A beautiful little girl has joined our family

On Tuesday, January 13th at 8:40PM Elyse Jean Edison was born. The event was nothing short of miraculous and left everyone in the room (hospital staff included) in tears.

Emily was in labor for about 12 hours and managed the considerable pain with grace. Little Elyse measured 21" long, eight pounds, and has long primate-like digits much like her father. Luckily her other features are more like Mom.

We were surrounded by enthusiastic grandparents before, during, and after the event, with Emily's mother Sharon providing us with lots of help during birth and afterwards at home.

Emily was understandably exhausted after the big event and we all slept a fair amount on Wednesday, taking advantage of the great care and services Evergreen Hospital offered us. We decided to stay at Evergreen Wednesday night and were discharged around 10AM on Thursday.

It struck me as odd that we were encouraged to take a tiny one day old child home with us, but had to wait eight weeks to bring our dog Fletch home from the breeder...I digress.

Since arriving home we haven't done much other than stare at our gorgeous little girl, feed her, try to decode her various cries, and stumble around sleep deprived. Today we plan to go out on the first outing which may include a stroller. We'll let you know how that goes.

If you haven't seen photos of Elyse, please feel free to check out this slideshow which is growing every day just like Elyse. 

The big day is here

Greetings from Evergreen Family Maternity Center in beautiful Kirkland, Washington.
Emily checked in this morning at 7:15 AM and is being induced.
She is on a low dose Petocin drip and is having moderate contractions.
We expect things will get interesting over the next several hours and we're anxiously looking forward to meeting the newest Edison very soon.
Stay tuned!

D Day plus 4

Apparently Baby Edi is comfy and cozy in its little placenta and just isn't ready to come out yet.

Just to give everyone a quick update, our doc has been closely monitoring our placental fluids, baby movement, and contractions. The fluid is what cushions the baby and allows the umbilical cord to remain functional (not compressed by baby).  Mom's fluids have been low and if they get to a "5" we will have to be induced immediately.  The test seems very subjective, but our numbers are ranging from a low of 6.5 (Friday) to a high of 9 (today). We go in for an ultrasound and non-stress test (monitors baby movements and heart beat as well as mom's contractions) daily now.  We are also monitoring at home to make sure baby is still moving, and it is!!

If Baby Edi is still chillin' in his/her moms belly on Tuesday, they will induce.

So the rx is to drink a gallon of water daily (you give it a try with a compressed bladder, might as well just bring the toilet with me) and keep trying to get this labor going.  Any old wives tales welcome!

Thank you for all your calls emails and special thoughts!  Soon, you will meet this little Edi!

D-DAY

Well, time is up.  Baby Edi should be here any minute:)

We wish it was that easy (the stork is bringing this thing right??).   Really, it is sort of like waiting for the cable guy...we know the baby will be here sometime between now and next Tuesday.  Today doc Wells says we are 1cm dilated and 75% effaced.  She also says unless you have a crystal ball, all this tells you is that you are further along than you were yesterday. Unfortunately our ball is broken.

So...we wait.  Mom is great (I mean carrying around the heaviest bowling ball known to man can get a bit old, but no complaints),  dad has a stress induced knot in his shoulder no amount of rubbing seems to get out and Fletch is eagerly selecting which toys he will share with his new sibling...but that's about it from the home front. 

We continue to search for the perfect name...any ideas??   "Nesting" has organized and cleaned things we never even knew could be that organized or clean and we have plenty of soups and baked goods stored in our freezer (speaking of freezer wow it is clean!).  If there was another week or two available we could start our own soup kitchen.

Thank you for all your support and love...we will keep you posted!