WC #4: Welcome Baby Claire!

I just received a greatly anticipated text from Brooks!  The long-awaited Claire Emelia has joined the family!

Claire

Born February 20, 2013 a little before 9:30 this evening and weighing in at 8 lb. 8 oz, she has kept everyone waiting a VERY LONG TIME!  Where to even begin?!?!?!  

While I know the past two days have been very difficult on "Mom & Dad," I think these past two days have been torturous for big brother Ethan!  At 8-years-old, he's been well aware of this pregnancy and what it will mean to have a baby sister.  The poor boy was in tears yesterday afternoon when he came home from school to find his mother sitting on the floor in her bedroom, folding laundry.  He expected to go to the hospital after school yesterday to meet his baby sister!  To cheer him up, I suggested we text all his grandparents, aunts & uncles and track guesses for Claire's anticipated time of arrival today.  (The doctor told Brooks he would induce her at 9:00 this morning and we'd have a baby by 3:00.  Knowing that's not how we "Zielke women" give birth, we knew that was unrealistic!)

Uncle Barton was the most optimistic, betting on 12:30 this afternoon.  Pessimist that I am, gave the latest guess for 6:40 this evening.  Turns out, I was the last loser...  Everyone else fell somewhere between Bart and me.  (The Gailey clan also added their guesses, but they were much more optimistic than the Sloan clan!)

So, big brothers eagerly awaited her arrival.  The entire family bet on her arrival and eagerly anticipated verification of their "win" as I received phone calls & texts throughout the day.  I'm sure Daddy was eagerly awaiting her arrival, not just to welcome his daughter into the family, but to be able to get his family back into a normal routine, with his family complete.

But, most of all eagerly awaited by her mother.  Brooks knew she wanted to have a little girl named Claire since the day she was seven-years-old and she was listening to some of my old records with me and I told her to stop and "listen" to the words to this song:

Gilbert O'Sullivan and Clair

(The little girl who inspired the song)

As I expected, Brooks was thrilled when she realized that this was a man singing a song to a little girl that he loved and baby-sat.  (In reality, Clair was the daughter of Raymond Gilbert O'Sullivan's manager/producer. He used to babysit for her and she called him "Uncle Ray." The song was written as a gift for the family.)  Brooks has held onto this name for HER little girl for twenty-three years and she's finally here!

Emelia also has special significance.  I had a very special aunt, Emily Zielke.  (My brother Al, couldn't say "Emily" when he was little and somehow came up with MiMi, which over time, was shortened to Miem (Meem).)  When Miem was born and they asked her mother her name, being a German woman, told them her name was Emilie (pronounced in German more like Amelia). Somehow, in the translation, it ended up being Emily.  Miem was the closest person to a grandmother that my children ever encountered on my side of the family and Brooks has also had a love of her German heritage, enjoying old family stories and histories.  Every one of her children have a name with family significance.  In addition to "Grandma Miem," Claire has two aunts named Emily (Barton's wife & Josh's sister).  Hence, named for a great aunt and two aunts, adding a German pronunciation with an Americanized spelling (for proper pronunciation), we proudly welcome the newest member of the Sloan family, my fifteenth grandchild.

              HAPPY BIRTH-DAY, CLAIRE EMELIA!!!!!