Toni Street welcomes her baby boy!

She was due to head on maternity leave but instead, Toni Street made an urgent dash to New Plymouth today to welcome her new baby boy.

The baby boy, who was carried by a surrogate mother, was due to arrive later this month but instead surprised everyone with his early arrival.

Street shared the news on social media, thanking her close friend and surrogate Sophie Braggins for bringing her son into the world.

Earlier this week, Street took the Herald on an exclusive tour of her new nursery, which has a distinct animal theme thanks to her two daughters, Juliette and Mackenzie.

But while Street was happy to let her young daughters partake in decorating, she's not planning to take their advice when it comes to names for the new arrival, with four-year-old Mackenzie championing the name Bruce.

The exclusive video on nzherald.co.nz shows a colourful mobile featuring giraffes, lions and elephants hanging above the cot and framed prints of animals — including a fox and a racoon — on the wall.

"I was so excited to just be able to use the 'boyish' colours," Street says of the room's white, grey and navy background colour scheme.

"The cot was decorated by my two girls," Street adds, pointing to two soft toy dogs. "The girls are into the pups."

The animal theme continues in the wardrobe, where Street reveals two bear suits before confessing she has already picked out clothes that will fit her boy far beyond his infant years.

"This is slightly embarrassing … this is for a four-year-old boy, and this here is for a three-year-old," she says. "Do you think I'm prepared enough?"

Street, 34, announced earlier this year that she and her husband would be welcoming a third child via a surrogate — her childhood friend Braggins.

A doctor had previously told Street that due to her battle with the auto-immune disease Churg-Strauss syndrome, another pregnancy would be too risky.

Street and Braggins have given interviews about the surrogacy throughout the pregnancy, in an effort to demystify the process.

Braggins, who has two children, said in June that she was feeling good about bearing a child for her best friend, but occasionally thought of the baby as her own.

"I do have moments where he does feel like mine. I think it is just biological because he is growing inside me and although my logical side says this is Toni and Matt's baby, I have moments when I think of him and think 'I love you little boy'," she said.

"I am really happy with feeling like that and I know where he is going in the end."
Commercial surrogacy (where a surrogate is paid to carry someone else's child) is banned in New Zealand, but there is provision for a surrogate's pregnancy-related costs to be covered by the commissioning parents.

"At the beginning there were all the obvious costs, like $12,000 for the IVF, $4000 for the obstetrician, and then there is accommodation for when Soph is up here (in Auckland) and those sorts of things," Street said on-air in June.

"You actually have to be quite on to it to remember all the day-to-day costs because you are not living it like you are when you are pregnant.

"The entire cost from start to finish, we think is around $30,000 and that includes the IVF, the implantation, the cost of the lawyers and councillors."

This article was first published on nzherld.co.nz and is reproduced here with permission.