After two postponements, nothing was going to stop Ashleigh and James Foster from getting married - not even the birth of their second child.
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Mrs Foster delivered daughter Stevie at 4.30am on Saturday, two weeks ahead of her due date and nine hours before their Wodonga wedding was to take place.
"I was joking with my obstetrician on the Thursday ... and she said, 'You'll be fine, I'll see you on February 4'," Mrs Foster said.
"I think it was about 1.30am that I rang the hospital, and they said come in in the morning, or ring us if anything changes.
"Then it went from zero to 1000. I left here at 4am, got there at 4.20am and then at 20 to five, she was here."
With a house full of wedding guests at their Killara home, the Fosters contemplated their options.
"We just went, 'Let's just try and get it done'," Mr Foster said.
"The only way it worked, was with help from the midwives."
The pair were granted a three-hour leave pass and were married by celebrant Sharon Milsome at 3pm, at their home instead of Sumsion Gardens.
"It was lovely, they had about 10 guests and everybody was so happy for them," Ms Milsome said.
"Ashleigh only got home half an hour before the wedding, she was amazing.
"In 550 weddings, there's been some amazing and funny circumstances, but this takes the cake."
The humble celebration was far from the large wedding that was scheduled to take place in New Zealand, Mr Foster's other home.
"It was definitely difficult without my family here, but it feels good to have done it ... it was a long time coming," he said.
"The last time I was there was 2019 and we were booked to go back a couple times before the wedding in March.
"We pushed it back to December and we were pretty confident until June, July."
With the New Zealand wedding no longer on the cards, and Mrs Foster falling pregnant within a timeframe the couple had always envisaged, they decided to lock in a ceremony before a sibling to Neave, 3, came along.
Mrs Foster was not fazed by the rush, feeling good and eager to make her partner of eight years her husband. "I think there was just so much adrenaline," she said.
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"I do have a proper wedding dress, which I obviously had from other dates, but I just went, 'Oh, I'll just find something'.
"I think maybe Stevie had a bit of FOMO ... she heard all this talk about it and said 'Well, I'm not missing that'.
"It was quite nice, though - my grandmother was here so she got to meet her third great-grandchild.
"It just turned out that we could celebrate two things."
