A FAMILY ON CLOUD NINE!

These Malian nonuplets are healthy and happy and have earned their place in the record books 

- KESHIA AFRICA

IMAGES and videos of the family are charming – bright-eyed kids playing with toys, dancing to Baby Shark, cuddling up to their parents on a couch, snuggling on a bed, dozing on a floor at nap time.

They’re similar to scenes you often see of a growing family, posted to document the everyday hustle and bustle of toddlerhood and to preserve milestone moments and special achievements.

But this family are unlike any other: the nine kids in the pictures are all the same age – and recently they became history makers, holding the Guinness World Record for the most children delivered at a single birth to survive.

It’s hard to reconcile the thriving nonuplets from Mali with the tiny bits of humanity they were at birth – impossibly small babies who each weighed between 500g and 1kg and needed to be on ventilators for 12 weeks until they were strong enough to breathe on their own.

The five girls and four boys – Hawa, Adama, Fatouma, Oumou, Kadidia, Mohammed, Elhadji, Oumar and Bah – are about to turn three and their remarkable progress has w a r m e d hearts the world over.

Their mom, Halim a Cissé (28), gave birth via C-section in Casablanca, Morocco, and after months in hospital the babies stayed with their parents in a flat nearby until they were strong enough to be flown home to Mali.

They recently boarded another flight – this time to Europe where they were set to appear on Lo Show dei Record, an Italian TV programme showcasing people attempting to break various records.

The nonuplets weren’t just attempting a record, though –they’d smashed it. And no one could be prouder than their father, Kader Arby (37). “It’s exceptional,” he says.