A mum-to-be planning her wedding and for the arrival of her baby never expected the two events to happen on the same day. Stephanie Tallent moved her nuptials to a hospital ward after her baby daughter arrived three weeks early.
The 41-year-old attended a routine ultrasound appointment with partner Jason Nece on Friday last week when a nurse found the expectant mum was in active labour.
Stephanie had been due to have a caesarean in September because the baby was breech, so medics were forced to act fast.
But the Texas couple told doctors there was one thing they had to do before the baby arrived.
“It was really important to us that we were married when our baby was born,” Stephanie told the magazine.
Staff at the Texas Children’s Pavillion for Women in Houston sprang into action to make the couple’s dream come true.
Dr Karla Wagner told PEOPLE: “All of a sudden, we had a wedding.”
The hospital chaplain was drafted in to perform the ceremony while Jason retrieved the marriage licence the couple had obtained a day earlier along with a white maternity sundress.
Stephanie was even provided with a bouquet, ‘something borrowed’ in the shape of a pearl necklace from a nurse and a ribbon as her ‘something blue’.
A nurse played Mendelssohn’s Wedding March on her mobile phone before the couple exchanged vows in front of around 25 people.
Newlywed Stephanie was then whisked away in a wheelchair with a ‘Just Married’ sign on the back to have her baby.
Less than two hours later, baby Sophia was born weighing 6lbs 3oz.
Stephanie told PEOPLE: “I didn’t think I’d be married and having a baby at the same time. This was the happiest day of our lives.”