THE BEAN ARRIVES!

We are so excited to announce the arrival of Lily Mae Denison on November 14, 2007 at 12:03 a.m. She weighed in at 7 lbs. 12 oz. and is 20 3/4 inches in length. She is absolutely beautiful.

Tiffany started experiencing semi-regular contractions about 4 a.m. on Tuesday morning, but we weren't sure it was anything we needed to immediately go in for. The contractions continued throughout the day, but started to taper off leading us to believe that Tiffany may have just been experiencing some false labor. When we went to her regularly scheduled doctor's appointment, however, we were surprised to find out that she was between 2 and 3 cm dilated! The doctor told us we would probably be going into the hospital that night. We were to go in when Tiffany's contractions were five minutes apart for an hour.

Sure enough, from about 5 p.m. to 6 p.m. Tiffany started having contractions every three to seven minutes. It all seemed a bit surreal as I started loading up the car with our bags and other stuff we needed, but got even more surreal as we were driving to the hospital. I wanted to turn on the flashers and drive really fast to get there (like in the movies), but Tiffany wouldn't allow it. She's a spoil-sport. :)

Once we got to the hospital, we found out she was 5 cm along and they admitted her right away. By this point Tiffany was experiencing some very strong and very frequent contractions. Though it was really hard for me to watch Tiffany go through this, I'm sure it was nothing compared to what she was going through. When Tiffany was fully hydrated the anesthesiologist came in and gave her the epidural. Tiffany has yet to stop lauding the praises of epidurals!

Things began progressing very quickly after they broke her water. She went from 5 cm to 8 cm in a matter of minutes. 9 cm followed very soon thereafter. I learned quickly that 10 cm is the max and this is the time to start pushing.

About 11 p.m. Tiffany started getting overwhelming urges to push, but the nurses and doctor told her to hold off. Finally, they let Tiffany start pushing and not a minute too soon. 11 minutes from the time she started pushing, Lily Mae Denison made her mortal debut. It came so fast that the doctor was barely able to get his gown on before she came! It was an intensely overwhelming experience to see Lily for the first time. Both of us really lost it when she came out. She is absolutely the most beautiful thing I have ever seen.

Now we were are in our post partum room and our enjoying our new friend, Lily. She has been a little fussy tonight, but I think she's asleep for at least a few hours now. She is an immense joy to have around.

We have posted our other pictures of Lily on Flickr and on Facebook. There will be more to come.