A reason to celebrate

Deepa Bharath

NEWPORT BEACH -- It’s been a great year so far for Bryn and Paul

Berlacher.

Their New Year’s Day package arrived 44 minutes after midnight. The

couple’s first child, Ava Berlacher, all of seven pounds, eight ounces

and 20 1/2 inches long, was also Hoag Hospital and Newport Beach’s first

baby of 2001.

Ava came a day earlier than expected.

“We kind of knew all along that we were going to have a New Year’s

baby,” said Paul Berlacher.

And that worked out perfectly because the couple from Old Towne Orange

doesn’t care for wild parties anyway.

“So now we have a good reason to celebrate New Year’s Eve at home,” he

added. “It’s a safe and secure place to be.”

Labor is never easy but at least Ava made it quick, said Bryn

Berlacher.

“We were here at 9:30 last night,” she said. “And she was out in about

three hours, four big pushes in the end. That was it.”

“I was scared to death,” said her husband, smiling. “But it was fun.”

The special baby got a complementary shirt from the hospital, said

charge nurse Susan Seyboth.

“We started doing that last year for the first baby of the

millennium,” she said. “We decided to do it for 2001 as well. It’s become

a custom now.”

Seven babies were born as of Monday afternoon, which wasn’t too busy

for New Year’s Day, said Seyboth.

For friends and families of the newborns, it was a great way to start

the new year.

“It’s been an awesome new year for us,” said Paul Berlacher’s sister,

Lisa Gregory. “She’s precious.”

As for the Berlachers, they were excited and the feeling that they

were parents was just beginning to sink in, said Paul Berlacher.

“I’ve never felt anything like it,” he said. “When I held her first

and she opened her eyes and looked at me . . . a grown man cries. It’s

not as much anxious or frightening. Just emotional.”