THE SPARKS: Nathan's Birth

It's about time I got around to posting these pictures. The poor kid is almost 2 months old. In my defense I don't know how to convert the pictures from RAW to JPEG and Daddy has been supper busy finishing his dissertation. Besides that life with 3 kids is CRAZY! But we love it and we are so excited to have Nathan as part of our family.

Nathan Randall Sparks was born January 12, 2015 at 11:24 am weighing in at 9 lbs 1 oz and was 22.5 inches long. He's middle name is after his Papa's middle name.

Ready for picture overload??

We kept with tradition and wore the same shirts we wore with the other two kids. The top picture is us heading out to have Nathan, the middle picture is Harrison and the bottom picture is Evelyn. Each time I thought I wasn't as big as the time before. Wrong! Haha. Must be hopeful thinking!

I was in room 2239, just two doors down from where I had Harrison.

Ben's pass that allowed him in and out of Labor and Delivery

Here I am waiting for the nurse to begin my induction. I have been induced with all three of my babies. Maybe I'm impatient and I'm sure my all natural delivery friends will frown upon this but my wonderful doctor asked if I wanted to be induced and I was very happy to say yes. I was due on January 15th but was induced the 12th. When the nurse hooked me up to monitor my contractions I was already having contractions every few minutes and she said I probably wouldn't have made it to my due date anyways. I had to agree since I was having pretty good contractions at church the day before. It all worked out because Ben started the new semester on the 14th and this way he didn't have to get a sub for his classes on the first day.

All hooked up and ready to go

We had the best nurse, Cherie. She was actually the same nurse who helped with my last two deliveries. It was just coincidence that she was assigned to me for Harrison and then I actually asked for her this time. She was so excited. After delivery she turned to Dr Martin and said they were three for three. We had a fun time that morning chatting and watching (ok, maybe making fun of) the mom's stroller fit class going on outside my window. But what else do you have to do while waiting around? Plus I could actually hear the instructor inside my room and I wasn't on the bottom floor. She even raised my bed up and turned me towards the window so I could see what her and Ben were seeing. It was awesome.

My contractions

Right before delivery. They started the medication at 6 am. My doctor broke my water around 8 am and I was about 3 cm. My epidural was in and working great at 9:30 am and I was at about a 5 cm. By 10:30 am I was at 6 cm and feeling pretty good. My nurse was going to go to lunch around 11 am so she would be back in time for delivery. She asked how I was feeling and if I was feeling any pressure down there. At this point my epidural was working and I was pretty numb to the pain. I could still move my feet but was pain free. I told her I feel fine and wasn't sure about pressure, that it felt a little different but I was fine. She decided to check just in case and sure enough I was fully dilated. You think by my 3rd kid I would know what was going on right? Anyways, she phoned my doctor and they got everything set up.

3 and a half contractions later Nathan was here! Biggest baby and easiest delivery. I thought he was going to be smaller but as soon as he came out Dr Martin guessed he was at least 9 pounds just by holding him. She was right! They had to check him out as soon as I delivered because there was meconium in the amniotic fluid. They had to check him out to make sure he hadn't aspirated any of it.