Rose Lara is Here!

The first pic of Rosie.

We could not get over how tiny she was (just 6 lbs 13 oz).

She looks so much like Lily as a newborn and they have the same long, piano-player fingers.

Lily meeting Rosie for the first time.

Jason spending some QT with little sister on Saturday.

Rosie at 1 week old.

Our Rosie girl is finally here!  For some reason, this pregnancy felt sooooo long.  I guess they all do but I was particularly anxious to welcome Rosie.  Maybe because it's so much more physically demanding to be pregnant and caring for 2 other kids?

I started having intense but sporadic contractions at about 37 weeks but it was at 38 weeks when I felt that labor would be imminent.  Matt and I spent all of September 11th hoping that I could hang on another day so that Rosie wouldn't have the worst birth date ever.  I called my parents at 3 AM on the 12th and they were at our house at 3:30.  By this time I was worried that I had waited too long to go to the hospital but we all still managed to take a moment and marvel at how wonderful LA would be without traffic.  We made it from Hermosa to Santa Monica in 24 minutes!

By the time I got my epidural at around 6 AM, I was in PAIN - much more pain than with either Lily or Jason.  It turns out this was a combo of waiting longer to go to the hospital and the fact that Rosie was "sunny side up" which made for more painful contractions, particularly in the lower back.

The time between getting the epidural and delivering was a little strange.  I fainted twice, which wasn't entirely unexpected given my tendency to do so, but it made me really sleepy and dazed.  Then, by the time I was ready to push, the doctor on call had to go do a c-section and then handle an emergency walk-in who lived my worst birthing nightmare by arriving at 10 cm dilated and having to deliver without an epidural.  Even our nurse seemed traumatized by that one!  But it all worked out because my active labor lasted only 8 minutes and Rosie was born at 1:38 PM, at 38 weeks and 3 days.

The hours after her birth were so special.  They placed her on my chest immediately and I held and nursed and cuddled her for about an hour straight like that.  As the 3rd child, she's going to have to share everything but especially Matt's and my time so I loved being able to just enjoy those quiet hours with the 3 of us.

Since bringing her home, she's been a pretty easy going baby.  She wakes to nurse about every 4 hours but sleeps for longer stretches at night, which is amazing.  The past 3 nights she's only woken up once to nurse so I don't feel like a total zombie.

Lily loves her little sister, as expected, but the big surprise is how sweet Jason has been with her.  He really loves touching her little features and naming them (his favorite is her nariz) and giving her kisses on the head.  Every time she squeaks he imitates her and exclaims "a baby!"  It's so sweet to watch.