Here she is!!

On the morning of the due date, I woke up around 3am (like I do most mornings lately) with lots of contractions. We had just been to the Drs the day before and he thought they were just braxton-hicks and I was still not dilated. So, I just assumed these were a continuation of the day before. They were slightly stronger but otherwise I didn't feel any different.

When Nick got up at 0530, I was questioning if I'd be able to the next evening for the scheduled induction. By 0600 we decided to go to the hospital just to be safe and see if I could get a little relief from the pain... So, we packed up, Nick called his work and we headed over to the hospital.

By 0700, they saw I was contracting about every 3 min and I was dilated to 5-6 cm! While I was on the monitor, they say saw the baby's heart rate drop a little. They told us we were gonna be admitted...things were moving quickly!

We got to the delivery room and I got an IV and some IV fluid so I could get an epidural. What an amazing thing!! I was finally able to catch my breath in between contractions and conserve some energy for the big show :)

The Dr came and broke my water and started me on a little pitocin to move stuff along. The baby's heart rate frequently dropped so they wanted to get her out sooner than later. Next thing I know, I was dilated to 8 and the Dr wanted me to push. He asked if I wanted a C-section and I said No, so we started pushing. Brenna made her debut after about 6-7 more contractions and a little help from a vacuum :)

She came out screaming! There was a pediatric team at bedside to check her since her heart rate had been low during labor. Here she is a few hours after birth and after being cleaned up.
We were so lucky our parents were able to come down from Michigan and arrived on Thursday afternoon to see their first grandchild! We had some very happy grandparents :)

Since Brenna and I were doing so well and she was eating and pooping well, we were able to go home after 24 hours. We were so anxious to get home to our own bed and not be woken up every few hours by the hospital staff, so left around 7pm.

Brenna was looking beatiful and feisty in her going home outfit from Aunt Caite :) She was so cute!