Our little bundle made her peaceful debut on Friday afternoon.  

Leslie was due on June 3rd, and Tyler’s parents were able to be in town for a few days last week, so we were getting a bit impatient when baby hadn’t arrived.  I started googling old wive’s tale suggestions for convincing baby to get a move on.  Caster oil was out of the picture, but might I recommend spicy eggplant curry? 

For those familiar with my past births (i.e., Whitney’s) you might appreciate that I didn’t try to beat my “20 minutes in the hospital before baby arrives” record, but in fact intentionally got to the hospital way early and took my precious time, delivering five hours later.  I wanted to not be rushed and I wanted to have the feedback of hospital checks to know progress, which I hadn’t had before.  This is also the first time that instead of hiring a Doula I had Tyler be my right-hand Doula-Man.  I truly appreciated his encouragement and support, and I was able to just focus on what I wanted and needed to do throughout the day.  I will admit I missed walking the neighborhood (much more interesting than the hospital halls) and I would have preferred my own bed to the plasticky hospital one, but in all, I’m happy with how it all went down.  

Here’s a few from the little Miss’ first days…          Dylan has had lots of questions leading up to baby’s arrival (What will our baby do? Will it throw food on the floor?). It’s taking a while for him to call her his baby sister or “our baby” instead of “your baby” (to me).  He’s not sure about holding her or touching her yet, but he seems eager to learn about her and help.       Whitney is quite interested in her baby sister, but also seems hesitant or almost shy around her, as if she’s surprised this little doll actually moves and cries.  She’ll look closely at the baby and then tuck her head to the side scrunching away.   The name Leslie is one that has been a favorite of Tyler’s for a while.  The name origin is Scottish and has a garden connotation which we both like. Maybe someday we’ll take her to 14th Century Leslie Castle in Scotland.  Her middle name is Nicola (means “victorious”), in honor of Tyler’s brother Nicholas, who passed away this past November, and who we were out visiting in the late summer/fall when we got pregnant.  Nicola is also a nod to Nikola Tesla, a brilliant inventor/futurist who has always inspired both brothers.

Sweet Leslie gets cuter each day, my parents and sister have been super star helpful with Whitney and Dylan so we’ve gotten a bit of focused time to back to the newborn groove (it seems like so long ago we were doing this with Dylan!!).   

The little glow worm needed some photo therapy to help with the bilirubin counts (all my babies have been slightly jaundiced).    So tiny in her car seat!  Ready to head home.    Whitney has been extra attentive to her baby dolls, which has been really cute. It took her a few days to answer that our new baby was a sister named Leslie…she kept insisting she has a baby brother named Alex.     We sang and ate cake to celebrate our third baby on her third day when we were all home together.  Welcome to the world, sweet Leslie Nicola, you are already so loved.