4th of July - Connor David McDougal was born!

Well we did it! We had our third beautiful baby boy! Connor David was born on the 4th of July! What a day! He came about 2 1/2 weeks before his due date and it was quite a surprise! I had my weekly check-up after work (that was supposed to be my last day of work to have a couple weeks to get ready for they baby!) on July 3rd. The doctor asked if I had been having contractions and I said not really. Just the fake braxton hicks stuff. So he checked me and I was alrerady dialated to a 5! He looked at me and said "So, what are your plans for tonight? Do you want to have a baby?" I wasn't quite sure what to say. He told me to go home, talk to Mike, pack stuff up and hopefully he would see me at the hospital later (Thank goodness he was the doctor on call that night!). He really suggested we go to the hospital even though I wasn't having contractions because I was so far dialated that if I went into labor on my own I probably wouldn't make it to the hospital on time (we live quite far from the hospital). So when I left I called Mike and told him what the doctor said. We had an appointment to meet with a realtor to look at a house so we met there. We looked at the house and then I was starting to feel like we really needed to go. So we went home and got the kids, packed up a few things for us and them, I took a quick shower and off to the hospital we went (with a quick detour to Mike's Aunt's house who took the kids for us). When we arrived at the hospital they checked us in. I was already dialated to a 7!!! Crazy! I wasn't even feeling contractions at that point yet. Well, they got my epidural in and then it was waiting time. Keep in mind it was already about 7:00 at night. We were really hoping to have the baby before midnight so it's birthday would be on the 3rd, not the 4th! But of course, not having strong contractions before the epidural now I really wasn't having them. Well, I guess I was having them, just not feeling them and they weren't strong enough to do their job. Finally they broke my water and eventually gave me petocin to make them stronger. After 3 doses of petocin and some pushing Connor finally made his way into the world on the 4th of July at 6:43 in the morning!! He weighed 7 lbs 3 oz and was 20" long. We are so excited to have him here! It has been a blessing and a joy to have his sweet spirit in our home. And the 2 older boys just adore him! Shawn especially is a big help to mom! And Brady just loves him to pieces! They both are so cute with him! So all in all it turned out to be a very good 4th of July!!! And just think, Connor will get fireworks every year on his birthday to celebrate!