It happens every year, but it is always good to hear when one twin is born in the old year and the other twin is born in the new year. A California woman, Maria Esperanza Flores Rios, celebrated the end of 2017 with a baby boy and the beginning of 2018 with a baby girl. When the babies grow up, they will have to explain how they can be Twins when they were born in different Years.
The twins
When the boy grows up, he will have bragging rights. That's because he was born on New Year's Eve at 11:58 p.m. Even though Joaquin Ontiveros was in 2017 for just two minutes, he gets to celebrate his birthday on New Year's Eve every year.
He was the last baby born at the Delano Regional Medical Center in 2017.
Joaquin's twin sister, Aitana de Jesus Ontiveros, gets to celebrate her birthday on New Year's Day every year because she was born 18 minutes after her brother at 12:16 a.m. She was breached and had to be delivered by C-section. She was the first baby born at the Delano Regional Medical Center in 2018.
Seyed Tamijidi, the doctor who delivered the twins, said he has been delivering Babies for 35 years and this was his first experience with twins born in different years. Louise Firth Campbell and Amram Shapiro, co-authors of The Book of Odds, say the chances of twins being born in different years are about one in 59,000. That's why it makes news when it does happen.
Look at these beautiful babies! This set of twins was born in Delano last night. Big brother was born in 2017. Little sister was born in 2018! Congrats to the parents! 👶🏻👶🏻
— Jessica Harrington (@Jessica23ABC) January 1, 2018
Aitana de Jesus Ontiveros - 12:16 am. Joaquin - 11:58 pm. pic.twitter.com/de1otp0iqv
About the births
Maria Rios is happy and thankful for the birth of her twins who were born on December 31, 2017, and January 1, 2018.
Both babies came early. They were not due until a whole month later. The Kern County proud mother's original due date was January 27, but she had a Cesarean section scheduled for both babies on January 10. If the delivery had gone as scheduled, both babies would have been born in the same year.
Not only will Joaquin have bragging rights about being born first, he might brag about weighing more and being longer.
He weighed 5 pounds, 9 ounces and was 18 inches long. His twin sister weighed in at 4 pounds, 10 ounces and was 16 inches long. Something else Joaquin can brag about is that he is the only boy among three older sisters and his twin sister.
The mother and both babies are doing fine and getting a lot of attention because of the years of the births. The babies will probably have their own birthday parties. A question was asked on social media if the boy gets to be deducted on the 2017 tax return while his sister will not be deducted because technically, she wasn't born last year.
Other area baby news
Even though Aitana de Jesus Ontiveros was born at 12:16 a.m. on January 1, 2018, and was the first baby of the Delano Regional Medical Center, she was not the first baby born in California on New Year's Day.
The first baby was born one minute earlier at Sutter Medical Center in Sacramento. Ignacio Calderon Pulgar, who was due a week later, was born at 12:15 a.m. on January 1, 2018. That baby was much bigger than the Ontiveros twins. He weighed 8 pounds, 7 ounces and was 21 inches long.