The birth of Kirsten, our first daughter, was an exciting event. Diane was in Regina General Hospital where I sat waiting. Her mother, Jo Dowling, was in a bar down the street.
Arrangements had been made for Ed Dowling, Diane’s Dad, to come up from Florida right after the birth. I went to the bar to be with Mom, thinking it might be a few hours, but when I got there Mom had already received the call.
“It’s a girl,” she exclaimed. I rushed back to the hospital’s second floor waiting room in the maternity ward.
Soon after Diane was brought out in a wheelchair. In her arms she held our first daughter. Exciting for sure!
I got a call from Dad: “Mr. Crib and Mr. Corvette are on their way,” he said. We spoke in phone code on land lines in those days to save money. It meant a crib had been bought at a baby store in St. Petersburg and had been shipped to Canada.
Our friends Stan and Jan Beadnell were happy for us. Jan did a radio show on CKX called My Two Bits Worth. That day she talked about a surprise package that weighed as much as a sack of potatoes.
Like all babies, Kirsten put everything to her mouth. Once she swallowed a bottle of iron pills, so we rushed her away to have her stomach pumped.
Next day she did it again, so back to the hospital we went. We smartened up after that and cleaned out the medicine cabinet.
Kirsten Albo is now in her 50s, mother of two, married to Bryan, running a successful business called KSA Consulting. She takes me to lunch sometimes and I am very proud of her.