Oh, the places she will go – and the delicacies she’s likely to bake.
Rosemary Evelyn George, named after her maternal grandmother, Rosemary Van Vleet, arrived at 4:20 a.m. at Northwestern Medicine Kishwaukee Hospital, the first child of Katlyn and Clint George, of Sycamore. She was the first baby born in DeKalb County.
Rosemary’s grandmother taught her mom to bake and sew when she grew up in Des Plaines.
“She’s a regular homemaker,” Katlyn’s mother, Michele Bednarski, said while admiring the newly expanded family Monday afternoon in one of the hospital’s maternity suites.
“She was like a second mom,” Katlyn said of her grandmother, who, along with her grandfather, died in 2010.
Katlyn was admitted Saturday night and induced about 10 p.m. About 29 hours later, Rosemary entered the world.
A few days overdue, Rosemary checked in at a healthy 8 pounds, 12 ounces and 21 inches. Her due date was Wednesday.
“She kind of fooled everybody,” her dad said. “When I look at her, I see God’s creativity, with how amazing he is, and the fact that he gives life.”
Clint George does asphalt paving, and Katlyn George is an elementary teacher at Southeast Elementary School in Sycamore, where she said she’s excited to someday have her “peanut” as a student.
“She’ll be able to go to work with me, to elementary school with me, so that’s neat,” she said. “Here, we have morning announcements about tractors, or something farming ... it’s very different. It’s a very nice community.”
Clint’s parents, Jim and Carol, live in Cortland, and along with the Bednarskis, have been a constant presence in the suites.
Katlyn and Clint George said the New Year’s baby honor isn’t important to them – “I would have preferred she came the day before,” Katlyn said.
So has Clint George’s sister-in-law, Renea Whitmer, who had the honor of giving Rosemary her first bath.
“It was very exciting,” she said. “I had an audience.”