It's every new parent's worst nightmare, you set your little one down and leave the room only to come back and see them missing from the cot.
For many, it is just over worrying, but for one Epsom family, it became a temporary reality after they were misled by their nanny, a person meant to be helping them take care of their infant child.
While they slept the nanny crept in and out of the property, left with the baby, and had even told a relative it was actually hers.
The Epsom parents have spoken out about the harrowing experience, detailing the moments after they discovered their two-week-old baby was gone.
"The only word is probably evil ... somebody that can be invited into somebody's home to look after their new-born baby," dad 'Matt' told TVNZ.
The parents' names have been changed for legal reasons.
After waking up and making the discovery, the couple went into a state of shock with Matt bolting out the house looking out for a homeless person he thought had committed the act.
Wife Louise was trying to make sense of it all while answering questions from a police operator.
"At the same time I had a thousand other thoughts - where is she, is she hurt, is she alive? Horrible, horrible thoughts", she told TVNZ.
Detective Inspector Scott Beard said the nanny become a prime suspect thanks to a CCTV camera installed at the house, as well as the phone call made to 111.
"When you take into account the lies, the ruse created over a period of nine months ... and then the actual kidnapping, I've never had anything quite like this before."
Louise said when they went to hire Manukau-Togiavalu it was based on positive recommendations and strong references.
"She seemed very kind and open," she said.
"Ironically enough she seemed sincere and I thought we'd get along well."
Kidnapper's web of lies
The nanny, Nadene Faye Manukau-Togiavalu, was jailed for three years in July for kidnapping the newborn from its parents' home.
Details revealed in court documents obtained by the Herald on Sunday, showed a web of lies and infatuation with pregnancy.
When she first met the baby's mother, Manukau-Togiavalu told her she had given birth to two baby boys, but that one of them had died.
In March of 2017, Manukau-Togiavalu went to a costume hire store in Avondale and hired a four-to-five-month-pregnancy suit.
During that time, the store asked her to return a five-to-seven-month-pregnancy suit.
She said she'd left it in a bag at the store but security footage showed otherwise. Manukau-Togiavalu then stopped all contact with the shop.
Manukau-Togiavalu's infatuation with the pregnancy then led to her applying to be a nanny for newborns.
Her co-defendant and cousin, Sydnee Taulapapa, provided a glowing reference.
She told Taulapapa a different lie - that she had given birth and had the baby adopted out, but that she'd made a mistake and now wanted it back.
Manukau-Togiavalu used Taulapapa's email to say she had previous experience caring for babies and had cared for Taulapapa's fictitious children.
The agency, which has its name suppressed, offered Manukau-Togiavalu jobs caring for older children, but she declined - she was specifically after a newborn.
In late July she accepted a position looking after a baby due in early August for an Epsom family.
Taulapapa arrived from Australia in mid-July and the pair began their plan to kidnap the family's child.
When later interviewed by police, Taulapapa said she had been coaxed into helping steal the baby, whom Manukau-Togiavalu claimed had been adopted out for $19,000.
But Manukau-Togiavalu's plan all along was to snatch the baby and pretend it was hers, and the father her ex.
Born in late July, the baby was cared for by Manukau-Togiavalu overnight at the Epsom family's home two to three times a week.
By August, she had hosted a baby shower and her room was adorned with baby products, including a cot.
On the evening of August 8, Manukau-Togiavalu asked the baby's mother if their family dog barked - a sign she was finalising her plans.
Taulapapa told Manukau-Togiavalu's family she had just taken her cousin to the hospital to give birth.
At about 11.30pm, Taulapapa waited in Manukau-Togiavalu's car near the Epsom home and in the early hours of August 9, the baby was taken.