and then there were four...five including Abby

I HATE blogger, so you're getting pictures first and boring commentary second. Sorry everything is out of order. Enjoy!

Mom and I did a photo shoot with Lexie when she was 5 days old:

Ella playing in the garden with her new garden tools:

Lexie's first bath:

At the hospital in the hat her mama made her:

In her going-home outfit. Tulips! Yummy!

Waiting for the action to begin:

I LOVE my family!!!!
The time we've all been waiting for has come...I'm finally updating our blog with pictures of our newest member of the family--Alexa Louise.

For those of you who care, I'll go through a relatively boring birthlogue. The rest of you, feel free to skip onto the good stuff...pictures!

The final weeks of my pregnancy went relatively smoothly, until the last week during which high blood pressure and proteinuria resulted in a scheduled induction for April 9th. My mom came on the 8th, and early on the 9th, we dropped Ella off at a friend's house and headed to the hospital.

When I arrived at the hospital, I was dilated to a 3, 75% effaced, and the baby's head was at a -2 station. By 10 am the pitocin was dripping and everything was looking good--the baby had great heart accels and she was really active. Around 1 pm, my ob had a meeting at the children's hospital next door, and the overly cautious floor staff were concerned about a few (as in, two in an hour) late decels, so they turned off the pitocin for a few hours until the doctors became available again. This was a bit frustrating because when they restarted it, they had to turn the drip rate down quite a bit, so that set us back even more.

At 4 pm, I decided I'd like to have them break my water to see if we could get things moving along more. Unfortunately, my ob left for the day, so we had to wait for someone else to come in and do it. Dusty kept saying, "Lauren, you know I did this during my 3rd year rotations...I can do it. The instrument is right there." I don't know why I don't believe him when he tells me things like that...maybe it's a product of my being a victim of his incessant teasing during our childhoods. I guess sometimes I still see him as the boy who tied my dress to the music stand at district band festival, or the boy who paid my sister to hide my curling iron--not the incredibly brilliant doctor who operates on people's brains and saves lives every day.

Anyhow, I digress. When the doctor did come in to break my water, Dusty was surprised to see that it was one of his fellow interns, Allie, who graduated with him last May. She asked us if we were comfortable with her being our doctor. I hadn't ever really known her, so I looked to Dusty. "Yeah, we're fine with it. I trust you....some other classmates, not so much, but you were one of the good ones." So, she checked me (5, 100%, 0), and broke the water.

After that, the contractions definitely started strengthening. Within the next two hours, I decided I was ready for an epidural. Again, a resident came to do it--this time it was a 4th year. He began by giving me lots of "numbing medicine," which was actually rather uncomfortable. He then attemped to place the epidural, unsuccessfully, for the next 20 minutes. This involved two sticks (not including the extra numbing medicine he kept injecting) and a lot of painful tapping sensations in my spine, which Dusty said was sterile saline they inject to determine the location of the vertebrae (I hope I'm remembering that right). I was feeling like I was going to lose it as the contractions were increasing in strength and length, and there was no relief in sight. Miraculously, the anesthesia attending just happened to walk by and pop his head in the door. He successfully placed the epidural in one pass. Dusty later confided in me that the resident was using a completely wrong trajectory and that he was about ready to tell the guy to stop and call the attending.

Next came the itching. UCH does an intrathecal along with the epidural, which I've never had before. It's nice because the relief comes immediately, but I have never experienced all-encompassing itching before. They promised it would wear off in the next hour or so, which it did.

The contractions continued to increase so much that I was having to give myself a boost of pain meds using the little button control. Allie came in at 10 and said she'd come see how I was doing around midnight. By midnight, I was having to focus my breathing during the contractions, even with the epidural and the pain button. When she came in, she checked me, and said that the baby's head was "right there." She told me to push a little to see how I'd push with the epidural. I did a half a push, and she said, "woah, stop!" Apparently, I could still push well under the influence! She got her chief and got gowned and one push later, at 12:21 am, Alexa Louise was born. Lexie was perfect, and was crying before they even put her on my chest. She was 19.5 inches long and a mere 6 lbs 7 oz. I know. I was shocked too. I was fully expecting an 8.5 - 9 lb baby as Ella was 8 lbs 2 oz. But Lexie is just the cutest little thing.

All in all, it was a FANTASTIC experience. The nursing staff was great, the ob staff was great, the anesthesia attending was great. It was so different from Ella's birth. They kept the lights low and it was actually quite relaxing. There was definitely a spirit of peace in the room.

Lexie's now 2.5 weeks old, and is a joy to us all. Ella has handled everything like a champ, and I've been so blessed to have help first from my mom, then from Dusty's mom and sister. And now, unbelieveably, Dusty is home for the week! Life is exceptionally good and I am SO BLESSED!

Now, onto the pictures.