My 'little' brother is turning 50 on Monday. It feels a bit weird to me particularly because he was born on my 8th birthday.
Our grandfather came up from Victoria to visit, which is the only time I ever remember seeing him.
Mum had made my birthday cake, but hadn't yet iced it when she had to go to hospital. Grandfather decorated it with jelly beans and it's the only birthday cake I can remember over the years.
I recall being quite chuffed at Mum having a baby on my birthday.
Ten days later my 'big' sister turned 10, so yes, her 60th birthday is not far off too. So for 10 days all 4 of us will be in our fifties...(another brother is 55.)
Kel always had a youthful quality about him..didn't marry until he was 43...no kids. So he wasn't keen on having a party ie: acknowledging his 50 yrs.
But my siblings and I are bringing a small party to him on Sunday. We kind-of bulldozed him into it. Just we four and 3 spouses. We don't see a lot of each other without kids and grandies, so I expect it will be very nice.
In my former life I was a midwife, and can tell you the if you don't want a baby born at christmas, be careful at easter. Where I worked, lots of men worked in the mines and they got an easter break. Christmas was always busy. Women due around christmas would pressure for an induction in the 2 weeks before, so we were busy then too. Lots of inductions end up with forceps, so the mum's postnatal days aren't comfortable- more work foor the postnatal ward. When an induction doesn't work, the caesar rate goes up, busier. If they got the dates wrong (and they do) the baby might not even be "due" and premature babies make even more work.
Moral of the story (from the midwife's point of view) "Just stick to the chocolate eggs at easter".
Gee Rosie, I didn't realise the 'choosing early delivery' had been around so long. I recently heard of a stupid woman who wanted to be induced early so the baby wasn't so big. Stupid stupid girl.
My sister had the unfortunate experience of her doctor wanting an early deliver, because it suited him. (She only realised this later.) Her daughter was only 5lb 8oz and had a lot of respiratory problems early on.
Blaze, my daughter was born on the 22nd Feb too! My 55 year old brother lucked out too with March!
To add to the Cancerians in my family, there's not only me, youngest brother, sister, son and late Dad, but a nephew, a nephew-in-law, and my daughter-in-law!
My father used to work governmental contracts in various parts of the world. We all packed up (poor Mum) and headed off to the Carribean for three years. Mum was pregnant en route and gave birth to one of my sisters whilst we were in Jamaica. At the end of the contract, we packed up again (poor Mum) and she was again pregnant en route to U.K. My other sister was born in England. After a few shorter contracts in Europe, U.S. and the Subcontinent, Dad got another long contract, this time in Australia. We packed up again (poor Mum) and came here for three years before returning to U.K. (again with the damn packing, poor Mum) My older brother and I kept checking Mum's midriff on the travels through Europe etc and again coming to and back from Australia. Upon our hearing that we were once again returning to Australia we did the midriff checking again. Mum finally noticed our 'examinations' and enquired about them. We told her that we noticed that when going to and from hot countries, she was pregnant but not so when we had anything to do with colder countries; so therefore it only happened when hot countries were involved. Australia is hot so we were expecting further arrivals. Mum pointed out that my brother and I were born when no hot countries were involved and that she was neither moving nor getting pregnant again.