Happy Birthday, Ashley!

You get the pictures first! : )

An hour and a half before delivery!

Meeting my girl for the first time

Getting cleaned up

8 pounds 11.5 ounces 18.9 inches long

proud daddy

^{Psalm 100}

¹ Shout for joy to the LORD, all the earth.

² Worship the LORD with gladness;

come before him with joyful songs.

³ Know that the LORD is God.

It is he who made us, and we are his^[a];

we are his people, the sheep of his pasture.

⁴ Enter his gates with thanksgiving

and his courts with praise;

give thanks to him and praise his name.

⁵ For the LORD is good and his love endures forever;

his faithfulness continues through all generations.

God has been so faithful to reveal himself to us in the past week, and Friday, March 25th was no exception! Just hours before we were to meet our sweet little girl, I was reminded of God's beautiful promises to his children, and I blogged about the sweet reminders of those promises. I treasure the precious ways that God spoke to my heart that day!

There are so many changes taking place in our family this season, and after settling the boys in bed (and deciding to skip out on ladies night at church), Scott and I crawled into our own bed, exhausted, at 8:30 and started discussing how we would survive/tackle the impending changes. About this time, I started experiencing fairly painful contractions, and they quickly became regular, and intense. When we timed them, they were just 10 minutes apart and lasting 45 seconds. I decided we should call in the forces (Scott's parents) just in case. They made it to our house by 9:45 and at that point my contractions were just minutes apart. Since every contraction had be on the floor, on all fours, I knew it was time to head to the hospital! We hopped in the car at 9:45 and my super star husband drove our car like a kamakazi pilot The stopping, starting, road bumping did NOT help my contractions! Yikes, even the seatbelt made them more painful! I probably had 10 contractions during the car ride alone and if you've ever been in active labor during a car ride, you know just how terrible it is!

We finally arrived at HEB around 10:15 and by this point onlookers thought I was dying on the floor next to them. I know that I must have scared several kids - poor things. My sweet husband found a wheelchair for me and quickly wheeled me to labor and delivery. It's funny how those nurses take their sweet time, as if I'm being overly dramatic and delivery is still several hours away. They showed me to a room and I labored in there for a while. The nurse finally came in to begin the lengthy check-in process, which always involves what seems to be meaningless questioning. At this point I'm desperately trying to answer whether or not I've ever had my wisdom teeth pulled while sweating and panting on the floor. This seemed to go on for quite some time! At this point my contractions are every 2 minutes, and lasting at least one minute long! I just KNEW this baby would be here soon. I think she finally checked me around 10:45, maybe even later and I was so discouraged to hear that I was only 5 1/2 cm dilated and 90% effaced. From previous experience, I would have said that I would be delivering shortly, but upon hearing the news that I was only a 5, I was worried that delivery would be a long time in coming. To this point, I had told the nurse that I was planning a natural delivery and hadn't even received an IV. BUT, when she mentioned to me that most people dilate only 1 cm per hour, I decided that I couldn't labor this intensely for another 5 hours! So about 11:10, I remember gritting my teeth during a contraction, water breaking, and shaking my head "yes" that I would like to have an epidural, and thinking to myself that I would develop the will power to turn it down once the anesthesiologist came to the room : )

By 11:15, I knew the baby was coming! I don't know if it was Ashley's large size, but I could literally feel her burrowing her way down. It was the weirdest sensation and it hurt just as bad as any contraction. I told the nurse that she just HAD to check me again, that they baby was coming, NOW. So, she checks me, smiles sweetly, and says, honey, you're only a 7, it will still be a while. Two or three more contractions go by and I say to Scott, I don't care what she says, the baby is coming right now. So he yells out our door for the nurse and she says, "Are you sure you want me to check you again?" YES, I say!! Well, she didn't have to check me at all because sweet baby Ashley was already making her appearance. Three panicked nurses delivered my little girl into the world! She didn't cry immediately, which had me really worried, but they assured me that she was fine, and moments later I was cuddling with my baby girl. I remember saying over and over how much I loved her. (scott reassures me that I said the same thing about all three, but I don't remember!) I held her for a while, and then they took her to the warming bed to clean her up. About this time the doctor made his appearance and seemed surprised that he missed her birth! But he had the privilege of

**warning - stop reading here if you don't want details!****

delivering the placenta and stitching up my tear. Since my epidural never made it to me, they had to numb me with the biggest shot I had ever seen! And clearly the numbing medication didn't work because I could feel every threading back and forth. But my baby was cleaned up quickly and was soon back in my arms. As soon as I was holding her again, she was crawling her way up my belly to nurse - isn't it amazing the instincts that God gives us?!

