Caden Ezralow Is ‘First Baby’

Caden Ezralow, born on January 3, is the First Baby of 2007 in Pacific Palisades, continuing a tradition started by the Palisadian-Post in 1954. He and his parents, Marc and Gayle, will receive more than 70 gifts from local merchants and business owners, including toys, an engraved sterling silver baby spoon, clothes, free haircuts, flowers, dry cleaning, restaurant certificates, and a $50 savings bond. Gayle Ezralow’s due date was January 11, but a month earlier her obstetrician, Dr. Toni Long, told her she had started to dilate, which meant the baby would probably come sooner. In late December, Gayle had contractions and her husband drove her to St. John’s Hospital, but labor didn’t progress and they went home. On New Year’s Day, they went to the hospital again. ‘I had contractions and I didn’t feel well,’ Gayle says. Once again the contractions stopped and the Ezralows returned to the Palisades. On January 2, their 8-year-old son Bryce had a play date with a friend. ‘I was worried because I didn’t feel the baby moving,’ Gayle says. When the friend’s mom, Ryoko Nadeau, came to pick up her son, Gayle told her, ‘I need to go to the hospital.’ Gayle called her husband and told him that she was going to St. John’s, but told him ‘Don’t worry, I don’t think it’s anything.’ He asked her if it was okay if he went to the gym. ‘Sure,’ she said. This week he said, ‘We’d already been to the hospital twice and I thought it was another false alarm.’ Nadeau drove Gayle to the hospital, and when they arrived, Gayle said, ‘Let me just sit for 10 minutes.’ Then she went inside and the nurses told her that she was in labor. Marc had just parked his car in the gym parking lot when he received another call to come to the hospital. At 4 p.m., as soon as Gayle lay down in her bed, the contractions started. ‘We’ll have this baby by nine,’ said Dr. Long, whose estimate was off by a bit: Caden Marc Ezralow entered the world at 12:58 a.m., weighing 8 lbs. 3 oz. The couple, who also have a six-year-old daughter, Riley, agreed that they didn’t want to know the baby’s sex before the child was born. ‘It was the hardest thing in the world not to find out,’ Marc says, ‘but we accomplished it. As it was being delivered, I knew it was a boy by the little face. Caden looks like a mixture of my son and daughter.’ The couple had picked out two girls names, Avery or Elle, but hadn’t decided on a boy’s name, so for two days the baby didn’t have a name. Marc searched on a Web site for prospective names. Since he and Gayle both liked Irish and Celtic names, he specified that name origin and got a list of names. ‘The name Caden just jumped out at us,’ Marc says. The couple decided to give Caden his father’s name as a middle name, but were worried that their older son might feel slighted, so they told Bryce that they would change his middle name, Nathan, to his grandpa’s middle name, Marshall. Grandpa and the parents were thrilled with the idea, and then Bryce weighed in. ‘Don’t you think that’s kind of silly to change my name after eight years?’ Bryce asked. His name will stay the same. The siblings are thrilled about the new baby. ‘When Bryce found out I was going to have a baby, he said, ‘Thank you so much!” Gayle says. ‘Now that Caden’s at home, all they want to do is hold him.’ Gayle says that having a third baby is already a different experience from her first two, who were born 21 months apart. ‘I’m enjoying it and I don’t take it for granted. I feel like this is such a treat for me to have this baby. He’s a lucky little guy because he has a lot of love to come home to.’ Marc has lived in the Palisades for 15 years and Gayle has been here for 10 years. Two years ago, Gayle and the two children lived in Park City, where Bryce trained with the U.S. Ski School, while Marc commuted back and forth every weekend from the Palisades. They decided it was too tough for the family and moved back to the Palisades. Both children attend Village School and mom keeps busy with volunteer work. Marc is a managing partner in his family’s real estate investment firm, Ezralow Company. He also co-produces feature films under the banner of Revolution Films, which has produced ‘Sleep With Me,’ One Tough Cop’ and ‘Locust.’ ‘I can’t tell you how many people called to tell me about the Post’s contest and told me to call,’ Gayle says. Fortunately for the Ezralows, their baby was born 12 hours earlier than Sawyer Liam Karish, the son of Jeff and Erin Karish.