His Birth

Our sweet baby boy was due Sunday, March 23rd. After the previous two being inductions and Stephen being 10 days late, I fully expected to be induced. My doctor was out of town the week of the due date, so I scheduled an induction with him at my 39 week appointment for Monday, March 31st and fully expected to see him there. :) But baby had other plans...
I mentioned previously that I was up for about 1 1/2 hours with regular, slightly painful contractions starting at 2am on Tuesday the 25th. Just when I started to get my hopes up a bit for a Solemnity baby, it all stopped. So back to sleep I went. Lita was here helping for the week, and she offered to take us and Tia Nana's family out to lunch at Jason's Deli. So after my 40 week appointment with another doctor and the girls' piano lessons, we headed off to eat a delicious lunch complete with cookies Austin picked up for dessert in honor of the Solemnity. Just as I finished eating my lunch, I had a couple more of the contractions like the night before. (What a nice "last meal" that turned out to be...thank you, Lita!!!) They continued in the afternoon but were very sparse and irregular, so I continued to go about my business. Around 3:30 or 4 they got a little more regular, so I texted Austin (who wanted to be off on the Solemnity anyway!), and he came home from work. I scolded him, though, because I really thought it was another false alarm. We got things ready to attend daily mass that evening. However, the contractions kept coming, more and more regular. They started getting stronger around 5pm. Lita went to Tia Nana's to get her stuff and prepare to stay the night here. We nixed our plans for mass and instead packed our bags and hung out a bit more. Just before 6, I recognized the familiar signs of transition and told Austin, "We had better go!" So off we went. We got to the hospital and were quickly escorted to L&D. I was at 8cm, so the nurses promptly called the Dr. (the one I had seen for my appointment that morning) and prepped me for birth. After a few quick pushes, our sweet boy was born at 7:13pm with a full head of dark hair and dark eyes that he barely opened for the first 24 hours. So sweet! I am very thankful for such a wonderful, natural birth and healthy boy!

It took us quite a long time to name him since he surprised us by coming on the Solemnity, and we wanted his name to reflect that. Sebastian Mario Ambrose means "Venerable Mary Immortal" and is also after three great saints that we admire. We were actually married on the feast of St. Ambrose!