Baby Brother...

Finn's long-awaited Baby Brother arrived yesterday at about 6:16pm - Wednesday the 29th of October. Cori is still in hospital with the li'l fella, but I'm back at home to sort Finn this evening before returning to the hospital after Finn's in nursery tomorrow morning. So I use this time to give just a quick (and rather tired) update...
Before all else, here is a picture of the new arrival:

The birth was straightforward, "easy" and very quick.
In short, the run of events (for me) was:

1. Get the phone call from Cori at c. 2.30, with her still hedging her bets with "I think this is it, so you better come, just in case."
2. Through the usual rainy misery of London traffic I get buses to collect Finn from nursery and then home, arriving maybe at 4:15.
3. As Finn rolls about on the carpet with Anna (Cori's heroic friend whom Finn adores) we pack the last few things in the bags and faff about in all haste.
4. We phone the taxi company, knowing that we'd been told to come in as soon as we were in labour. Wait for taxi, wait, wait... Phone another taxi company, wait, receive Kafkaesque phone-calls, wait, wait, find taxi parked in the wrong place.
5. Endure taxi ride to hospital.
6. Report to antenatal check-up place, where the midwife/nurse-person calmly checks Cori and then walks us up to the delivery rooms.
7. Stroll around the room as they begin to run the birthing pool. Lean on the edge of the tub when the contractions come.
8. Stop filling the tub. Unable to move from leaning on the edge of the tub.
9. Baby is born (standing up), at about 6:16pm

It all happened very quickly, especially the hospital bit. This is probably best illustrated by the fact that parts 4, 5, and 6-to-9 were all of about the same length in time.

The contractions lessened in the taxi, but as soon as we got in the hospital they were immediately serious and every two minutes.

It all went very well, and the swiftness of it all meant that it was much easier to get through, without the exhaustion or fear creeping over us all. It was still terrifying and painful and epic etc., but, relatively, so much easier than Finn's birth, and even that was very straightforward when compared to others.

The amazing ease of it showed in Cori being able to (very tentatively and precariously) walk about the room only shortly after 7pm or so. Amazing!

Unlike for Finn, I was able to spend the night (on the floor), and also unlike last time, the new-born slept soundly and perfectly, even needing to be woken to feed.

This left us this morning (relatively) well rested and able to enjoy the baby...

We were also able to discuss the name, and we think we've come to a decision. On the train back from York a few weeks ago we fought it out to pretty much the only first name we could agree on, even though it was neither of our favourites (I don't think). We have had no better ideas, and we're not going to do much more thinking on it, so it is unlikely to change from what we have now:

Orry Franklin

'Orry' because it's a nice name and Manx and unusual. (It comes from "King Orry", whose name comes up in many ways all over the Isle of Man).

It was also chosen as it was easy to pronounce... but it transpires that it's not so for anyone America. Even Cori...

For we Brits it's "O" as in "Orange"; but for Americans it's seemingly clearly an "O" as in "Oar". Making the the name either rhyme with "Sorry" or "Story".

I don't know what we're going to do about that, but at least I can put my claim down first, that it absolutely should be "Orry" to rhyme with "Sorry"!

We did not have a middle name at all, and we didn't come close to one in our discussions about the first name, so we landed on one which we both quite like, but which I wouldn't want to have as a first name:

Orry Oscar Franklin

My sister gave a laugh at the name, my father asked if we were joking... we see that it is a bit silly, but we think that it will grow into being a good name. - Either that or we need to come up with something better very very quickly!
... But we think that Orry is going to be a goer for him though:

Unfortunately, because of the swiftness of the birth, the hospital are keen to monitor the baby for longer, so Orry will need to be there for five days. So I will be visiting daily around looking after Finn. We started today, when left the hospital to go and collected Finn from nursery and return with him to meet his new baby brother:

Finn was very good with him and he took it all very much in his stride. He was interested and pleased to see Orry, and very ready to kiss him hello and goodbye etc. when prompted. It seemed like a very good start to Finn accepting his family as expanding into four, but we will see how it goes when we're all home. Hopefully that won't be long...