Evie Jean Grossnickle

Our sweet baby girl, Evie Jean, was born on her due date at home, February 14th 2015 at 8:03pm. She weighs 7lbs 4 oz. and measures 20'' long.

It was a long day. The days leading up to my due date, I would get a couple moments of cramping, but nothing that stayed consistent. I woke up to contractions about 5 minutes apart and started to time them shortly after that. Around 9am I knew today was the day. I texted my midwife to tell her what was going on and informed friends and family the day had finally come. Because we had the flu sweep our house days before, I had to find someone who already had the flu, watch Brody and Laeunabelle so we wouldn't infect any other families. Sarah and Stuart were willing to help, and came to pick them up after Leelu woke from her nap. My Mom and sister Cassie came shortly after Ellie and Jasmine around 12:30. Once everyone was there and the kids were gone, things started to slow down. My contractions were less frequent going from 3-5 minutes apart, to about 9 minutes apart. I think I was getting performance anxiety because of all the people now waiting on me. With my last labor, I did most of the laboring alone and progressed fairly quickly that way. In efforts to start over, Tim and I tried to take a nap since laying down is what started the contractions before. We sent my Mom and my sister home till I got closer, since it was a longer ways off than I was expecting. Ellie gave me some cotton root bark to help bring on the contractions as well as using the breast pump for a few minutes and rubbing Clary sage oil on my abdomen and ankles. That started to get things going again, bringing my contractions back to 3-5 minutes apart lasting about a minute each. At this point, I hadn't been checked to see how far along I was, so at about 5pm Ellie checked me and I was at 6cm. Yay, we were getting somewhere! I was having a hard time being patient. I tried different positions, but the most comfortable was sitting on the exercise ball. Evie was in prime position and couldn't descend any further down, her head was right there, my cervix just needed to get out of the way. I was being very impatient the whole time. I had another dose of the cotton root bark. We all watched one of the most beautiful sunsets we've had all year. At about 6:20, I was at 8cm and the contractions were getting a little more intense. I took frequent trips to the bathroom, each time bringing on at least two contractions. My mom and sister were back at this point, but stayed out in the living room. Finally, during my last trip to the bathroom, my water broke which took me by surprise, and I knew I needed to get off that toilet now. I started to walk out of the bathroom and immediately had to throw up. The toilet was now too far away so into the shower I went. At this point, I knew I wasn't going to make it any further and the baby was going to be born here. We have a teak wood bench where I rested my arms, knelt on the tile and started to push. It all was happening too fast and very intensely. She was immediately crowning and out in a minute. The pain caught me off gaurd and it was hard to keep my cool and focus. Both Ellie and Tim caught her as Tim exclaimed "It's a girl!". She came out with her hand by her face, the cord pinning it under her chin and twice more around her neck. I was in shock, and couldn't hold her for a few minutes. I felt like I couldn't move, which was fine because they had to untangle her anyway. I got the shakes as I stood up and turned to sit down and deliver the placenta. She was so beautiful and tiny, despite the bruising on her face from the speed of the delivery. I got her to latch on for a little bit before I took a shower and the after pains kicked in. Ellie helped push out the clots, which hurt quite a bit but was necessary. Evie makes the cutest little noises and has already made our family so happy. Brody and Laeunabelle came home this morning and were so happy to see her and comment on all her little features. Brody wanted to see her feet, He looked at her toes and said "oh look at her big toe, it's so little". They both love looking at her and touching her gently. She has got some great older siblings. When I asked Brody what Evie's second name should be he said "hm....Evie.........Cute." 
We love our new addition.