Ellie's Photoshoot

Andrew's awesome cousin Jessica came over to our house and snapped some fun pictures of Ellie! They turned out great! Thanks Jess!!

Ellie's Day of Arrival

February 24th at 2:43 pm our life changed forever. Our sweet baby girl, Ellie Catherine, arrived into the world. The day started out a little stressful trying to get to the hospital. North Carolina decided to have it's one crazy snowstorm of the year on Feb. 24th. It normally takes us about 25 minutes to get to the hospital from our house but that morning it took us a little over an hour. Luckily, we had seen the storm coming so we had decided to leave early anyway the night before. Since Ellie was still breech we had a scheduled C-section. It was a little weird just walking into the hospital with no assistance. I had always imagined rushing into the hospital and in a lot of pain. We had about the complete opposite. We just took our time walking in. Andrew kept saying he wanted to drop me off at the entrance but I told him I was fine just walking from the parking garage. My mom had arrived the night before and it was fun to have her there. She was so sweet and had brought all her stuff to keep her entertained in the hospital. She found her little spot in the waiting room and settled in while Andrew and I went back to the OR.

They got me all hooked up to the monitors and in a bed and then just left us in a room to wait. We had such a nice nurse. When she found out my mom was by herself in the waiting room she went and got her and brought her back to the room.  It was great to have my mom there because she was a good distraction for us and made the time go by quicker. I was scheduled to have my C-section around 9 am but due to some emergencies during the night and being the third one scheduled I got pushed back.

After waiting for so long, when they finally came back to get us it went FAST! The doctor(Dr.Carlson..she was great) came in to check one last time that she was breech...even though you could clearly see just looking at my stomach that she was breech. Dr. Carlson had to do it for protocol. They unhooked me from everything, Andrew got in his fun suit, and my mom snapped some last minute pictures.

I wasn't super nervous for the surgery. I had had major surgery before and my dad is a surgeon which helps because doctors are just normal people to me... my dad does surgery on a weekly basis so it is nothing new to me. The one thing that I was pretty scared for was the spinal block. I had heard so many different stories from people. I'm not afraid of needles but normally I can see when they put it in. So not being able to see it is what made me nervous. I was SHOCKED by how painless it was. It really just felt like a little sting but nothing compared to what I had imagined in my mind. I was also shocked by how quickly it worked. The doctor had warned me it worked pretty quickly but I didn't realize that by the time I went to turn my body to lay down on the table I couldn't. The nurse and the doctor had to lay me down. It was a very different feeling not being able to move your entire bottom half.

They brought Andrew in and it was nice to be able to have him right there. Andrew told me later that they had already started the surgery when he walked in and I had no idea. (I really felt not pain the entire time) One of the side effects of the medicine for the surgery is that you can shake. So for the entire surgery I was shaking pretty bad. I wasn't scared by it too much because it wasn't painful but Andrew thought otherwise. He kept rubbing my hand and asking if I was okay. He was so sweet the whole time.

Dr. Carlson leaned over the divider and asked if we were ready to meet Ellie. (we had told the doctor her name) We said yes...we weren't really sure we could say no ;) Then it was a very spiritual moment for me as I felt her leave my body . It is a very special moment and feeling I can't describe and will never forget. All the doctors yelled "Happy Birthday Ellie!" and said "Look at that hair!" Ellie gave a nice scream when she came out and I was SHOCKED when they showed her to me and saw all that HAIR! My whole pregnancy I kept telling Andrew I just wanted her to have a little hair. I didn't really have heartburn my whole pregnancy that is linked to hair growth so I was pretty positive we were going to have a bald baby. Boy, was I wrong!!  They brought her over to me and set her down on my neck. It was not the most comfortable position for me since I couldn't hold her. Andrew was holding her on me. It was so sweet to feel her breathing and scratching on me.(She had SUPER long nails as well). It was pretty quick when she was born and the majority of the time was spent sewing me back up. I accidentally looked up at one point and saw a good chunk of my lower half in the reflection of the big OR light. Let's just say I looked at Andrew for the rest of the time.

When I finally got to hold her and look at her up close it was so special! I could not believe that we were holding our sweet little daughter. All throughout our hospital stay I just kept saying..."This is my baby...I can't believe this is my baby!" I guess even to this day I keep saying "I can't believe this is my daughter!" She is so wonderful and we love her so much!