God really has had a sense of humor with our family this year. Not only did He give us another baby due in March, but He made sure that she was born within a week of her big sisters' birthdays as part of quite a story.
Saturday, March 12th, was the big Winnie the Pooh Birthday Party for Lily & Noelle. There were 14 little people at our house for two hours, along with a total of 6 saintly parents there to corral the chaos. It was a blast, the kids had a ton of fun, and we were all wiped out!
Sunday, March 13th, we "lose an hour" of precious sleep, head to church, then post-church naps and rest. Still, with all of the weekend's activities, everyone was a little cranky, and we decided to go out to dinner to avoid food prep, cleanup, being cooped up in the house, etc. On the way to the restaurant, our car started doing weird things, and after we stopped for gas, it would simple start, stutter, shake, and stop. So Archer pushed the car from the pump to a parking spot, and the girls and I ended up walking from the gas station to the restaurant, where we started our meal while Archer spoke with the gas station attendant and tried to diagnose the problem. Archer had his wallet, but we had no phones, and Noelle was in her pajamas with barely a coat on.
After we all ate, Archer called a cab from the restaurant to meet him back at our car to pick up carseats, then drive back to the restaurant to pick us up. The cab never showed, Archer successfully started our car and we ended up making it home in our own car around 8:15pm.
I started getting the girls ready for bed while Archer made phone calls about getting a rental car that evening, since it seemed too risky to be without reliable wheels even for a one night with Batch3's due date looming 9 days away.
At 8:30pm Archer came up to tell me there were no car rental places open until the morning, unless he was to go to the Detroit Airport (35 minutes away). I told him that wasn't going to work, because my water had just broken.
After some confirming calls to the midwife and to our friend Sharon who was "on-call" for us for watching the girls during Batch3's birth, we ended up borrowing Sharon's 2nd car for the night so we could reliably get to the hospital when labor got going, and settled in to wait for the contractions to start.
So we waited, cleaned up the house, made last minute emails and phone calls to arrange the week now assuming we'd have a new baby, started laundry, the dishwasher, and then settled in to watch a movie.
Around 12:45am I had a couple (literally, 2) real contractions that brought flashbacks to the births of Lily & Noelle, so we called the important people, and by 1am were in the borrowed car with the infant carseat literally thrown into the backseat, and racing to the hospital. We were admitted at 1:15am, and measured at 4-5cm and +2 station. After a few agonizing minutes in triage where the nurse attempted to get a 20 minute continuous monitor of the baby (Woman, I'm gonna have this baby by the time you get it!), she gave up and I made the nurse practically run with me down the hall into our own room (I wanted to make it before another contraction) and into the birthing tub.
A few minutes later, at 2:06am, Clara Jane was born. She weighed 7 lbs 8.3 oz, is 20 inches long, has a head only 13 inches around, and is very beautiful, of course!
1 comment:
Wow, what a memorable time! Clara is so sweet.
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