Vann-tastic

The Vann Clan has just expanded in a spectacularly wonderful and amazing way: world, meet Josiah Daniel, new member of the human race. 30 hours after hearing my sister-in-law had gone into labour we still had no news and so my folks and I decided to drive down south to the hospital to counter our feeling of inertia...we arrived just in time to see my brother walking out of the delivery ward, dazed and beaming at his newly-acquired status of 'dad'.

I am so, so grateful for the timing and the privilege of being the first to congratulate my brother, and to meet Josiah in his first hours in the world. Now I have to tell you, a bunch of friends and acquaintances have had babies and I find all of it very cute and heartwarming - I also have 2 awesome nephews who are older, but living overseas means I have sadly only met them a handful of times and didn't get to see them brand new. It's been fun watching people in my life grow their families, but something seriously hit home when I met Josiah. I felt something warm and deep shifting in my heart and even now I find myself regularly overcome with emotion about this new little person in the world.

Now I know what you're thinking - most people will put that down to broodiness, but I don't think it's quite that. I still have not reached the point in my practical or emotional life where I want to push one of these bad boys out myself, but this is the first time I've felt such a visceral connection to the whole process of creating new life. I've never seen a newborn, and I was floored at how perfect he is! A little perfectly formed person, ready to roll. I've never understood new life as a miracle more clearly than I did meeting him.

I think mostly I feel connected to the experience in part because Dave and Laura have been on a very long and and emotionally draining journey in trying to have a baby, and in part because Josiah is family - he's one of us, I'm connected to him and by extension feel responsible for him. As such, I'm determined to be his best aunt ever - I'm already hatching plans to teach him practical jokes to play on his mum and dad and take him rock climbing...

Blog-readers and facebook followers, prepare yourselves. I am seriously in love with this little dude and you can expect much gushing, picture-taking and sighing about him for many, many months to come. :)