Berry Sweet Berry

The entire labor/delivery process was a wonderful experience. Saturday, Aug. 4 was the 'Due Date' but I had decided that I wouldn't get my hopes up...it's funny that I had that date in my head for 9 months but when it actually got there I was kind of in disbelief.

Brandon and I had a wonderful morning and afternoon...eating breakfast, running errands and just enjoying each other--having a Saturday morning together with no ministry agenda is an anomaly...I can count on one hand how many of those we've had since we've been married. We really enjoyed spending that time together (I already said that, didn't I?). Around 12 noon, I started having some contractions, but nothing overwhelming...we kept on with our day. Around 2:30 we began to document the contractions which ranged anywhere from 30 minutes to 3 minutes apart. We did that until our friends, David and Jodie came over to watch a movie (we watched Denzel Washington's DeJaVu...sooooo good)! During the movie, there were a couple of contractions that were rather strong, and about an hour after our friends left, they got close enough together that we called the dr. who told us we could come to the hospital or stay at home for a couple more hours. we stayed, packed our bags, finished the dishes (who wants to bring a new baby home to a pile of dishes?) and got excited. Around 2:45am we left for the hospital. They checked me and admitted me around 4. The contractions were not pleasant, but not too awful either, so I held off on the epidural until I was 7cm dialated (around 8am). After that, it was smooth sailing! I couldn't feel any pain, and the process moved forward at a great pace. We were stalled only by the nurse who was delivering a baby next door and was tied up for almost an hour after I was fully dialted. The dr. finally got another nurse to help because Ella was on her way. We pushed for 10 minutes, and our precious daughter entered the world! Brandon hooted and hollered, I examined Ella for any signs of abnormalities (found none--she's perfect) and then they cleaned her up, I fed her, and the family came in to meet their new addition. The entire experience was joyful and relatively easy (sorry to all you moms out there who are reading this and didn't have an easy delivery).

The doctors and nurses at Greenville Memorial Hospital were wonderful, and we enjoyed all of our visitors. We had the baby go to the nursery at night so we could sleep (we'd been up for well over 36 hours). They discharged us on Tuesday, August 7th.

She was soooo little! we put her in an outfit that her Aunt Pepper gave her--Preemie sized, but it still looked big on her little arms and legs! she was beautiful, though. The carseat, as you can tell, has some room for her to grow into. I know it won't take long before I look back at this picture and wonder how she was ever this small...

Home life has been wonderful. We've had lots of visitors and wonderful people bringing over food and gifts and spending time getting to know our precious angel. She is a big eater and loves her sleep (just like mom and dad!) and has really been an easy baby to handle. Brandon and I are actually getting sleep (in shifts, but hey...we'll take what we can get), and life is just wonderful.

Here are some more new pics of Ella!

This is her Redemption Diva onesie that Mommy made for her. She actually messed this one up pretty bad the other night. It's being pretreated before the laundry! :)

No, we don't usually sleep with Ella in the bed, but after a feeding I was up and thought it would be a cute picture. She is usually in a bassinet by our bed. Brandon and I who are both usually VERY deep sleepers, have laughed at how each little squeak she makes has us up and at 'em in an instant!

By the way...he's COMPLETELY WHIPPED!

More to come, so stay posted! Thanks for your love, prayers and comments!

The Berry Bunch