She Was Late, But Still In Time To Be Newtown’s First Baby

By Kaaren Valenta

Cindy and Rich Paltauf said they never dreamed that they would have Newtown’s first baby of 2004.

“Emily’s due date was December 28 but our son Nathan was born 12 days before his due date, so we expected that she would be born earlier, too,” Mr Paltauf said.

But Christmas and New Years came and went. Finally, at about 6 pm on Saturday, January 3, Cindy Paltauf went into labor. Emily Joan Paltauf was born at 1:07 am on Sunday at Danbury Hospital. She weighed 9 pounds 2 ounces and was 20½ inches long.

Brother Nathan, who is almost 2½, also was 20½ inches long at birth. But he weighed only 7 pounds 5 ounces.

“She’s a big baby,” Mrs Paltauf agreed. “That’s the three-week difference. He was almost two weeks early and she was a week late.”

Cindy Paltauf was coached through labor by Gloria Garia, a certified doula who lives in Newtown.

“She was excellent,” Mrs Paltauf said. “She works to relax you and to help you focus on what you have to do.”

Rich Paltauf was there, too, and the couple was able to stay in the same hospital room with their baby until they came home to Newtown on January 7. The Paltaufs live on Longview Heights Road in the house in which Rich grew up.

“My family came here from Danbury in 1973 when I was in the eighth grade,” he said. “Newtown was such a small town at the time. I remember that the drive from Danbury to Exit 10 seemed to take forever. At the time I-84 didn’t go through. The additional lanes weren’t built until later.”

In high school Rich Paltauf became a volunteer firefighter through his activities in the audio visual department, where Millard Goodsill was the audio visual coordinator. Mr Goodsill also ran the Newtown High Forest Fire Crew, an arm of the Connecticut Department of Environmental Protection.

“It was a good crew –– we had a good time and learned a lot,” Mr Paltauf said.

It also encouraged him to become a professional firefighter. After four years with the Danbury Fire Department, he joined the Waterbury Fire Department where he has served for 15 years and is a battalion chief. He is also a life member of Newtown Hook & Ladder.

He met his wife, who is originally from Fairfield, on a blind date.

“We were introduced by Joe and Sue Miller, who live in Newtown,” Cindy Paltauf said. “She is a friend of mine from college and he is a longtime friend of Rich’s.”

Cindy and Rich married in 1999 and bought his parents’ house on Longview Heights Road the following year. Cindy Paltauf left her position as a fourth grade teacher at All Saints Catholic School in Norwalk to become a full-time mother when Nathan was born.

The couple have been renovating their house, putting in a new kitchen complete with a cathedral ceiling, a fireplace, and a feeding station for the family’s two boxers, Buster and Spencer.

Currently, Rich Paltauf is on a four-week leave to help at home.

“Cindy can use the help and I want to be here,” he said. “We also are very appreciative of what the merchants of Newtown have done for the first baby. It was a nice and very generous gift for us.”