Royal Toybox, Reopened: A (The) Baby Story, Part 1

In case I forgot to mention it, you know, on facebook, twitter, text messages, phone calls, smoke signals, cuneiform, face-to-face, face-to-bathroom-door (inside joke) or on this blog, I have a son!

Clark Joseph Garvey was born on June 20, 2011 at 4:23 pm. Lisa was amazing. She's my hero. Everyone who reads this post should take a second and raise an invisible glass of crystal to her strength.

I assume most births are, but the moment Clark was born was incredibly surreal. It happened in fast forward and slow motion, over the course of years and all at once. I KNEW it was going to be a boy, and at the same time, I was absolutely certain we were about to have another girl. I was totally right and simultaneously could not have been wronger. Yup. Wronger.

At about 4:25, I walked from the delivery room to the waiting room to make the big announcement. My mom had been waiting for hours to hear any news, and OF COURSE she chose that moment to use the ladies room. So when I, grinning from ear to ear, opened the door and took a breath, I was met with wide eyes and waving palms, and fingers pointed at the bathroom door. I tried to make a bit out of it by going back out of the room, but she was out by the time I'd retreated a half step. See, that's why you should never wash your hands, kids.

The grandmothers, with clean hands, meet their grandson

Meeting again

"Expect me to be in a good mood for months..."

The next couple days were a blur and I sleep-walked through much of it. I'm still not entirely awake, mind you, but those first few days were especially zombie-like.

The night after Clark was born, I drove over the the babysitter's house and let Maeve and Addie in on the news. Remember, we hadn't found out the sex beforehand. Here's pretty much how it went:

Me: You girls have a baby brother!
Maeve: No.
Addie: Hey, I went swimming today!

Clark's sisters came to the hospital the next day, though, and were noticeably warmer.