Layona Chandler Matsuo arrived early and just in time.
Five days into the new year, Layona was born at 5:07 a.m. at 3,294 grams (7.2 lb) in weight and 49 cm in length. She was the first baby born at Sechelt Hospital in 2024.
While one cannot campaign for New Year’s baby, new mother Kahori Matsuo was determined to see her daughter the first baby born on the Sunshine Coast in 2024.
Layona was due Jan. 11 but Kahori as her family has a history of delivering babies early, she was pretty sure her daughter would arrive early. Once 2024 loomed, Kahori started doing all the exercises she could to urge Layona into the world, hip-shaking her way into the new year, and motherhood.
Despite the hip shakes, Layona took her time. At one point, Kahori and midwife Amanda Reid thought another baby had taken the New Year’s title, but it was a false alarm.
When Kahori went into labour on the evening of Jan. 4, she was the only patient in Sechelt Hospital’s maternity ward (though she was told a number of babies – Layona’s future classmates – were due in the second week of 2024). After six hours of labour, Layona arrived, finally crying as she nestled onto Kahori’s chest.
Layona is the first child for the ebullient new parents, who met on the Coast a couple of years ago.
Father Wyatt Chandler arrived on the Coast following the pandemic, having been raised in Hazelton, B.C. He works in landscaping and renovating and is set to fulfill his dream of coaching parkour gymnastics starting next month.
Mother Kahori immigrated from Japan a few years ago and has been a nanny on the Sunshine Coast for the past five years, caring for at least 20 children, she estimates. This came in helpful when it came to preparing for Layona. On the baby equipment front, “I didn't buy anything,” she laughs. It also means she’s had a lot of experience witnessing various parenting techniques. “I was thinking, when I get the baby I’ll do this. I’ll do this. I won't do this.”
Paternal grandmother René Chandler was on hand soon after Layona’s arrival to meet her first grandchild. She relayed that the day before Coast Reporter visited the family’s Selma Park home, they went for a walk down by the water. As they were walking along, Kahori finally pushing her own child in a stroller, the new mother commented, “This is my dream come true.”
Around B.C.
The first baby born in B.C. in 2024 arrived at the stroke of midnight. Taylor Stutsky was born to Julia Goryn and Travis Stutsky, weighing in at six pounds, 14 ounces.
In the Vancouver Coastal Health (VCH) region, the first baby of the new year, a baby boy named Ayan, was born at 2:19 p.m. at the Squamish General Hospital.
There were 162 babies born at the Sechelt Hospital in 2023.