Leone Bruce Larsen's debut

Read at own risk!

I started having mild contractions Saturday 9/24 at 1:45am and I kept thinking it would pass, especially since I wasn't due til October 13th, but it kept happening throughout the day just not enough to alarm my midwife.

Come Sunday morning, I passed my mucous plug & called my midwife and she wanted me to come in to the hospital to check the movement of the baby & make sure he was ok. I went in at 11am and she checked my cervix, which I had been worrying about 'cause I heard it was painful, but it wasn't at all. It probably didn't hurt 'cause the contractions were painful enough. I was dilated at 3cm and totally effaced. My contractions were coming on stronger, but not close enough to be active labor. She wanted me to stay in the hospital a little bit longer 'cause I was 100% effaced but I chose to just go home & wait it out & shower ('cause I knew it would be a long night) til my contractions were closer together. So we went home & Aaron had to work so I told him to go in but to make sure his phone was on him. I got home & my contractions were still not close enough, but they were getting suuuuper strong and when they finally got 5 minutes apart I texted Aaron to hurry and come home & take me to the hospital. I know, who sends a text when you can call? I didn't want him to hear the pain in my voice i guess. I told him not to talk to me when I would get a contraction, I know, so mean, but if he did talk to me I would've just bit his head off.

I had been going back & forth on how I would go about with the delivery, if I'd go unmedicated or have an epidural. After taking our childbirth classes, I decided that I would DEFINITELY have the epidural. Lucky for Aaron that I got the epidural or I would've spent these past two weeks apologizing for my demonic behavior had I not gotten it.

We went back to the American Fork hospital at 5pm and I was 5cm and I originally told them I would wait til I was close to a 10 in pain to get my epidural, but right when I got there, they asked if I wanted them to call the anesthesiologist then and I was like, ok. hahaha! I LOVED the epidural! I felt soooo good & so calm and I was so grateful I got it! My midwife kept saying maybe i'll have the baby before midnight, but he was still high and my water had not broken yet. So at 9 1/2cm she broke my water and when it came time to push it only took 15 minutes and out he came just after midnight. It was so surreal! I think out of the whole experience, I hated pushing, only because the nurse that was counting kept getting distracted. She would talk to the other nurses then come back counting where she left off. I felt like I was holding my breath forever! Thank goodness I didn't have to push long. There is no kind of modesty once you go into labor. It's crazy how you don't even care that your legs are wide open & there are a bunch of people in the room, all that's on your mind is that your baby comes out ok and is healthy.

When he came he had the softest cry. He sounded like a mouse, it was so cute. The midwife said he sounded like a girl, haha! I'm so grateful for the midwife I had. She was amazing! I'm grateful for the nurses that helped as well. Loved my experience but not loving the recovery process, that's another story to tell.

born: 9/26/11 at midnight. 7 LBS 1 OZ 20 INCHES

Took us forever to figure out his name, but when we finally came up with his name, it felt so right...our mothers told us so so we know it's his heavenly name :)
Leone is my dad's middle name and Bruce is Aaron's dad's name. He is named after strong, compassionate, loving, God fearing men.

After being scrubbed clean.

Here he is at 1 week with his yellow jaundice eyes, that have gone away yay!

here he is at 2 weeks getting tummy time. When we left the hospital, he lost weight and was at 6 lbs 9 oz but at his 2 week appt he got back up to 7 lbs 11 oz. Our baby boy is growing :) WE LOVE HIM SO MUCH!!!