She's here!

First, the facts: Tessa Winn was born Sept 16 at 7:35 am. She weighed 7 pounds, 7 ounces and was a lengthy 22 inches. Wanna hear the story? Everyone wants to hear the story. Don't hate me when you hear the story.
As has been discussed, she was due last Friday the 13th. At my doctors appointment that afternoon the doc said she was low and ready, I just needed some contractions to get things started. So he checked his schedule and I was booked to be induced early Tuesday morning. I was glad he picked the date because I didn't like the idea of choosing her birthday.

40 weeks and 1 day, in what I sincerely hoped was the last belly pic

Apparently she agreed with me, because at 5am Monday morning I started having some new pains. Not too bad, but irritating. By 6am I went downstairs and told Josh (who was getting ready for work) that maybe there was possibly a chance that I might be in labor. Called mom and asked if she would come out. Told her it wasn't a huge rush but after dinner like originally planned wasn't going to be soon enough. About 25 minutes later I called her back and told her to speed. By the time she got here the bag was in the car and I was pacing the driveway. Josh was kind and turned the 25 minute ride to the hospital into about a 15 minute one. I think I was already in the emergency doors before he even parked the car. They sent me upstairs and offered me a wheelchair but I was already in the elevator and not slowing down. Went to the exam room, spent what I thought was a good 20 minutes in there but Josh assures me was much closer to 5. Hurried to the closest L&D room while nurses were calling questions out at me. I think they snagged the first doc they saw walk by (who happily was one of the ones I really like from the practice I go to) and about 30 minutes after we pulled up to the hospital doors our daughter was born. The speed meant no drugs, which the nurse later told me she pretended not to hear me ask the second or third time because she felt bad telling me it was too late. But, she's here, we're good, so it all worked out.

Monday's Child is Fair of Face... =)

It only took us about 13 hours to name her (Luca was "Baby boy" for a full 24 hours). We would settle on a name, sit with it for a little and decide maybe not. And then we'd do that again. But finally, Tessa Winn. Tessa, depending on where you look on the internet, is either a variant of Teresa meaning harvester, or of Italian origin meaning countess. We like that one =) Or, it's from the greek word for Four and related to tessera and tessellation. Which if she gets some recessive genes and is good at math, she will like. The internet also just informed me it is "Asset" backwards, which is interesting. Winn is my mom's maiden name. With her 4 sisters, and all their girl children and grand children, being a Winn Girl has always been a part of me. I share my name with my grandma, and now my daughter shares her name with the whole crowd. =)

Also, the picture of Tessa was taken by Bella Baby in the hospital. We now own the copyright release on all the images from her shoot. You can see the pictures by going to www.bellababyphotography.com and entering the access code kwar0917Karlson into the box on the right side of the screen. If there are any you want prints of, let me know and I can make them. Or, alternately and more realistically, let my mom know. She's way better at following through on that stuff than I am. They will host the pictures for 2 weeks, but we have them forever. So really, let mom or me know if you want prints.