Welcome Alanna Marie!

I haven't really been posting about how Michelle's pregnancy has been progressing over the last few months, because I have been way too busy posting about Cece. Our due date for our second baby girl was 2/21/13, and the original plan was to schedule a C-Section on 2/20/13 if she hadn't come earlier. Michelle had been doing a lot better during this pregnancy when compared to the last one, and planned to work until 2/14, and then start her maternity leave. So she got everything in order, and her replacement while she is on leave trained, and was finally able to relax a little bit. This relaxation did not last long however, as at about 12:15 AM on 2/15, Michelle woke up to go to the bathroom, and when she tried to move, she realized that her water had broken. She went into labor just 8 hours after she had finished work before maternity leave, that is how you maximize it!

When she woke me up, and told me her water broke, I was a little confused because I had just gone to bed less than an hour ago. So my response to her was "wait, what did you just say?" I then for some strange reason proceeded to question her on if she was sure that her water broke, and how she knew that her water had broke. Then after a couple of minutes of getting her out of bed and helping get everything cleaned up, my mind was a little bit more clear and I started to get everything packed while she called her parents and the doctor. After getting us all packed and ready to go, I woke up Cece who was very excited since we had been talking about going to the hospital to bring home the baby.

We got to the hospital a little bit after 1 AM, and after getting ID bands and getting all of the admitting paperwork done, went into a room to get checked out. After all of the preliminary work, we talked with the doctor and since she wasn't having major contractions, they would have to start her on pitocin to induce active labor to get things going. This made us both think about the last labor with Cece and after they ran all of the numbers, we only had about a 47% chance of having a successful vaginal delivery, so we opted to just go with the C-Section. Since Michelle last ate some Thin Mints about 8:00 PM the night before, we had to wait until 4:00 AM to have a full 8 hours to digest food. This just goes to show you that Thin Mints are so good, they can induce labor!

Cece in the Triage room with us waiting to make a decision about what to do with the baby. She was such a trooper the whole time!

Cece got a little sleepy at 4:00 AM in the morning waiting on her little sister!

Michelle's parents got to the hospital around 2:00 AM and thankfully were able to watch Cece for us so we could focus on the new baby. They took Michelle into the OR to get prepped and I got to wait for what felt like 2 hours before I could move our stuff into the recovery room and put on my jumpsuit, hairnet, and mask to go into the OR with Michelle.

Me after getting ready in the Recovery room getting ready to go into the OR. 

It took the doctors some time to get the spinal done on Michelle, and they said that they actually bent two needles on her spine before getting the third one to go in. It also took a little bit of extra time to cut through some of the scar tissue from the previous C-Section, but everything went well, and at 4:52 AM, Alanna Marie was born (for anybody wondering, we pronounce it a-lah-na, but will probably mostly call her Ali) weighing 8 lbs 12 oz., and 20 inches long. After they spent a few minutes getting her a little cleaned up, measurements, foot prints and all that fun stuff, I was able to hold her next to Michelle while they closed her back up. It was such a special moment and of course we both started to cry. After Michelle was ready to go, we got moved into the Recovery room and spend a couple of hours there waiting to go to our postpartum room.

It was a bit of a long night, but well worth it! Proud Mama with her baby girl. 

Ali with her stat card, they didn't bathe her until at least 6 hours after birth to help with breast feeding. 

 Looking back at some photos of Cece, she looks so much like her!

Just an adorable little face, we love her so much!

Cece was so excited to meet her baby sister Ali!

This moment was so incredibly adorable to us, we couldn't get enough! Cece of course didn't want to share her baby sister, but after she held her for a while, she finally decided it was time to share. 

Grandmom was happy to get her turn to hold baby Ali!

Pop Pop patiently waited for his turn.

Happy baby!

The stay in UNC Hospital went really well, all of the doctors and nurses were so nice and helped us make sure that baby Ali was very healthy and happy. We were also very lucky that you could pretty much have as many visitors as you wanted from 6 AM - 9 PM, so we had lots of visits from Michelle's family and did Facetime with my family since they couldn't be there. Here is a few more photos from the next day.

Cece making sure that Ali has her pacifier.

Ali with all of the guys she got while in the hospital. 


Here is Cece learning how to hold and touch baby Ali.

After three full days in the hospital, Michelle was well enough and the baby was healthy enough to head home. Ali did lose a little over a pound in the hospital, but everything else looked good besides her weight loss, so we just had to be sure to keep feeding every three hours. We got all of our stuff packed up, said goodbye to all of the great doctors and nurses that helped care for us, and we were on our way!