The New Little Miss

We've got a new Little Miss in our house and we couldn't be more in love!  At 39 weeks and 1 day she came into our world and stole our hearts immediately. I know I'm biased, but come on!  Look at how sweet she is!

*For those of you who don't want the story - just scroll and drool through the photos from this point on :)

God has blessed me with big, healthy babes at birth so my OB said it would be fine to induce at 39 weeks. We went in at 1:30am on Friday 4/1 to get things started. I was already beginning to dilate in the weeks prior so we hoped it wouldn't take much to get my body into labor. After starting Pitocin around 2:45am we waited. No...I waited. Mr. Bell slept. The anesthesia dept came to chat about the option of an epidural. I had told them I would want one and after a little informative, routine chat she asked if I had any questions. I had 2. 1: What time is shift change? (In case I ask for one and have to wait an hour for the new person on call) and 2: How many Drs are on call? (If only 1 then I'd ask when my pain was still tolerable in case they are tied up). Needless to say I made her laugh as she replied, "This is not your first child!"  

We settled in for the long night and I decided to get the epidural around 5:45am. Those drugs are incredible!  Immediate results!  At 6:30am the Dr on call broke my water which took me to 4cm. We continued to wait. No...I did. Mr. Bell continued to sleep. By 9:30am I was at 6cm and by 10:30am I had gotten to 8cm. That's when the fun began. I had been blissfully unaware of the severity of my Pitocin driven contractions until just before 11am. We still aren't sure what happened, but my epidural stopped working. From feeling nothing, I suddenly catapulted to feeling EVERYTHING. I realize women go med-less all the time, but they get to grow with the pain and tolerate it as it builds. This was a far worse scenario!  It only took about a half hour to be complete and start pushing. I had an incredible team of encouragers around me - Mr. Bell, my OB, and a nurse - and through searing pain I sought God's help and trusted in Him to bring me through. At 12:12pm my OB urged me to open my eyes, since I had them shut from pushing, and I saw our perfect 8lb 1oz Little Miss. All my exhaustion and pain took the back burner to my heart bursting with joy and thankfulness for this little babe. 

We've now fallen into the swing of life with 3 kids. It's incredible how quickly Miniature outgrew his baby status!  He's such a big kid now!  

All in all life is good. We feel abundantly blessed!

Until rest time - Mrs. Bell