Madelyn Mae Himes

In case you haven't heard via word of mouth, facebook or family members' blogs, our baby girl has arrived!! Madelyn Mae Himes was born on Friday, June 19th at 2:15am. She weighed 8 lbs 4oz and was 20.75 inches long. She has brown hair, blue eyes and is absolutely perfect.

On Thursday evening, I finished eating a wonderful dinner with Brant and my dad, when I started feeling strong contractions. They started around 7:30, but I knew I had to stick it out awhile and see how long they persisted for. I proceeded to leave with my dad to the auto mechanic across town to pick up his car and drive it back to his house. The contractions continued and my dad admitted that he felt a little nervous having me drive his car back in this condition...particularly if my water broke - he wasn't interested in having to deal with that mess! We made it there and back just fine. But when we returned home, I informed Brant that he better get his things together and close up on what he was working on, because we were going to be calling the hospital shortly.

We made it to the hospital at 9:30pm and they started monitoring me and checking me out to see how I had progressed. We were at 5cm and 100% dilated; I was told I could stay and I would be having the baby in the middle of the night! :) My contractions were hitting every 2 minutes, or so, and I was giving Brant's hand quite the squeeze. He handled it very well. They hooked me up to my IV and wheeled me to my room. Soon, a doctor came in to give me the miracle drug, i.e. epidural. I chose not to look at any of the equipment as he proceeded. I expected the process to be very painful, but it felt more awkward than painful. Brant and I were very impressed with how the doctor handled it; he had a calming demeanor about him and we both felt confident and assured that everything would be just fine, and it was. In fact, it was more than just fine. It was amazing...

After about 10 minutes, the medicine kicked in, starting with my toes. The numbness quickly moved all throughout my legs and lower abdomen area. It was quite the sensation. I would look up at the monitor and see my body going through a big contraction, but I couldn't feel a thing! Amazing!! I turned on the TV to pass some time and the first station I came to was John Travolta singing Grease Lightning. That's right. If you know me well, you know that I adore musicals and really love Grease. I was in heaven! Brant looked at me and smiled in disbelief, saying, "Are you kidding me right now? You are in labor and singing along to Grease??"You can see how excited I am in the picture above, with remote in hand. Yeah. That was awesome.

The nurse came back around 1am to check me out. She told me that I was 10cm dilated already and this baby would be coming earlier than we might expect. As she was saying this, she suddenly gasped loudly and jumped a bit. I just smiled at her and said, "What?" I was thinking, maybe the baby just came out and I didn't even realize it because I was so numb! Ah, so naive. She told me my water just broke and we would start pushing in about 30 minutes (she wanted the medicine to wear off just a bit so I would be able to push).

I started pushing at 1:30. It wasn't as difficult as I had imagined (again, thank you, epidural). I just pushed on through, remembering to breath and thinking about the end result. I will admit I was also thinking about other happy thoughts, namely one: Mickey Mouse doing his dance moves for the Fantasmic Show at Disneyland. Hey! Anything to get through the pushing is fair game, and my way just happens to be involving Disney, can you blame me?

At 2:15, I gave a very powerful push and Maddie came popping out; seriously. She took the doctor, the nurse and Brant all off guard. She had been crowning a bit, but hadn't really come out significantly at all. Brant said that she "caught air", and the doctor had to fumble a bit just to catch her in time! It all happened so fast, it was incredible! We were awestruck as soon as they placed her on my chest. She was so tiny, she was so adorable and she was our daughter! When did this happen?!?

Brant cut the cord, gave her a bath and changed his (and her) first diaper. He's a natural! By the time she was cleaned up and I was repaired, we were moved into our recovery room and shortly after, visited by all 4 proud grandparents. She was a show stopper! Our day moved forward in similar fashion: lots of excited visitors, oohs and aahs, doctor visits, pediatrician visits, tests, more tests, hospital food and no sleep. :) It was all wonderful; truly.

We were discharged on Saturday around noon and were so happy to get out of the hospital without a hitch. The entire process could not have been smoother and we couldn't have asked God for a bigger blessing with how everything went down. Although my 9 months of pregnancy were far from blissful, the delivery was wonderful and my daughter is pure bliss, that I might just sign up to this again someday.

Our little Maddie Mae is absolutely perfect. We have been richly blessed and are soaking in every moment we have to cuddle her, stare at her and love on her.