The Big Day Arrived!

Beatrice Anita and Elizabeth Hope were born at 6:27 pm on Friday, April 6th. The girls came out together in the same push. Beatrice is an incredibly healthy girl for her age. Elsa was suprisingly beautiful and intact. Mom is doing well after a speedy natural delivery.

Bea weighed in at 3 pounds 9 ounces and is 18.9 inches long. She did so well at birth they let Mom and Dad hold her in the O.R. before transfering to the Special Care Nursery (no NICU yah!). Today she is doing so well they quit monitoring her oxygen level and even tried to breastfeed. She does have jaundice and will need to be under the lights for a while. The current estimate is she can come home between 2 and 5 weeks. Across the board everyone is extremely surprised how well she is doing for someone of her age. And, she's awful cute with her full head of dark hair.

Elsa was down to 4 ounces (she was 13 ounces in January) and was probably 11 to 12 inches long. She looked just like she did in the ultrasound with her feet crossed and her hands together under one side of the head like she had just gone to sleep. She had a smile on her face and looked so peaceful. We were very fortunate that we could hold her, take pictures, and wrap her in a blanket. We were each able to spend some time alone with her and the grandparents were also able to spend some time with her. Matt walked her over to the Children's hospital where the cremation society will pick her up.

Melissa is doing spectacular. She's up and walking around for the first time in months. After a few false starts, when labor began everything went extremely fast. After having significant contractions for 3 hours the nurses told us to expect another 12 hours. However just one hour later a startled nurse who was examining Melissa pronounced she was ready to go. Nurses immediately starting throwing furniture around the room to get Melissa's bed out of the room. As they wheeled her down the hall they were shouting out they had not notified the O.R. of her arrival but the babies were coming out. Seventeen minutes after arriving in the O.R. Melissa gave birth. The doctor said she was an exceptionally good pusher. Unfortunately the placenta was not nearly as easy to deliver and took another 45 minutes to an hour (not to mention a lot of muscle from the doctor - more details at your request) to come out.

We'll provide more details of the busy day and future events and milestones in coming blogs. We are so thankful for all of the love and support we have received over the course of this pregnancy. We couldn't have done it without all of you. Now back to the breast pump for Mom and Dad (yes, Dad has jobs, too).

Love,

Melissa and Matt


P.S. Kelly K. and Craig B./Emma won the baby pool and will be sent pictures of Bea ASAP. We thought there was another person who picked April 6th, but our independent accounting firm has not been able to verify the official entry (that means we lost it - if it was you let us know).