Couple Married After Boston Marathon Bombing Celebrates Arrival of New Baby

Alexandra Copley Watling, whose middle name honors the site of the 2013 bombings, was born on Tuesday morning.

A Dallas couple who wed just after running the Boston Marathon last year, soon after a pair of bombs tore through its finish line, are celebrating the birth of a baby girl Tuesday.

Robert and Kelli Watling welcomed their daughter Alexandra Copley Watling, whose middle name commemorates Copley Square — the site of the Boston Marathon finish line, and of the 2013 twin bombings.

Alexandra was born at 10:26 a.m. Tuesday, weighing in at 5 pounds, 6 ounces.

The Watlings are a couple with a deep love of running, and a tradition of linking their milestones to marathons.

Their love story began with a first date at a 5K, progressed to a proposal after the Chicago Marathon and culminated in a wedding after the finish of the Boston Marathon on April 15, 2013, just after the bombs exploded.

Their Boston Common nuptials had just begun last year when the bombs exploded, but with the support of their families, they went ahead with the wedding anyway amid the confusion.

"At that time, we still weren't sure who did this or why," Kelli told NECN earlier this year. "If it was a terrorist act, we certainly weren't going to let them derail our plans."

The couple raced the Boston Marathon again this past year knowing their daughter was on her way, in a triumphant move Robert said at the time marked "a perfect ending for us."

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