My sweet husband was a rockstar that Friday night. He was so sweet to continually follow me around with a wet washcloth to my forehead, rub my back, tell me how proud of me he was, and to pray over me. His tenderness was exactly what I needed to make it through delivery, he definitely earned his fathers day this year! My wonderful husband loved me well during those three hours of labor! Not every husband can survive watching his wife give birth sans any drugs. Praise Jesus for Scott Patterson! And God was sweet and tender with me as well - graven on my heart was

Isaiah 41:10 ....I will uphold you with my righteous right hand. I prayed this verse through each contraction and He was so faithful to uphold me!

I was amazed to hear that Ashley's birthweight was a whopping 8 pounds 11.5 ounces! Huge baby : ) They even took back all the newborn diapers and exchanged them for 1's. Blane was exactly 7 pounds at 10 days early, and Gavin was 7 lbs 10 oz at 4 days LATE. So this little girl was big at 5 days early, especially considering that I gained the exact amount of weight with each pregnancy!

Some friends had mentioned to me that the "after pains" get worse with each pregnancy, whoa were they right! For the next 24-36 hours I would have contractions that were nearly as bad as right before delivery! I was really surprised at how true it was!

I held Ashley the entire first night and loved every minute of cuddling with my sweet girl. One of the technicians continually monitored my blood pressure - I guess there's reason to be concerned when it's only 90/54?? The next morning the on call pediatrician raised concerns wondering if her collar bone had been broken during delivery, but a quick x-ray ruled that out - praise God!

I like to refer to our hospital stay as a BabyMoon. It was the most restful, peaceful time ever! Scott and I enjoyed some really sweet time together, and even though we were awake all night long, our days were fun and it's always nice to have someone bring you food! And, it doesn't hurt when the nurse brings you a reeses pieces in the middle of the night for a snack! Oh how I will miss having babies!!! The boys came up for a visit and although tentative at first, were enthralled with their new little sister! Gavin kept asking to "hold it" and the smiles on Blane's face were full of big brother pride. Blane even asked if he could be shining star that next week at school and bring Ashley to show his class : ) Scott went home on Sunday morning to relieve his mom of the boys, so I had all day alone with my sweet girl. But, God ordained two of the most wonderful visitors to come and see me. My discipleship group - two of my precious sisters in Christ- had planned to stop by for a visit. The circumstances were perfect and they were able to stay with me for about an hour and a half. It was a wonderful time of loving each other and ministering Truth! I really needed that girl time before heading home : )

Scott and the boys came Sunday evening to take me home. Blane had been asking Nanna and Poppop "WHEN can Ashley come home?" I'm not going to lie and say that coming home was easy, it wasn't. I mourned the fact that it was the last time I would ever experience delivery - I was leaving behind a season of life that I loved. And it was overwhelming to return home where two little boys needed their mommy just as much as the new baby did. I wondered through tears if I was really cut out to handle it all.

The days that followed were a blur. Mom and Dad came in to help, and luckily Scott was off work too. Ashley visited her pediatrician for the first time and there was concern about too much weight loss. He suggested I supplement with formula, in my stubbornness I decided that was the worst decision ever. Our follow up at the breastfeeding center was the same news, too much weight loss - and of course that made me worry. Even though my milk had come in Sunday night (just two days later), she still wasn't gaining any weight. Then her umbilical cord became infected. But luckily, we had that taken care of and by day 6 she had stopped losing weight, and her umbilical cord stump fell off. Whew!

I've realized that by your third child, you don't sleep, you survive. Sonic is helping me with that : ) The boys are madly in love with her, they always want to know where she is, the kiss her, brush her hair, and love on her. Blane took a picture of Ashley with him to school, tucked it away in his little pocket. His teachers told Scott that they would catch him taking glimpses of it during the day. What a sweet big brother. He melts my heart. Scott is sweet as ever with his little girl. And there's something in me that causes me to worry more about her than I ever did about the boys....

So thankful for the wonderful ways that God has been faithful and loving towards us. I anticipate coming to know Gods character more greatly this summer as we embark upon challenges, and great change for our family. (Stay tuned for more blogging on this subject). I am in love with my little girl, with my family, and with the God who has graciously loaned them to me.