Our baby girl arrived Friday March 14th!
Introducing Jaimee Grace Summers:

Friday was an incredible day. I got up at 6:15am to head to the store because Drew reminded me the night before that he needed 24 filled plastic eggs for his class Easter party as well as 12 dinner rolls for their feast. So off I went (it was still dark outside - I hate that) to WalMart. I was having some contractions, but I’d been having some good ones for the past couple weeks, but what felt different this morning was that I was also feeling really crampy. I wondered if something was starting to happen, but I didn’t want to get my hopes up.
Got back home and told Ron how I was feeling and he got really excited and was convinced today was the day. I started my work day but had a feeling I wouldn’t last the whole day so I spent the time tying up any loose ends. By the time Ron left to take the kids to school around 8:15am, we were pretty convinced this was it. So I finished up packing for the hospital, made a few calls, tried to keep working, and started timing contractions.
The contractions started getting beyond uncomfortable and were coming regularly so we left the house around 10:30am and my sisters (who were both able to come and drove together!) came out from the Bay Area to meet us at the hospital. By the time we got there, I was having very painful contractions, some of them coming every two minutes. In between contractions, we took a picture where we parked the car:

(notice I’m still in my jammie pants - I didn’t have it in me to get fully dressed, lol)
Usually when you go in to the hospital to have a baby, they put you in triage to see if you’re truly in labor before they’ll admit you. But the nurse at the check in area said to another nurse “this one’s in real labor - she’s an admit”. She could tell by looking! So I got to skip triage and get right into a room. Around 11am I was 3cm but 100% effaced and having serious contractions. This is in between contractions:

I opted for an epidural (have done one labor with and one without and already knew I was going to go for the epi this time). By noon the epi was in place and I was 4cm. My sisters showed up around 12:30p I think. I was soooooo glad they made it, it was so exciting for all of us!!
By 1pm I was at 9cm! So they started getting all the birthing stuff set up in the room while my Dr (yay, he was there too!) kept a close eye. By 1:20p I was at 10cm and it was time to push. Four sets of pushes later she arrived at 1:35pm! It all went so fast, we couldn’t believe it! She was 7lbs 15oz (just 1oz shy of 8lbs, but she looked SOOOOOOO tiny to me!) and 19 1/2 in long. I can’t tell you how amazing it was.

Ron’s parents arrived at around 2:30p and got to visit and then Ron & his dad went to pick up Drew & Holly from school since they get out at 3pm. Talk about perfect timing!! Drew and Holly were so excited to meet their new baby sister:

I can’t believe we’re now a family of FIVE!!
We went home from the hospital on Sunday afternoon. And at this point we still HAD NO NAME for our baby!! So we left the hospital with “Girl Summers” lol.

(in her car seat before we clicked her in)
The journey of giving birth and bringing baby home has been amazing, I can’t even describe it. Of course, there are some things I’ve forgotten since I had my last baby 8 1/2 years ago:
1. How tiny newborns are. Really, you’d think after my 3rd that this wouldn’t surprise me so much, but I can’t get over how tiny she is. She’s just. so. tiny.
2. How cute the newborn noises and facial expressions are. Yep, forgot that too. The little faces she makes just kill me. Yawns are the best. And the coos and sweet little noises… oh my gosh, I’m dying, she’s so cute.
3. How painful it is when the milk comes in. Um ya, forgot some of the bad stuff too. In all the years Ron has known me, he’d have to think really hard to think of the times I’ve cried from being in pain, even throughout my sternum surgery ordeal several years ago. Wowie, Monday was a killer. The worst out of the three times I’ve been a mommy.
4. How I can stare at her by the hour. I can’t get over it - she’s just so unvelievably beautiful and perfect and yummy.
5. The indescribable joy and contentment of having your newborn baby sleep on your chest. That’s about the best I’m going to be able to translate that into words.
After we got home we were trying different names on her. We didn’t decide until Monday night late that Jaimee was it. P.S. Ron was the one who wanted that name spelling. It was really important to him so I let him have it. And he let me have Grace (he wasn’t a big fan of that name). So Jaimee Grace it is and we both really love it! We’re still working on the whole breastfeeding journey - it’s been a rocky ride. But hey, she’s less than a week old so we’ve got time. Looking forward to that being normalized though.
And of course, we’ve taken tons of pics of her. Here are a couple cute ones from yesterday:

(ok, just looking at this right now is making me want to run over to the bassinet and give her a big kiss on the cheek)

(we call this pose “Touchdown!”)
Well, it’s time to feed her so I gotta run. Then we’ll probably nap together. How blessed am I?