So what's new...what's new...Katie! Baby #3 has landed. The quick version is Katherine Adara was born August 24, 2:38am 6lbs 10oz and 19" long. I'll put the long version at the end of this post, that way if you're easily queasy you can skip it. I can't beleive she's been here a week already, and yet it does seem like she's always been here. She's a very easy baby, sleeps a lot and poops a lot. Teri was here yesterday to weigh her, she was 7lbs 2oz already. Bri and Serena think she's great. They both like to hold her, but not for too long. She has brown hair and brown eyes, which is shocking since we kind of thought we only produced clones. Pictures soon, let's say a week.

In other news, Bri goes back to school on Tuesday and Serena got her first haircut a few weeks ago. Just a light trim to even things out a little.

Katie's Birth Story
On my due date, Aug 23, I had an appointment in the morning with my midwife. She’d already made me go to a bunch of ultrasounds to check on the baby’s growth and size. The results of my latest made her all wiggy for reasons we haven’t really gotten an answer to. The ultrasound from two days before had listed the baby’s size as just under 6 pounds, and all I could get out of Teri is that it “could maybe be indicative of a problem” and we wouldn’t know until she was born. I’m not sure when the standard baby size became 8 pounds, I missed that memo. She wanted me to consult with an OB the next day and recommended hospital birth instead of home. She messed with my cervix a bit (they call it a stretch and sweep) to see if that would kick things off since my preference was definitely natural labour over any interventions. I’m not sure if that did it, or if it was just because I had already dilated to 2cm.

I started having what were real contractions shortly after, but they were very very infrequent (maybe once an hour) and not strong at all. Over the day they got a little stronger and a little closer together, but I wasn’t really convinced I was in labour. I wasn’t really even convinced I was in early labour. I went and had a bath at 10pm, and was still able to read my book and shave my legs and stuff so I was thinking maybe I’d go to bed. The contractions were fairly strong, but short. I decided to time them for a bit and was kind of surprised when they were 2-3 minutes apart. I would have thought them 5 minutes or more. We decided to page Teri and have her come check me since she wanted the birth to be in the hospital. I didn’t want to be in the car in transition again. It was a good thing we called her, otherwise I probably would have ended up having the baby somewhere I didn’t want to – either my room or in the car would be my bet. She came to check me and I was at 4cm at midnight. We decided to wait another hour to make sure this was it, and an hour later I was at least 5cm and they were starting to get pretty strong. That was 1am on the 24th. We aren’t exactly sure what time we got to the hospital, but I think it was about 1:15. The hallway leading to labour and delivery is 12 miles long at least. I have no idea how I ever made it there last time, Mike says he thinks he and Erica pulled me down it. Erica made it in from out of town and met us in the hallway, which was good. We (her and I) had been afraid she wouldn’t be able to come this time either due to childcare issues or just the fact she’s a little out of town and I am quick.

I’m not sure how long I laboured before pushing in the hospital, but I think it was at least half an hour. So, we’ll say 1:45am. I had a few pushes before my water broke, so it’s a good thing I didn’t wait around at home for my water to break like it did with Serena. Because it took so long for my water to break it wasn’t quite as intense as Serena’s birth. In some ways that was good, but in others it made it seem longer even though it wasn’t. When my water broke it gushed all over, it’s a good thing no one was standing there. I felt like I was pushing forever before she started coming. It really wasn’t all that long, and since not every contraction was a pushing contraction it was probably only ¼ of the pushes it took to have Serena. But since everyone kept telling me how small the baby was going to be, I sort of expected her to come out a little faster. I kept waiting to feel her head, and it seemed like it was never coming. However, once it did it was quick after that. Only one or two contractions for her head and maybe one for her body. She had the cord wrapped around her neck once, but Teri couldn’t get in there easily to remove it so she just left it until the whole baby was out. When they passed her to me, the first thing I said was that she didn’t look all that small to me. The second midwife (Celeste) agreed. I think Celeste saved me a bunch of grief by telling Teri several times to wait one more contraction before calling the pediatric team. That way she was born and obviously not teeny either just before or after they arrived. So, Katherine Adara was born at 2:38am on August 24th weighing 6lbs 10oz. No hemmorhage or tearing for me this time either. I’d say 3 ½ hours of labour, but not as intense as Serena’s 2 ½.

The only downers about the hospital birth was that Teri was in and out of the room constantly, which was distracting. All the birthing suites were full, so we were jammed into a closet of a room. It only had one chair, Celeste sat on the floor for awhile before she was needed. Because the room was so small, the three hour wait after was terrible too. Mike had been up almost 24 hours and sitting doing nothing only made him more tired. There wasn’t even a phone in the room, so we couldn’t call anyone. My mom called at 4am to see what was going on. But there were good things too, like not having to put the placenta in my fridge after. As well, I paid more attention to my contractions so as to avoid the drive at a bad time – if I was staying home I think I would have honestly been caught by surprise at the pushing stage and ended up stuck in a room I hadn’t planned on being in.

Anyhow, I am long winded. She’s two days old now (only two days?) and she hasn’t lost any weight, which is great. She seems to have her days and nights mixed up, which is not so good. The kids love her to bits, especially when she’s awake. I feel totally fine, yay! We went grocery shopping today even. My back has been bad because I think I overused the muscles tensing up, but I am hoping to get in to see my massage therapist. I’m also a bit tired, but that’s because Katie has been only sleeping an hour at a time at night, but I’ve been sleeping late in the morning. I’ll need to sort this out before Mike goes back to work.