Saint Joseph’s delivers its first baby of 2016 on New Year’s morning

In her room at Providence Saint Joseph Medical Center, overlooking Burbank, Suzanna Djglyan was showing her daughter, Natalie, 8, how to swaddle a baby Monday afternoon.

Enfolding her newborn son, Gagik, the first baby born at the local hospital in 2016, in successive triangular sections of a warm, cottony blanket, she said: “Like this, then like this, then like this — then we get a little burrito.”

The little boy inside the tight bundle, who weighed in at 7 pounds, 4 ounces at birth around 8:25 a.m. on Friday, was the second son and third child for Djglyan and her husband, Yeso — all three were born at Saint Joseph’s, all three delivered by Dr. Richard Bardowell, the parents said. The family lives in Lake Balboa.

“It was actually overwhelming,” Suzanna Djglyan said of the New Year’s Day birth. “Overwhelmed with joy. He’s so cute, a healthy baby boy.’

For Yeso Djglyan, who works in the transportation business, the delivery was the first one he’d had to miss, he said. He was at the Rose Parade with clients and came to the hospital later. He said talking about missing the birth still gives him goose bumps, but he had to do it.

“No work, no eat,” he said. “Baby’s gotta eat.”

The most important thing, he said, was that the baby, who is named after his maternal grandfather, was born healthy.

“It’s a monkey year, and we’ve got a little monkey,” he said, referring to the animal sign for 2016 according to the Chinese Zodiac. The Chinese New Year doesn’t take place until next month.

Last year, the year of the goat, there were about 2,400 babies born at the Burbank hospital, according to Patricia Aidem, a spokeswoman for Providence Health & Services of Southern California. Among the most popular names in the local nursery is Noah, which may be fitting for the winter of El Niño.

Gagik was originally expected to arrive on Jan. 8, but, the new father joked, it would have been better for tax purposes if his second son had been born on New Year’s Eve.

“New Year’s or not, it’s the best present, best blessing you can get,” he said. “It just puts more excitement into our lives.”

Yeso Djglyan said their first son, Harout, 6, named after his paternal grandfather according to family tradition, also had an interesting occurrence surrounding his birth date. He celebrated his first birthday on Oct. 10, 2010, or 10-10-10.

Harout said he was happy to have a little brother, but he was shy about whether he thought it mattered what day the baby had been born. Instead, he seemed awed by the sight of his new sibling.

“I can’t stop looking at his face,” Harout said.

“Because he’s so beautiful,” his sister, Natalie, added. She said she plans to help with the diapers and “everything,” though her brother wanted no part of it.

Natalie said she was excited to have a new brother born on the first of the year.

“It’s amazing because we can celebrate his birthday on a very special day,” she said.

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Chad Garland, chad.garland@latimes.com

Twitter: @chadgarland