Samantha's birth

The kids were out of school this last week for Spring Break and Clay was supposed to have a 4 day weekend that was taken down to 2 with very little notice. He's been out in the field since really early yesterday morning and will be home hopefully some time tomorrow.

I realized that I did post about Samantha's birth when it actually happened but I'll recap it a little here.

Samantha came into our home on Sunday, March 16th (the third of ours to be born on a Sunday). She's been the only one where I had my water break before labor started. My sister Kimberly had arrived the day before from Colorado and we were trying to get all the kids ready for our 11 am church. As I was taking the rollers out of Amanda's hair for church, I noticed that things were different. The kids all came running when I asked for someone to get Clay. I finished her hair and loaded all the kids into my sister's minivan and sent them to church. I still wasn't having any labor pains.

With all of our girls, I usually dilate early and am almost half way days, if not weeks, before they are born. The same was true with Samantha. We headed to the hospital knowing she would be born that day. It was an interesting drive. I have always been nervous about being in labor and having to worry about making it in time to the hospital. It was a much more relaxing drive.

They checked me and confirmed my water had broken. The nurses called my midwife and asked what I wanted to do. We decided to try to give my body a little time to see if labor would start on its own. I walked the halls of the hospital so many times with Clay, we finally started counting every little camera, fire sprinkler, etc. to try to give us something to do. It was rather boring but we tried all day to get labor started. Every once and a while if I laid a certain way on my side, I could actually get the contractions going good but as soon as I shifted, they would stop.

As much I didn't want to be induced, I knew my body needed a little help this time. Shortly after 9 pm, they started me and then things picked up quickly as I suspected. Labor was much more intense this time. Samantha's head got stuck on part of my cervix that refused to dilate, her shoulders got stuck, and she had the cord wrapped around her. Had it not been for that, she would have been here in probably 30 minutes. At 10:04, with the help of both Clay and the midwife to deliver, she finally made it. There were moments that I honestly didn't think that we both were going to make it. I was very relieved when they finally placed this angel in my arms.
Samantha was our biggest baby at 7 lbs. 10 oz. and 20 inches long. Right from the beginning, the nurses were commenting on the expressions she was making. She has always had the most interesting facial expressions of any baby I've ever met.