Here's the story, and I'm going to try to condense it a little bit...
We headed down to Clemson for the NC State game on November 6. Had a great time with friends. A few didn't even realize I was pregnant! I was 37 weeks. It took a LONG time to climb the stairs to our seats and boy was I winded when we got there... but no problems, enjoyed the day and Clemson even pulled off a win!
Fast-forward a whopping 5 days. Thursday morning I woke up damp and lay in bed wondering what was going on... possibilities being I wet myself, I lost my plug, my water was leaking. When I finally dragged myself out of bed, no easy feat for someone who is 38 weeks pregnant, it turned out to be option 3. After a moment or two of disbelief, I decided to change and go back to sleep (it was 5am). Yeah, that didn't work... I told Cullen, my water was leaking, so he should stay home and then got on the computer and notified the 3 people who needed to know what was going on- still in disbelief and wondering if it would seal itself back up and wait another 2 or 3 weeks. Cullen jumped into action, doing important things like packing the hospital bag. Nothing was ready, because we weren't expecting this for another 3 weeks. I should add, I was not having ANY contractions, just leaking water every time I moved. It amounted to about a pad every 1-2 hours.
Yep, spent the ENTIRE day like that on Thursday. The in-laws arrived, with my nephew, for the weekend, I finished everything that still needed to be done... including, washing, folding, and putting away all the baby clothes and the baby blanket. Later, my sister-in-law arrived with my niece and decided not to leave the 2 kids for the night :) I went to bed with a plan: pray that my water stops leaking or contractions start for real. In the morning we planned to call to dr office and head in to at least get checked, if we weren't on our way to the hospital. Cullen was going to work and his mom would take me wherever I needed to go, while his dad stayed with the big boys.
Friday morning... contractions, yay! And my water stopped leaking, yay! Cullen went to work. I hung around, contracting every 30 minutes or so. Michael woke up at 7 and wanted to be held, no surprise there. Suddenly, contractions were every 5-10 minutes. I told Mom it wouldn't be long, so she might want to get dressed. I called the office. The nurse called me back. I told Mom we should probably leave right away. I threw up. Jan (my amazing english mid-wife) called back as we were walking out the door. She agreed I should come in and mentioned how excited she was that she was on call... I agreed!
We met Cullen at the hospital around 8 am. Jan confirmed that my bag of waters was in tact. Good thing, because I was NOT admitting that it had been leaking since early AM on Thursday. I labored and answered the bazillion questions. Daniel was born in 1 push at 9:48am. No tearing, no problems, he was perfect. Noticeably smaller than his brothers, but also 3 weeks earlier than any of them. Born on November 12, 2010, 7lbs 3oz, 18.5 inches. I breathed a sigh of relief for another boy. I love my boys, all 4 of them and their daddy too.
The big brothers came to meet baby Daniel in the afternoon. Michael didn't like the hospital and didn't really care one way or the other about the baby. Scott and Blaise both wanted their turns to hold him. Daniel and I went home the next day and we began to settle into a routine.
Michael decided he really liked the baby, once we let him hold him. Now he regularly asks for turns to hold him and is constantly "petting" him on the head. While he liked the baby, he did have a hard time adjusting and we dealt with an extra helping of moodiness and drama from Michael for a month or so... none of it directed at Daniel, so we were thankful for that.
Daniel and I had a hard time at the beginning with nursing... we're talking the most painful 3 weeks of nursing EVER, and that's saying something, because it was no cup of tea with Scott either. I learned that it doesn't matter how many kids you have, they are all different. I already knew that... but now I know it more... and I'm sure I'll learn it even more everyday as we keep trying to figure out how to parent 4 very different little boys.
Now baby Daniel is already 3 months old... mostly sleeping through the night, smiling, except for the camera, laughing, babbling, grabbing for toys, still obsessed with his fingers and sucking on them, cute as can be. He's in the 14-15lb range, I think, and around 25inches long already, so a fairly big boy. I think he looks most like Scott, but also totally himself :)
