When comedienne Katherine Ryan welcomes HELLO! into her spacious north London home, the woman herself is an island of calm amid a sea of activity.
“I’m always sane,” the TV star, who is married to her childhood sweetheart Bobby Kootstra, tells us during this exclusive photoshoot and interview. “I know that ‘Nothing matters very much, and very little matters at all.'”
That calm demeanour will come in handy when this family of five expands to six. Katherine, 42, is pregnant with her fourth child and cannot wait to welcome another baby to her brood, despite having to cope with this summer’s heatwaves.
“I am well into my second trimester now, so it will be a fat girl summer for me. The entire hot summer, I will be large and in charge,” she quips. “It’s going to get ugly, but that’s fine.”
The new baby will join elder siblings Fenna, two, Fred, three, and Violet, 16, meaning the star will have three children under four, with a large age gap between them and her eldest.
‘Surprise’ pregnancy
While chatting to us in the busy kitchen as her eldest Violet and her husband Bobby get ready nearby, the star reveals that her pregnancy was a “bit of a surprise” – but not a huge one.
“We don’t use contraception, because we’re old and we’re financially solvent, and we like having kids. That’s been the case for the past six years we’ve been together,” she says.
Her teenage daughter’s reaction
With her trademark candour, Katherine adds: “Violet is not very excited. She said: ‘This is enough kids; what are you doing?’ She has had mixed emotions through all my pregnancies.
Violet is not very excited. She said: ‘This is enough kids; what are you doing?’ She has had mixed emotions through all my pregnancies.
“She was happy about the first one and then with Fenna, she was annoyed at worst, indifferent at best. But now we’ve come to an understanding. She understands she will love the baby but she doesn’t think we should be having any more kids.”
Home birth plans
The family moved into the house in June 2019, attracted by the secondary schools in the area. “It was our family home, and we meant to fill it with children,” she recalls. “You can get a bigger house in zone five, and it’s also good for touring, because I’m right on the M25.”
It is also where Katherine’s youngest Fenna arrived via water birth. And although the star of The Duchess is keeping her due date private, she does open up about her desire to have this next baby at home again.
“Fenna took the longest, but that was my favourite one. Bobby feels he has a bit of PTSD from that, because she was ‘sunny side up’ and got a bit stuck, but she was never in distress and was born fine,” she says.
To read the full exclusive interview, pick up the latest issue of HELLO! on sale in the UK on Monday. You can subscribe to HELLO! to get the magazine delivered free to your door every week or purchase the digital edition online via our Apple or Google apps.
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