I’ve started this post at least a dozen times; it’s been sitting open on my desktop for days…. I continued to get lured away by baby snuggles or the opportunity to sneak a quick nap.

I am so excited to introduce you to our sweet little boy! “Little G.” arrived on New Year’s Day at 4:30 a.m. He weighed 8lbs 4oz, 20in long.

God is so faithful. I am overwhelmed by his goodness.

Looking back over the last 10 weeks of my pregnancy God provided for our family in amazing ways. When I think about the weeks leading up to Little G’s birth and his birth story, I am so humbled by His graciousness and faithfulness.

At 36 weeks my midwife had me stop taking all medication that was preventing contractions. (You can read about my preterm labor at 31 weeks here). I continued to have contractions off and on over the next two weeks but they never progressed. We enjoyed a lovely relaxing Christmas at home all together. It was such a wonderful answer to prayer. The thought of Little J. spending Christmas with friends while we were away in the hospital made my mama heart sad.

The days leading up to the New Year became a countdown of avoiding the double health insurance deductible. Our health insurance reset on January 1^st for the New Year. If I were to be admitted to the hospital on 12/31/2015 but baby wasn’t born until 1/1/2016 we would pay our deductible for both 2015 AND 2016. I was almost in tears on the phone with our insurance company.

We enjoyed an early dinner with friends on New Year’s Eve as we awaited my mom’s flight that evening. It was such a relief to have my mom arrive before the baby was born, something I thought wouldn’t happen with all the signs of early labor. Little J. would get to stay home and spend time with Grammy when the time arrived for us to go to the hospital.  We picked up Grammy from the airport, arrived home around 9:45 p.m. and unpacked the car. Fifteen minutes after being home, my water broke. “Are you sure you didn’t just pee your pants?” (The response from the hubby… and let’s be real… being my second pregnancy and 39 weeks, it’s always a possibility). My water never broke with Little J., so I wasn’t exactly sure what to expect. It was 10 p.m. and since I wasn’t having contractions I decided to lay down for a bit until things started to progress.

Just after midnight my contractions were getting stronger and closer together and we decided to head to the hospital. 12:30 a.m. on New Year’s Day we arrived. Sitting in triage, getting check-in, I was overwhelmed by how God had provided for our family that evening. A series of events so perfectly timed.

My birth experience with Little J. was one I was hoping to not repeat. In the end, baby and I were healthy, which is all that matters… but it resulted in a 3^rd degree tear and nearly 40 stitches. My recovery was slow and painful.

I was hoping to avoid an epidural for as long as possible, since it completely stopped my labor with Little J. I spent my first hour in a warm bath, once my contractions started getting really painful I switched to using nitrous (laughing gas) and then eventually elected for the epidural. I was eight centimeters dilated after the epidural was in place and was able to start pushing fifteen minutes later. Six minutes of pushing and our sweet little guy was born. No tearing. No stitches.

God you are so good!

We are enjoying every minute with this sweet little boy. He is such a joy!