Lanyiah Rachael Bushnell Is Wyoming Medical Center’s New Year’s Baby

The Bushnell family was celebrating more than you were early New Year's Day.

Lanyiah Rachael was born to Jazmin Jones and Eric Bushnell at 2:02 a.m. Thursday, the first baby at the Wyoming Medical Center for 2015.

"Her due date wasn't until Jan. 3, or tomorrow," Jazmin said at an informal news conference Friday in her room at the Ruth R. Ellbogen Family, Mother and Baby Center on the third floor of the new McMurry West Tower.

Earlier that day, a checkup didn't indicate any changes in the due date, she said.

They watched the ball drop in Times Square at 10 p.m., and labor began soon thereafter.

She checked into the hospital and was put on an epidural block, which didn't fully take hold by the time Lanyiah Rachael -- at 5 lb., 1 oz; 22 inches -- was born, Jazmin said.

Mom and dad arrived at the name by considering what would rhyme with the baby's 7-year-old sister, Maya.

They like "Nyiah," but when they said it, Maya came running, so that was too close.

They then tacked "La" on front of Nyiah and that worked, Eric said.

"Rachel" was a long-standing family name for them, he added.

Hospital spokesman Eric Valdez said the family of the first-born baby of the new year receives a large goody bag of diapers, gifts, and WMC-monogrammed water bottles.

"And bragging rights," Valdez said.

All of which seems secondary to Jazmin, who moved here in 2011.

She never expected to have the first baby of the year, she said.

"I'm blessed," Jazmin said. "I wouldn't change it for the world."