Brotherly Love

Little Evie, you don't know how special you are. You not only have a very loving mommy and super proud daddy, but you also have a wonderful big brother.

Will has been your biggest fan from the very beginning, even before you were born. He loves you so much! At times, when my hands are full, you will start to fuss and Will comes to your rescue. He can usually calm you down by just talking to you. If that doesn't work, he'll push your swing or hold your pacifier in your mouth until you calm down. In some cases, you are inconsolable, he runs to find me and informs me that "Baby Sissy's hungry!" He is so proud when he can help you.

I especially like the times when you and him are side by side on the floor. He likes to lay beside you and talk to you. He laughs out loud when you just happen to hit him with your flailing arms. Sometimes he'll nonchalantly place his hand gently on your belly while watching his favorite movie. You gaze up and smile at him, most of the time he doesn't even know he's being watched.

You will always have a best friend and a protector in your brother. Just as did I with both of mine.

Evelyn Olivia....a birth story

I was 39 weeks and very eager to meet my daughter. At this point, I was a week and a half further into this pregnancy then my last. My son, Will, was born at 37.5 weeks and was huge. He weighed 9 pounds and 5 ounces, so naturally I was very paranoid that she would be much larger than him. I was down right miserable and so exhausted. Finally, it was the weekend and I was bound and determined to not have to go to work the next week. My contractions would increase when I was active, so we decided to find something to do. I remember going to the mall for no reason other than to walk around to try to induce labor. But, of course, the whole time I had only a few wimpy ones. Discouraged, we went home. Later that night, just before bed, I told Kyle "I'm having a decent amount of contractions." Jokingly I said, "Not that it really means anything." I then fell asleep.

I woke up, as I normally did each night, around 4am. This time it was because of a contraction. I thought to myself, "Huh, I wonder if these will continue?" So I grabbed my phone and started timing them. To my surprise they did! As I sat there, I figured it would be a long day....or so I thought. They were coming about every two minutes. EVERY TWO MINUTES?! Holy crap! I had slept through the beginning stage of labor. After about 15 minutes, I called the doctor and he urged that we head in to the hospital. By now it was 5:00, I called my mom to come over to watch Will and I had to drag Kyle out of bed. We quickly packed up some last minute items and headed to Mercy. Of course, we had to stop for gas. (Kyle's lucky I didn't kill him, I told him to get gas on our way home from the mall the day before!) We finally arrived at the hospital just before 6:00. Whew, we made it!

We were checked it, my IV was started and blood work was drawn shortly after 6:00. I was holding my breath hoping that I wasn't dilated too far. I was expecting an epidural because I was worried she would be over 10 pounds. Yikes! To my relief, I was 5cm. Almost an hour later, which felt more like forever, the blood work came back and the epidural was placed. Ahhh...I was able to relax and catch my breath. As contractions increased, my water broke around 8:00. It was stained with meconium which raised some concern. When I heard this, I started to worry and I just knew that she would be going to the Intensive Care Unit. Regardless, I still had a task at hand. When my water broke, I was dilated to about 7cm. Things were progressing much faster this time around. I was really shocked. With every contraction I felt more and more pressure in my already sore pelvis. I remember Kyle leaving to go and find something to drink. In the meantime, my doctor came in and checked me again and this time I was 10cm. At that moment, Kyle walked in as the doctor said, "I think that we will have you start pushing now." I still can see the stunned look on Kyle face. He laughed and said, "Good thing I wasn't gone too long!" The team was gathered and with about 5 pushes Evie was born at 8:56am without much difficulty. To my surprise she wasn't 10 pounds, she wasn't too far from it. She weighed 9 pounds, 11 ounces and was 20.5 inches long.

Kyle and I cried with overwhelming joy. Within a few short hours we became a family of four.

She was then taken to the ICU as a precaution. They wanted to make sure she didn't have an active infection from the meconium in the fluid. She was given 48 hours worth of antibiotics and no infection was found. She was released and came home with us a few days later.