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Chad and I have been looking forward to finally seeing what our little girl looks like. Now that she is here it has been fun to recognize family features and to hear everyone’s opinions on who Eden resembles. She has really steely eyes—I of course hope they evolve into the striking blues Chad has while his vote has been that they turn out like mine. We’ll just have to wait and see.

In my opinion Eden really looks like a Church. You can see some of Larry’s features already. The bridge of the nose and the cheek area look like him. She resembles my baby pictures a lot too. We can’t wait to see how she grows.

Elisa’s contractions continued for the rest of Monday evening. When they were about 7-10 minutes apart we called the hospital. They warned us that they might have to send us home if the contractions weren’t 5 minutes apart, but they said to come in if we felt like we needed to. I decided to try and wait it out because I didn’t want to be sent home. 🙂 It was probably only a little over a half hour later and only a couple of very strong contractions that I decided I wanted to go no matter what. Rachel picked us up in her car. We got to Zollikerberg Spital at 10:20 pm. I was really frustrated when there were 8 minutes between contractions, because I just knew they were going to send me home, and I was in so much pain. The nurses were in the middle of their 10:30 shift change, so it was a few minutes before they examined Elisa.

Their first check showed that Elisa was dilated at an 8 or 9! That’s a big number—it usually takes half a day of working through contractions in the hospital to get there. Elisa had been doing it on her own at home all day, (while we walked all around town). Elisa was a lot tougher than she knew. When they said that I was an 8 or a 9, I was overjoyed because I got to stay, and because a lot of the work was finished. But at the same time, I knew right away that it was too late to get an epidural, which is the whole reason that I wanted to go to the hospital. 🙁

It was only a few contractions later that they asked if I was ready to push. I was surprised that I was. The next few minutes went fast. Everything went fast. Elisa’s water broke. Then we went into a delivery room. There wasn’t time to even put on Elisa’s nightgown. I could see the baby’s hair already.

Elisa got nervous that she was doing the pushing wrong. The contractions felt different and so when I was told to push during a contraction, all of a sudden I felt like I didn’t know what to do, or what my body was doing. I think I imagined that the contractions at that point would be much closer together as well and that threw me off.

It was very memorable for me that at one point I just didn’t think I could do it. And I said, “I can’t!” Right after that I said, “No, I can! I can! I can!” And I did. 🙂

It was so crazy and unbelievable. I had thought that we would be having Eden the next afternoon. It wasn’t long before the doctor came in. In under an hour we had our baby!

Eden Marie Parry was born on September 15 at 11:25 pm CEST in Zollikerberg, weighing 3.16 kg (6 lbs 15 oz) and measuring 48 cm (18 7/8 in) long.

I didn’t have any serious tears or anything. There are three tears that the doctor said are superficial. Elisa’s pain medications are helping her feel comfortable. She has been recuperating really quickly. She has no trouble walking or sitting.

Once we had called family, we went to bed. It was already 3 am by that time. All the family was up, of course, because of the time zone difference.

Sometimes we look at Eden and wonder what happened, and how we got a baby so suddenly. It’s been so fun to learn to take care of her. I could be entertained just staring at her all day long. She’s wonderful.

• Baby’s first photos

Elisa was woken up at 5 am today by contractions. She’s been having them almost all day, anywhere from 5 to 40 minutes apart. We’ve been going on walks to stay busy and keep her body relaxed. We’re hoping that real labor starts real soon now. Elisa added, “Ouuuch!” 😥