Stella Katherine is Here!

And 2 weeks old tomorrow, already! Where does the time go?

Sunday Night, May 2nd we put sweet Max to bed and said goodnight to my dad who had come up to stay with us for a few days while we were going to be in the hospital having Stella. We finished a few last minute things and got our bags completely ready. I called L&D to confirm my 5:30AM induction and they asked me to call in the morning just to be sure they had a room ready.

We took showers and I pre-fixed my hair. Don't want my natural insane frizzy hair showing too much, even when in labor. And then we went to bed. And tried to sleep. And tried to remind myself to take in my last night feeling SK move inside of me. And woke up at 1:30, 2:30 and 3:30AM before my alarm went off at 4:30AM.

Called into the hospital and they had a room! YAY! But they didn't have a nurse ready for us yet, BOO! So we were sent back to bed to wait until 7AM to show up. Hard to sleep when you are having a baby in just a few hours. Max ended up waking up right around 5AM anyways so we brought him into our bed to cuddle and he fell back asleep and stayed asleep as we crept out.

We arrived at the hospital at 5AM and met our nurse Madeline. Now Madeline was probably 70+ years old and I LOVED her right off the bat. It was like having the most knowledgeable grandmother as a nurse :)

We started the paperwork, changed into the gown and all that jazz and right past 8AM Dr. S came in and broke my water. Contractions started thanks to Pitocin and the morning was spent moving VERY slowly along. I was a little worried Stella was following in her big brothers footsteps with a longggggggg labor. But by 11AM my contractions were getting darn painful and right on top of each other so I was checked again. Only a TWO! What! But Madeline decided that since I knew I wanted an epidural there was no reason to sit around in pain so she went ahead and called the anesthesiologist for my epidural. He was great and did a perfect job, I could still move my body around but I felt NO pain.

Madeline watched me and baby Stella like a hawk as she started bumping my pitocin up steadily. We moved to a catheter and internal monitor on Stella and things started moving along. By midafternoon I was a good 5 centimeters dialated. And then Madeline moved me on my side and Stella really started boogying. Our girl was ready to come out!

Thankfully my family was all arriving and I even got to visit with Sweet Max for a few minutes before everything really got started. He kept looking under the bed for Stella and was a bit confused as to where she was. Cute cute boy.

Madeline checked me again and I was a 9! Yikes! At that point it was 3:45PM and Rob had to call his mom because she was still at Target. I told them my goal was to not push until 4:20PM because Dr. S still wasn't there. Madeline called him several times and he was on his way over from another hospital. At 4PM I told her I was feeling a LOT of pressure to push. She called him again and he was already at the hospital. Thank goodness because I was ready to push!

4-5 periods of pushing and Stella Katherine was born, 8 pounds 3 ounces and 20.5 inches long. She had dark brown hair, big green eyes and was a beauty. I cried when she was born and Rob took a million pictures and never took his eyes off her. Welcome to the world Stella! We are so blessed and honored to be chosen to be your family. We love you baby girl!

More pictures to come in a slideshow.

Always,
Jesi