I was two days overdue and had visited the hospital that morning for a stretch and sweep, which is quite often possible with a second baby, as the cervix doesn't close as tightly after you've had a baby! (See nothing is ever the same again!) The midwife had high hopes of success, as my cervix was good and soft and almost entirely thinned out. I remained glum, as my first daughter had been very late: 18 days. Nothing worked to bring on my first labor, and I had a hospital induction despite wanting a homebirth.

The day went on and on, and nothing happened. It was the day before Christmas Eve, and my husband was home. To cheer me up we decided to do some last-minute toy shopping for our daughter and went to a large toy store. On the way in the car I started to notice Braxton Hicks contractions, which weren't painful but were coming frequently. We kept an eye on them as we continued our shopping. At 6.30 p.m., I was standing at the checkout grimacing slightly as I paid for the gifts, and I decided it was probably time to go home.

I called the hospital to let them know I thought I might be in labor (still didn't hurt!) and let the on-call midwife know I might need her later that night. We arrived home at 7 p.m. with the midwife hot on our heels, and she examined me upstairs on our bed. I was 4 centimeters dilated already! I finished putting our 19-month-old to bed and went downstairs for a cup of tea and a bounce on the birth ball.

We had hired a home water pool from our hospital, and after an hour of laborious filling on my husband's part (I was fine!), I finally climbed in. The water was great and really relaxing. My contractions seemed to fade a bit, but the midwife didn't seem worried. After a while, she said although I didn't seem too uncomfortable, she was going to give the second midwife a call, just in case! Not long after, I experienced mild urges to push!

The second midwife came in the door as I was squatting on the floor next to the tub pushing. She rushed to get everything ready, as they both felt things were progressing rather more rapidly than they had thought! At 10:32 p.m., my second daughter burst into the world (giving me a nasty tear – entrance from waters breaking to gazing at Mummy was seven minutes!).

I was ecstatic. I finally had my marvelous homebirth and my baby in time for Christmas. Ecstatic at least until the midwifes started to stitch me up. My daughter was 9 pounds exactly, the same weight as my first daughter, and my stitches were pretty major. But I wouldn't have missed the wonderful feeling waking up in my own home the next morning and introducing our first daughter to her little sister – Santa's early Christmas present. She had slept upstairs through everything.

At home I was in control and it felt great. Both midwives were amazed at how quick and focused the whole labor had been and thanked me for a lovely homebirth experience!