Introducing Phoebe Lucia Macro

At 5.49am on 28 August 2019, the moment we had been waiting for since that first positive pregnancy test back in December of 2018 arrived. Little Jelly Bean was born, and we finally found out the gender: it’s a girl!

She’s absolutely adorable, with lots of dark hair and the cutest lips. She makes the sweetest sounds, and she’s very tall! She’s in the 98th percentile for length. She weighed 8lbs 9oz when she was born, two days before her due date and one day before my birthday.

We named her Phoebe Lucia Macro. Phoebe has been one of my favourite names since I was a teenager, and mushily enough when Ryan and I were first dating at the age of 16, we had two bears that we’d given each other as gifts. They were called Ryleigh and Phoebe (Ryleigh because it’s a blend of our names, and Phoebe just because we loved the name). So it seemed only fitting that we would call our daughter Phoebe, a name that holds such fond memories for us already.

The origin of the name Phoebe is cool, too. It’s Greek, after the Goddess of the moon and it means to shine brightly, a motto I have always aimed to live by. So all-in-all, Phoebe just seemed to fit perfectly for us, and we couldn’t find another name we loved quite as much.

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This time last week I had no idea that this little lady was about to make an appearance, two days before her due date and one day before my birthday. Introducing Phoebe Lucia Macro, born on the morning of 28 August weighing 8lbs 9oz. We loved the surprise of finding out her gender on her birthday, even if we were convinced she was a boy right up until then! We have had the most incredible, exhausting, emotional, rewarding and fascinating week and are completely smitten. #babygirl #newborn #surprisegender #firsttimeparents #instamum #mumsofinstagram #pblogger #pbloggersuk #baby #firstbaby

A post shared by Ashleigh (@ashleigh.online) on Sep 3, 2019 at 11:03am PDT

Her middle name, Lucia, which we pronounce Loo-Sha, was chosen to pay homage to St Lucia. Ryan’s family comes from St Lucia and it’s also where we got engaged, so it’s a very special place to us. We can’t wait to take Phoebe there some day.

I’ll be sharing some baby-related posts here on the blog over the coming weeks, but in the meantime you can see updates on Instagram on both my personal account and our family one.

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Sleepy snuggles with my girl. We gave her a bath and read her a story before bed last night and it was so sweet. She seemed to find it very relaxing and had a lovely long sleep afterwards, which made the rest of the night so much more manageable! Hopefully we can do the same again today. I got her up at 7 and changed her outfit, but then I dropped a slice of toast with jam on it on her and had to change her again 😂 poor thing! She’s been napping well today too but that always worries me because it may mean a trickier night. Let’s see! Happy three weeks Phoebe ❤️ #babygirl #newborn #threeweeksold #3weeksold #baby #firsttimemum #firsttimeparents #instamum #instadad #instababy #babiesofinstagram #mumsofinstagram #pblogger #pbloggeruk

A post shared by The Macro Family (@themacrofamily) on Sep 18, 2019 at 5:37am PDT

I’ve got a pregnancy essentials blog post ready to go in my drafts. I had planned to share that on my maternity leave but this little miss decided to arrive on day one so I didn’t get a chance.

I’ve also put together a newborn essentials list based on the 3am Amazon purchases I made during Phoebe’s first few days, and I’ll be sharing our birth story soon too.

But for now, I just wanted to let you know that she’s here. Welcome to the world Phoebe.