our chloe girl.

i was planning on taking a 40 week picture last friday, but then i ended up having a baby instead. chloe jane was born friday, august 20 at 3:29am. she knew is was perfect timing cause the rug for her room had come in that day. she weighed 6.6oz and 19.5 inches long. she's a peanut. labor is a bit of a blur cause it happened pretty quick.

7:30pm-my water broke, thankfully at home. i wasn't sure if it was for real especially since i wasn't contracting at all, so i called my mom and she said it sounded like the real thing. i called the dr. and she told me to come in cause i tested positive for strep b. so, we finished packing some stuff up, maybe loaded the dishwasher, and headed out.

8:30pm-made a quick stop at joe and heidi's house to give back their car antenna that matt had stolen the week before. joe wanted to show matt the progress on their basement work...thankfully he was only in there for 3 minutes...i timed it.

8:45pm-we arrived at the hospital and got put into a room to get checked. that is where we met jen, our favorite nurse. she thought matt was a nut. she checked to see if my water broke and indeed it did. i was a little suprised. i still hadn't had any contractions yet and i was still only 1cm. they set us up to stay in a room.

10:30-dr. gilbert came in to check on me. she said things seemed to be moving slowly and decided to start me on pitocin. i had maybe a few small contractions at this point.

11:00-the pitocin started and the contractions came. ow. they started out mild and then quickly came faster and more intense. matt ran out to wawa at one point to get some food, since we thought it was going to be a long night, and i got some of the worst ones while he was gone. it was not fun.

12:55-the nurse said she was going to come check me at 1:00, but matt buzzed her in a few minutes earlier to see if we could get the epidural. the nurse was a little snippy with us, but she checked me and i was 2cm and said that was enough progress where i could get the epidural. thank the Lord. i felt like a wimp that i'd only made it to 2cm, but i was ok with that.

1:30-epidural done without a hitch. about 4 contractions later, i was happy again. why would anyone NOT get the epidural?!

2:00-the nurse checked me to see where i was and i had gone from 2cm to 6cm like that. so, matt and i went down to try and sleep a little.

2:30-nurse comes in to check me again and i had was almost at 10cm! matt and i were shocked. things started happening pretty fast as they started to get things ready for delivery.

2:55-i started pushing. i felt nothing. for about 4 pushes, it was just the nurse and matt in the room. i was confused...wasn't there supposed to be a dr. here?! dr. finally came in. i pushed about 4 more times and chloe jane was born at 3:29am. what a crazy moment when they put her, just born, on my chest. so surreal.

a little while later, we had some visitors come in. we were so blessed that papa and grammy hayes, grandma and grandpa prater and aunt traci came in the middle of the night to meet chloe.

the next few days we tried to take it easy in the hospital. i had lost a lot of blood, so there came some challenges with that. but, we were released on sunday morning and very happy to be going home. on saturday, chloe had only lost a few ounces. but, when we were released, she was 5.15, so we had to go to the dr. the next day for a check up. oh, and she was slightly jaundice. at that appointment, she was back up to 6.2. she's been nursing like a champ. we went to the dr. again yesterday and was at 6.10. what a porker. the dr. was very pleased and i think slightly surprised. she showed her displeasure by peeing all over his exam table.

overall, she's been doing great. she's slept through two nights, with us only waking up to feed her. there has been a few rougher nights too, but we know that is expected. matt has been my hero taking care of us. we've loved being parents so far. as ange said about her and jer, we are totally first time parents...talking about her and laughing at each facial expression. matt seriously cracks up at them. i swear she's smiled at me, but i know that's probably not possible. i sadly have not taken too many pictures cause i've been couch bound, but a photo shoot is on the books. the hospital ones will have to do for now. she has reminded us of a gnome and the french peas from veggie tales. we have a photo of matt when he was born and it is scary similar. but, we think she has more of my lips and chin. i think she's even changed a little since these photos.





we love her so much!