Our Sweet Little Sarah

Here are some pictures of our sweet little Sarah. It is hard to believe that one week ago our lives changed forever. Our family is feeling more complete and our hearts couldn't be more filled with love and thanks for our sweet little family. She is such a beautiful little angel and her big brother couldn't be more sweeter to her. Alex loves to give hugs and kisses to his little sister, but I can't help but think that he is wondering why she isn't going "home" at the end of the day...
These pictures were taken about 3 days ago and she continues to change daily.
Be forewarned, Sarah's birthing story follows:
Here is the story behind the arrival of our sweet little one.
On Tuesday the 18th of November, I went to the doctor hoping that I would have progressed and would be well on my way. When he said that I was still a two, I was a little disappointed because I was really excited to finally meet the new baby that would join our family. I always thought that our baby would come early, I just didn't think that it would come this early. All week I had had the feeling that I should pack my bag to be ready to go to the hospital. Lesson learned, when prompted, act on that prompting.
Everything was normal on Wednesday, I cleaned the house, made bread, fixed dinner and enjoyed an evening with my husband. We went to bed about 11 p.m. and at about 12:45 I got up to go to the bathroom. As I got out of bed, I said "uh-oh" I don't think I made it to the bathroom. It took me a minute to realize what had happened. I came back to the bed and woke Eric up and said that my water broke and that we needed to go to the hospital. I quickly made arrangements for a friend, Trisha, to watch Alex and then started packing a bag for the hospital. We then dropped Alex off and ran a quick trip to Walmart to pick up some batteries for our camera. We arrived at the hospital and then I went to triage to get checked out. The nurse confirmed the rupture of my water, said that I was dilated to 3 cm and said that I had my ticket to stay the night. The contractions were getting stronger, but not anything that I couldn't handle. They got me set-up in a labor and delivery room and began the whole process of checking me in and getting me hooked up to the machines and IVs.
They checked me when they finished the process and then I was 4 cm. By now it was about 2:30 and things were going well. They continued to monitor me and about 15 minutes later I was 5 cm. I opted for pain medication through an IV, but they couldn't give it to me after I reached 7 cm. I said that I wanted it and she left the room and came back about 5 minutes later and was going to hook me up, but decided to check me again. I was now a 7. She said that she couldn't give it to me now. She asked if I wanted an epidural, and I remembered when I had Alex that it took about 45 minutes to get the epidural, so I opted not to get it. I was going for it. I always thought that if it got too bad then I could get one later.
They kept on checking me and I was progressing very quickly. I was 9 cm and fully effaced. About 5 minutes later I was 10 and was feeling the urge to push. They had already called the doctor on call and he was on his way. Because I was progressing so quickly, the labor and delivery nurses had already called the ER doctor to try and come up and deliver my baby. They were worried that I would be delivering without a doctor present. They kept telling me to breathe and not to push. I kept alternating between pleading to push and giving ultimatums that I would be pushing now. The contractions were coming so quickly all I wanted to do was push. It was probably about 10 minutes of telling me not to push and the doctor finally showed up. He got ready and I asked if I could push he said to go ahead an push and out she came on the very first push. The hardest part of the labor was waiting for the doctor to show up so I could push.
We didn't know if we were having a boy or a girl and we were excited to find out that we had a baby girl. Sarah Anne was ready to come to our family and we couldn't be more excited and privileged to be her parents. We loved you from first sight.