Welcome Emma Jennifer Faro!

Emma decided to grace us with her presence on March 23rd at 7:39am. Her due date was the 31st so she came a little over a week early. I'm not really sure how much of the labor and delivery details to share because I'm sure some readers don't want that kind of information. So for those that want more details feel free to ask and for those that think I already shared too much...sorry.

On saturday, we had a bunch of our friends over and we watched some basketball. That whole day I thought I was feeling some contractions but wasn't quite sure. Saturday night at about 1am I found out that I was having them for sure. I woke up with some serious back pain and thought I might be in labor. So Aaron and I were up most of Saturday night into Sunday morning. We called the midwife and she told us to call her back when the contractions were closer and more regular...that never actually happened. We timed them all day Sunday and they got closer and more intense but not very regular. Finally at about dinner time we called the midwife again. She told us to come in basically because she thought its what I wanted, not because she thought it was really time.

So we get to the hospital around 7:30pm on Sunday. At this point, we're at over 18 hours of labor. I wondered if they were going to send me home cause I wasn't ready but they said they thought it was real labor and told me we'd stay. They offered, and even pushed, the epidural but I told them I wanted to try and go without it. Stupid. After 6 more hours of labor (24 hours total so far) she told me I was still only 3 or 4 centimeters so I got the epidural. I REALLY should've gotten it earlier. From then on I slept off and on until 7am when they said it was almost time to push. There's a good story about my anesthesiologist but this is already long so that will have to wait...but it involves me telling her I was gonna kick her in the face...so if that interests you feel free to inquire further. :-)

The pushing part was really fast for me. I only pushed five times and she came right out. The midwife almost didn't make it into the room in time to catch her. It was really a surreal moment. They placed Emma right up on me and told me it was a girl. I was actually surprised since the whole time I thought I was gonna have a boy. Aaron got to cut the cord and went with the nurse when she cleaned her up and measured her and all that jazz. It was so sweet to watch Aaron's reaction and see him hold her for the first time. Special moments with our daughter :-)

We had lots of visitors in the hospital those two days and we've been home now about a week. Life sure is different. I do nothing I used to do, and I spend my whole day doing things I don't really know anything about. It's definitely hard. Everyone tells me the first few weeks are hard and it gets easier. Thats good cause I probably can't keep this up forever. As hard as they've been, they've been awesome too. Emma makes the cutest faces and sounds and sleeping with her laying on your chest is the best thing in the world.

I'm sure there will be more updates now that Emma is here. Although, I thought I was too busy to write earlier...now I really AM too busy to do anything so we'll see :-)