Introducing Dolce Daisy Holmgren!

Our second little angel made it to the world on Tuesday, November 3 2009. She is so perfect and we love her so much! Here's the story:

On Monday night, I thought I should go into Labor and Delivery because I was having contractions every time I stood up. I talked myself out of going in because the contractions were really not painful and they were coming so fast and close together when they were happening that I couldn't really time them. I decided after calling my cousin who is a nurse in Labor and Delivery that I would drink a lot of water and lay down for a full hour to see if they would stop. I put Mckinley to bed and the contractions kept going but they seemed to be slowing down. David was training for a new position and so he really needed to go in to work that night and I was really nervous letting him go because our other car is having its usual problems and I was having mental images of the car not starting and not being able to get ahold of anyone. (and then having to call 911 and deliver my baby with my co workers! There would be awkwardness forever after that... haha)But he went in for his training, and I told myself that we had to wait until morning when I had a scheduled appointment to see what was going on.

The next morning, I had my appointment with Dr. Gatherum. I went in and just as before with Mckinley, I had lost a pound. When Dr. Gatherum came into the room, he said, "well, maybe you'll be dilated to a 5 or 6 and I'll just send you over to L&D and we can have her today. " He did the check and we were pretty surprized that I was actually dilated to almost a 5. So he asked me what I wanted to do. It wasn't the most convenient time to have her but since he was giving me the choice, I wanted to have her as soon as possible as long as it would be safe for her to come. He said that at 38 weeks and 2 days she would be just fine. So of course I said "let's have her today!"

I went and picked up David and we dropped Mckinley off at my parents and made it back to the hospital just after 10amDavid was so thrilled on the drive over because the baby was going to be born on "inverted 311 day." My birthday is 3/11 and now you know why David married me. haha. My cousin Annie was my nurse which made things so much fun and stress free. She did such a great job!

Dr. Gatherum came in around 11:30 to break my water but as he was preparing to break it, he felt her little hand right up by her head. I was so glad that he caught this before breaking my water because if her hand would have come out first, he said we would have had to have a C-section because of the risk of injuring the babies arm or shoulder. Luckily, they just shook hands and he waited to break my water.

We started Oxytocin around noon, and the contractions started coming really fast.(Like 2 minutes apart.) I wasn't in much pain, although I was having "off the richter" contractions as David called them, but I was dilating really quickly(I was at a 9 after maybe an hour.) and I was getting nervous that I would be delivering soon, so we had the anesthesiologist come and get my epidural in. They have a unique epidural system at Valley View where you can still move your legs while it's working. It seemed pretty wierd because I could still move everything but I couldn't feel the contractions. (I was worried it wasn't working until they told me about it, apparently there are only a few hospitals that are using it. I thought it was pretty neat.)

After another hour, I was fully dilated and effaced and the babies heart rate was being affected by the contractions, so Dr. Gatherum walked in and said "let's have a baby!" He had a surgical hat on that said "Don't Panic!" and I kept reading it whenever they would say that the babies heartrate was dropping again while pushing.

This ended up being a posterior delivery. Mckinley was posterior or "Sunny side up" too, and Dr. Gatherum told us that with two posterior births in a row, it's likely that my pelvic anatomy is shaped in a way that only allows posterior delivery. This causes back pain during and after the delivery and makes the delivery harder for some women. I had to have a third degree episiotomy with Mckinley,(whatever that means?) and a smaller one with Dolce but aside from that the delivery was quick and easy with both.

Once she was out, we could see that she was just perfect. It was so much fun to see the babies face for the first time after spending 9 months wondering what she would be like. She was so sweet and had the daintiest little cry while they were cleaning her off. She hardly cried at all but snuggled right up to me as I was holding her.

She weighed 6lbs 12oz which is exactly what her big sister weighed. However she is only 19 inches long which is an inch and a half shorter than Mckinley was when she was born. We wondered if she would be a red head, and I joked the whole pregnancy that she must not be because I never had any morning sickness. Haha, she actually has dark brown hair! (I wont be surprized if it goes blond because mine was dark brown too. ) Her pediatrician thought she might have little club feet because of the way that she snuggles her legs up and crosses them.(I will post a picture. It's so adorable.) but she doesn't because she can straighten them and move them side to side. She is so cute and tiny, we are loving everything about her. She already has really chubby cheeks and a double chin.

Because of IHC's visitor policy because of H1N1 flu, we were only allowed to have four visitors during our stay at the hospital, and Mckinley couldn't be one of them because you have to be 14 years or older to be a visitor. Mckinley was only allowed to see her new baby sister through the nursery window, which made it feel like we were in jail:( She was so excited when she finally got to meet the new baby. She couldn't wait to hold her, and ever since she has been very helpful by patting the baby's back, comforting her when she cries, hugging and kissing her,playing peek a boo with her and doing everything else that expert big sisters do. She is a natural.