Mr & Mrs's Seabird are delighted to announce the safe arrival of their 2nd baby, Jasper Leo, on Sunday 3-4-5 (good birthdate!) at 1230pm This is how it happened...
After going to bed on Saturday night after a bath and a couple of paracetamol (good advice Pupuce ) the contractions got me out of bed again at 1215am. I left DH sleeping - thought he might as well, I wasn't sure how long things were going to go on the following day - and spent a few hours watching Fried Green Tomatoes At The Whistle Stop Cafe (pausing for contractions!). At 4am I went up to the spare room and managed a few hours' sleep in 10 minute snatches in between contractions. Then at 730am I rang my mum & asked her to come up from Wales to look after DD as the friends who were going to have her during my labour were away for the weekend. Things eased off a bit then so I had breakfast and went back to bed for a few hours. I also watched Home Birth Diaries which coincidentally had my midwife delivering the baby, which I took as a good sign!
I got up at 11am, rang the midwife and told her things might be happening today although not yet as the contractions weren't regular enough (!) and decided to have a bath, at which point things really stepped up a few gears. When I leapt out of the bath during a particularly painful contraction DH encouraged me to go downstairs to the birth pool and in retrospect it's a good job he did or the baby could've ended up being born on the toilet!
Once I was in the pool I realised that I could feel the baby's head with my hand and told DH he better get the midwife asap . Thankfully she arrived at 1220pm, 10 minutes before Jasper! My mum arrived 2 minutes after, when I was still in the pool with him attached by his cord. And DD woke from her nap another 10 mins after that, and came down to meet her baby brother as we were all drinking tea and eating tuna sandwiches.
At 7lb12oz Jasper was a good pound heavier that his sister but his entry to the world couldn't have been more different (she was forceps, stitches etc). So far he's been very placid in keeping with his smooth arrival, but we're reserving judgment on his long term character til we've spent a few more nights with him!
Sorry for the long ramble, but I'll be wanting to know the minutiae of everyone else on the April thread's births, so I thought I'd tell it all myself!