He or she will be the first child born to a serving president during the history of France's Fifth Republic. And so even if the parents weren't international beauty Carla Bruni-Sarkozy and the dynamic French leader Nicolas Sarkozy interest in the next resident of the Elysee Palace would be high. Despite the model-turned balladeer's desire to downplay the pregnancy, media coverage is at fever pitch.
Every day reports circulate that she's in hospital already giving birth. In fact, Carla, 43, has been seen this week having a pizza with her 56-year-old husband. She was also seen making a phone call in the street near the home she has held onto in Paris' chic 16th arrondissement. Despite admitting being at the end of her tether with the pregnancy, Carla looked relaxed and as if she was enjoying these last few precious weeks before the sleepless nights begin. After relationships with Eric Clapton and Mick Jagger, the first lady is used to the limelight.
Her romance with the president started in a whirlwind of publicity as the press pack followed them on holiday in Egypt and they married after just eight weeks of dating. It's not an experience that Carla is keen for the new baby, whose sex she hasn't revealed, to suffer. She has vowed to "do everything to protect this child". And no wonder when adding to their family – she is already mother to a nine-year-old son from a previous relationship, while her husband has two grown-up sons, a teenage boy and a grandson – is a long-held wish. "I'd love to have children with Nicolas. I hope to, if I am young enough. It would be a dream," she said shortly after her marriage. "If it comes, I'd be the happiest person in the world."In pictures: How Carla became a model wife for the president