jono” Harley tells The Weekly, beaming at wife Michelle as he expertly changes a nappy at home in Wollongong, NSW. “It’s a lot to sink in. I’m a twin, so I grew up with a brother. But that was just a stock standard thing, nothing like these fancy guys!”
The couple’s journey to parenthood has been long and harrowing, fraught with grief and devastating loss. Michelle suffered a near-fatal haemorrhage after their first IVF baby, Ralph, was stillborn at 18 weeks. Cautioned that another pregnancy could kill her, the high school chemistry teacher was bereft. Until her mother, Jasmina Pandevski, and sister-in-law, Sophie Falzon, 34, selflessly offered to “step up” as surrogates.
Cute siblings Hugo Jay Harley (Jay for Jasmina) and Spencer Louis Harley (a nod to
