Hooray! He Has Arrived!

For some reason I'm feeling lazy today. Here are a bunch of pictures of things that happened this week.

Halloween costumes: KGB agent, African lady, Pioneer girl, Princess, and Cowboy.

We let the kids eat candy Halloween night and pick 6 favorites to save, then chopped up the rest of the chocolate and made chocolate chip cookie dough that we can eat for the next few months. Everyone likes the plan except Rea, who is old enough that she could ration her candy and just eat it for months; we might adjust how much candy they get to keep based on age next year.

Grandma Julie took Alison and the kids to This is the Place Heritage Park on Thursday in hopes that walking would bring on labor. (It didn't.) We rode the train and saw a family of deer only a few feet away. Rea thought this was about the coolest thing she'd ever seen: "I've never seen a live deer before, Mom!"

We petted a sheep at This is the Place.

The wooden train at This is the Place was also a big hit.

(Now Alison took over and is writing a long birth story post while Mike gets a nap.)

We waited and waited all week for our baby to be born, trying all the old standbys: lots of walking, spicy food, raspberry leaf tea, etc. Nothing seemed to help.

By Friday, Alison was ready to start trying stronger methods, so she asked a friend for some Clary Sage Essential Oil and rubbed it on various acupressure points that are supposed to induce labor. By Friday evening she was having strong contractions... and then they stopped. All night and all the next day contractions kept starting and stopping, driving her crazy. Saturday evening around 5 they started up again, but she figured they'd stop like they always had before, until one suddenly hit her so hard that she told Mike to call the midwife because either she was going to have this baby or she was going to get an epidural.

Grandma Julie was 45 minutes away having dinner, so we dropped the kids at a neighbor's and left the car keys so Grandma could pick them up and went to the Birth Center at 7:30pm. On the way, Alison was saying, "I really hope this doesn't just stop again..." but when we got there, she was dilated to 8 cm, so obviously it was the right time! Baby Gideon was born 2 hours after we got there.

This was Alison's second water birth at the Birth Center and third Hypnobabies birth. Alison absolutely loves being in water and it relaxes her so much that it's the best way for her to give birth. She had an easier time with contractions as soon as she got in the tub. Hypnobabies has worked amazingly well for her for all three, but this was the first time Alison was in deep hypnosis during contractions and awake and able to do things in between contractions; with Sara and Timmy she stayed out of it the whole labor. It was a good experience to be more interactive, especially since Gideon managed to get a hand up next to his head, which caused lots of back pain during pushing. This time she was able to tell everyone that she was having back pain and Mike did counter pressure to help her get through it. She pushed him out with no tearing, which is rare with a hand up, and the whole thing went very smoothly. Water births and Hypnobabies are both amazing for Alison.

Gideon Sam Brown was born at 9:46pm on November 5th 2016. He weighed 8lbs 1oz and was 22 inches long.

He has six toes on each foot, but his hands look normal. The midwife also says he has a slight lip and tongue tie, but so far he's nursing like a champ, so she'll only clip them if we start seeing signs of trouble (not gaining weight, sore nipples, etc). He's very healthy and happy; he has had his eyes open more than any other baby we've had and he has hardly screamed after the first adjustment to being out of the womb. Everyone comments on how much he looks like Timmy, and we keep accidentally calling him Timmy. He has the snuffly nose that all of our kids have had; we think it might just be something about how our kids' nasal passages are built, because they all have a rough time adjusting to breathing clearly. The kids are ecstatic about their baby brother and they're all very good at being gentle with him, especially Timmy, who loves to pet his baby.

Him being born at 9:46 meant that we finally got to go to sleep at about 2am, and Mike took care of the baby when he snorted and fussed in the night so that Alison could rest, so he only got a few hours of sleep. Luckily Grandma Julie stayed and took the kids to Church and played with them today so that we could rest some more. We are so grateful that she was here! She'll be heading home soon, since Mike will take the next week off to take care of things here.

It was a good week.