megan's here!

megan paige officially joined our family this past tuesday, april 22 at 7:56am. she was 7 lbs. 7 oz. and 21 inches long. she is only slightly more impatient than her big brother.... he was 4 days early, she was 9. we are all adjusting fairly well to our ever expanding family. though, at this point my vote is to close the borders and allow no more immigration..... but that's just the lack of sleep talking.

alright, fellas.... look away. here's all the gory details for the ladies. but i have to say they aren't all that gory. sunday night i was feeling ok. it was then that i felt my first contractions. mini little things, and i thought, "oh, great.... with contractions like that, this could go on for weeks." monday i was doing some serious cleaning, so when i had 4-5 contractions i thought it was just b/c of my activity level. i was supposed to go grocery shopping that night, but megan was pushing on some nerves in my legs.... apparently, it's normal when baby gets low to get horrendous shooting pains in your upper inner thigh due to baby pushing on nerves.... lovely. since i couldn't exactly walk more than five steps without feeling one of those and doubling over from the quickly gone but definitely felt pain, nathan offered to go shop and take connor with him. i was thrilled with that idea. i started feeling ok, so i decided to clean out megan's closet and start organizing her clothes. they were all sitting in tubs downstairs and i thought it was about time i got them washed and ready. good thing, huh? once again, i thought the contractions were just brought on by my activity. i started having them every couple hours and they were starting to hurt more. nathan told me if i didn't tell him when i was having a contraction, i was in big trouble. i think he was worried that i would brush it off like i tried to do when connor was born. i would have done anything NOT to go to the hospital. so i told him about all the ones i could remember and he got out his handy little yellow pad of paper and started writing them down. they got progressively worse from 9:30p to 1:30a then they seemed to stop and i fell asleep. i thought for sure i would be sleeping in until about 12 the next day. but at 3:45a i was jolted out of bed.....sure freaked out nathan. once we both woke up enough, we started talking about when should we consider going to the hospital. turns out this was simply to humor me. in reality, nathan knew we were going to be on our way very soon and he was trying to think of what he should wear to the hospital.... warm day clothes or chilly day clothes.... was it going to be warm? hmm?? i decided that i should go take a shower so i didn't feel nasty when i came home.... i was convinced that they were going to send me home and say i could expect this to go on for days.

i think it was about 5:30a when we dropped off connor at nic's. we pulled up and mike and nic were sitting on the porch....nicole told that part of the story on her blog. by the time we got to the hospital my contractions were pretty close together and wouldn't it figure we got up to the maternity floor and were stuck in line behind two people that could barely speak english so they were taking FOR....E.....VER! thankfully, b/c connor was born at the same hospital my info was already in the computer and checking it took no time. but then nathan had to wheel me down to the triage room and those people were in front of us. we sat out in the hall for a couple minutes and nathan made me laugh by making fun of things we saw. then he spotted my doctor. turns out it was a busy morning for the guy. it was nice to know he was already there though.

we finally get into the triage unit and get set up behind a curtain. the nurses up there were pretty busy so it took them a little while to get to us. one of them came in and started asking a billion questions for the chart. the next one came in to check me out and she said, "oh, boy... you're already at 6." she asked me if i wanted an epidural. nathan and i both answered, "YES!" they cracked up b/c we both said it pretty sarcastically and then i said, "girls, i'm not here to be a hero. i get a baby either way, right?" and just like with connor one lady said, "well, judging how you are doing right now i'm sure you could do it without. but good for you." so while the questions continued, they started my iv for the epidural, and then before you knew it we were on our way down the hall to a labor and delivery room. i think it was just about 6:30a at that point. once i got my epidural it was all good. we were chatting it up with the l&d nurse and it turns out her niece was in my sister's class in school. my doc came in and said hi and as usual started joking around with nathan. i was sitting there thinking, "uh.... hello? patient over here!" they're like old buddies and it really is a nice diversion when i'm not feeling so hot. :) after that everything is a blur, but nathan tells me it all went down like this:

7:30a- doc checks me and says i'm at 9 and he'll break my water

7:40a- doc checks again and tells me i can start pushing when i want to

7:56a- hello, megan!

7:57a- nurses comment on how fast that went

7:57:30a- nathan and doc congratulate each other and joke that it was easy b/c of THEM! and the wonderful prenatal care i was given.

7:58a- i told nathan he didn't have to worry about missing his golf outing saturday, and my dad could stop worrying about missing out on seeing megan b/c of his turkey hunting trip this weekend--yes, he would have gone hunting no matter what. :) i'm so accommodating.

needless to say we are very thankful to the Lord for His protection and for giving us this gift. we've been blessed with family and friends showering us with help and food. :) my mom has cleaned this joint probably more than her own house this week. i feel like a slug but i'm not going to overdo it like i did with connor.... i got wicked sick about two weeks after he was born, and i do NOT want to do that again.

it has taken me about 4 days to type all of this up so i'm just going to add a few pics and then put a few more each day that i feel like looking at the computer screen.

"ok, i distinctly feel a draft..... do you people not feel this??"

"well, that's a little better but this color does nothing for my complexion."

proud daddy with his brand new princess

the green eyed monster reared it's ugly head early. connor saw grampa looking at megan and grabbed his chin to redirect his face and asked if grampa wanted to take a picture with him...... ah, depravity. :~) he's actually been doing really well. i can't complain, that's for sure.

the kiddos with bb..... and connor's version of a vampire.

i'm pretty sure there were about 3 cameras being flung around, so no one really knew where to look all the time.

grampa and bb with their 4th grandchild.... that sounds so weird to me.... how can they have FOUR GRANDKIDS???

yes, he's wearing his pink shirt. and it wasn't even planned! turns out he threw it on that morning and when he got to work he remembered they were supposed to be taking a picture for something. he was bummin' b/c he realized he'd be in the picture wearing his least manly shirt. then he got the good news that megan was born and he was a proud peacock after that.

connor thinks uncle mike is too cool.

megan i'll teach you all kinds of cool stuff.... just stay away from my golf clubs.

cheesin' with grampa and bb

i specifically said at least two times, "i want a picture with all 6 of us and then with just my 4 family." first my dad left the pic, then nathan moved out...... i think it was here that i said, "how difficult is it to organize 4 adults for a picture?!?!"

there we go.... nice face con man

not sure what i was laughing at but i thought this was a great shot of our fam.... just relaxed.