Walt has Arrived!!!

Well, what a difference a few hours makes. When I was convinced that Walt was going to not only take the full 40 weeks, I was "concerned" he would get so cozy in my belly that he'd take even longer. Well, our little bundle of deliciousness arrived on Saturday, January 8, 2011 at 3:22 p.m. He weighed 8 lbs, 6 oz and was 21 inches long. This is FAR bigger than my OB had estimated just a week prior. Here's proof:

My doc isn't an inducer, so I was just waiting for signs of labor. Signs I had read about in a million books, blogs, and articles, but STILL wasn't convinced when it started happening. The Friday before Walt was born, Chris and I settled in to watch the Ags in the Cotton Bowl. I'm not going to lie, I was a nervous wreck for the game. I'm sure Walt didn't like that environment. I went to bed around 10 p.m. (thoroughly beat down by the Ag's performance), only to wake up at 2:30 for a potty break. Not 30 min. later I had my first contraction. Looking back, it is painfully (literally) obvious that was the real deal, but I had no idea what to expect and I've read that false labor/Braxton Hicks can be very convincing.

By 6:00 a.m. we called the dr. (my contractions were 5 min apart). By 7:30 we were at the hospital and my contractions were 2.5 min. apart. I continued to think this was a false alarm. It wasn't until they were hooking me up to an IV and telling me this was happening that it all sunk in. From start to finish, labor was 12 hours, but it really progressed quickly.

Now that we've been at home for a week (today), we are slowly starting to figure things out. I have included some more pics of the little man below. But first, I would be remiss not to admit the other major life event that occurred in tandem to Walt's birth. Our sweet and sassy Sally Pants dog decided Walt was enough of a handful for us, and left this world the same day we brought the booger home. As many of you know, she was well into the end of her life (at youngest, she was 14, but we don't know exactly how old she was). During my hospital stay, Chris would run home to check on her and saw her deteriorate right rapidly. Though we miss her so very very much and wish her and Walt could have met, we know this was exactly the way the universe intended it. We miss you Sally P!