It's a Girl!!!

We were so excited to welcome our little girl on Sunday! She was born at 10:42am on Sunday morning and weighed in at 8 pounds 8 ounces and was 21 inches long. That's about 2 pounds and 2 inches longer than Grace! So, in Gore terms, she is a 'huge' baby :-)

I actually had an ideal labor this time. And, by 'ideal' I mean quick! I woke up Sunday morning around 1:30am with some contractions. Because I've had so many false alarms, I didn't think much about it and figured they would go away. I didn't bother timing them or anything and just tried to go back to sleep. I'm guessing they were about 15 minutes apart because it was just enough to go back to sleep between contractions.

When I finally decided to look at the clock it was already 3:30am and I timed the contractions which were now about 8 minutes apart. Eeek! At this point I woke up Aaron and told him to call my parents. I just hoped we had enough time for them to drive the 3+ hours to my house before we had to go to the hospital. My contractions stayed about 7 to 8 min apart till about 7am at which point I decided to get out of bed and into the shower. Wow, what a difference standing up made. I started getting them about 2 to 3 minutes apart in the shower and they were so intense! Aaron and I started talking about our 'Plan B' for Grace and he told me to get back in bed to slow the contractions down. I did and it worked. My parents arrived a little after 8am and we were at the hospital by about 8:40am. By the time I got to the hospital I was only at a 5-6cm and was so irritated because I really wanted to be farther along that that. I was only at a 5 when I was admitted with Grace and she didn't arrive for another 10 hours. By the time I got to my actual room I was at a 7 and went into the shower again to help relieve the pain and keep the contractioons coming. It was so PAINFUL! I cannot even explain it.

By the time I got out of the shower it was a little after 10am and I was at 8-9cm and the contractions were coming one on top of another. My nurse was telling me that I was going to have that baby within the hour and I wanted to believe her but just couldn't. After being in labor and pushing for so long with Grace, I didn't think anything about this labor would be quick. I was wrong. The next 40 minutes were a total blur, but I remember telling my nurse that the baby was coming and was pushing even though they hadn't given me the OK. They broke the rest of my water about 15 minutes before and that really spead things up (who knew you could break your water more than once? News to me, but I didn't bother to ask about it. I had more important things to do :-)

Long story short, I started pushing and had Chloe only 4 contractions later. It was less than 10 minutes total. The doctor almost didn't have time to get ready for the catch. I couldn't believe it. She was a SHE! They put her on my chest and said "It's a Girl" and Aaron did a double take and we both just said, "Really?!" What a surprise! We were even more surprised to find out she was such a big girl. She came out a little purple. The cord was wrapped around her next twice but it wasn't tight, so the doc wasn't concerned about it. She got some color back right away and we were just sitting there in awe of our new little girl.

Cut to 4 days later. We are exhausted but loving our new role of parents of 2 girls. Grace has been a wonderful big sister and she takes this job very seriously. She loves Chloe and wants to hold her all the time. Oh, and by the way, Grace was the only person who consistently told us we were going to have a baby girl...the entire pregnancy! Maybe she knows something. Maybe I should let her pick out some PowerBall numbers?! :-) Grace is very involved with Chloe and likes to be a big helper. It also helped that Chloe brought Grace home some Big Sister presents from the hospital. That was a big hit!

That's all from the Gore house. Almost time to feed the baby!

xoxo,

the Gores