A baby sister

A new person in the world, and she is the only person on this planet earth who is your baby sister. This will mean another change to your blog format. Quite a fundamental change actually. From this point forth, Noah, this blog is not only written for you, but for your baby sister too.

Of course, these facts don't matter. You still aren't making memories despite us having hilarious conversations with you every day. There is something utterly profound about that. If your mummy and I were both to be beheaded by terrorists or something tomorrow at Tesco, you will live your whole life without a single memory of us. Yet we have experienced so many wonderful things together!

Anyway, your baby sister.

What do we need to say? Well, you call her "My baby" and you look after her without any serious jealousy of any kind. You are being such a wonderful big brother so far. You know when she is hungry, you say, because she sticks her tongue out. You don't fully understand why she has a front bum instead of a willy. You look like a giant now compared to her although you are still our baby Noah.

The birth.

The birth went very well. But before the birth, here are a few pictures from the day before Scout was born. We went for a walk to try and force the baby out via gravity. Your mummy looks like she is wearing a comedy suit. She isn't: it's all her:

That night, the contractions started and your mummy's cervix began it's journey to dilate to 10cm (sorry Noah, these are details I am intentionally including to make you cringe.)

By 7am we were in the hospital. We were given a sweet suite and I soon got bored of waiting for the contractions to kick up a gear so I took some pictures (I had just got a new phone with a panoramic picture option:

I am biased, but how can your mummy look so utterly perfect, even at times like these?

The first official stage of labour is when the contractions are considered to be starting properly. This stage of the labour was near 3 hours long. The second stage - the pushing stage - was three minutes.

THREE MINUTES!

She was shouting, "TELL ME WHAT YOU WANT ME TO DO AND I'LL DO IT!"

I told her to push with everything she had.

She did.

Her voice turned into a that of a wounded army soldier. She screamed and pushed like when the strongest man in the world pulls a train. All neck vains and bulging eyes.

Then Scout was here.

You were no longer an only child. You were a big brother for the first time.

Of course, you knew none of this at the time because you were with grandma and grandad having the time of your life: being the centre of the universe.

Of course, there cannot be two centres of the universe. That space has to be shared.

Luckily, you have been accommodating and warm in the sharing of your space. You pulled up a chair for "your baby Scout" as you call her.

And all of our lives are once again changed forever.

Pictures to follow.