So, it was a different Dr. who was on call for the day (which I was very sad about, because I love my Dr). The Dr. who was on call that day was delivering a different baby at a different hospital when I was ready to deliver, so she called MY Dr (hooray!) who raced over to the hospital.
My nurses got the room all set up for the delivery (it was really such a quiet day until this point, and then it seemed a little hectic when everyone was getting out all of the machines and what not). My Dr. hurried into the room and asked me if I could feel my contractions. I told her no, so the Dr./nurses had to watch the monitor to see when I was starting a contraction and they would tell me to push. Well, on my first push my Dr. stopped me because my water hadn't broken yet. (If one of my Dr.'s had been available earlier in the day to break my water, I probably would have had Kallie about 4 hours earlier.) So my Dr. broke my water, and I continued to push. After the first time I pushed, my Dr. told me I was doing really well and that if I could continue to push like that, that the baby would be out in about 10 minutes. That was really encouraging to me, so I did my best to keep pushing like I was.
After only 20 minutes of pushing, Kallie was here! I had warned the nurses that I was an emotional person and would likely cry, but I guess my Dr. was not in the room when I gave that warning. So I started crying, and my Dr. asked me what was wrong! Ha ha, so I told her that I was just so excited to have Kallie here. I dismissed Mike from my side so he could go see the baby and take pictures (I was surprised and...honored (?) that he didn't rush away from my side the second she was born). Here is the first picture we have of our sweet little girl (she's already kind of smiling!):
Getting weighed: 6 pounds 4 ounces (she does not like to be cold, so she was not very happy that they took off her warm blanket to put her on the scale)
Getting all cleaned up while holding Dad's hand:
First family photo:
One happy Daddy:
I love my sweet little girl:
There wasn't a room available in postpartum right away (since they had had so many deliveries in the last couple of days), so we got to stay in our delivery room for a while and just admire our new little angel. We made some phone calls, sent some text messages, Skyped with our families, etc.
After about an hour or so, they were able to move us up to the postpartum floor. That night, our friends Michael and Heather Carlson came to visit:
We had a pretty good first night at the hospital. I felt so bad for Mike, his little couch/bed was not very comfortable, and he didn't sleep well through Kallie's noises and crying (which has changed now, he sleeps through that almost every night now). I finally let the nurses take Kallie into the nursery so that we could try and sleep better (I didn't really sleep any better, I was too excited to see Kallie again! I would wake up and look at the clock and wonder when they were going to bring her back in to me to be fed).
The next day we had fun holding our new little girl and taking pictures of her:
(This little hat was so cute. They had the regular hat, then they made a couple of cuts to the front/fold part, and slid a second hat through the slits to make a bow!)
We also had some more visitors. The Beck's came to visit:
Brittany, Camille, and Brittany came to visit as well:
That night, I let the nurses take Kallie to the nursery again (if it had been up to me, I think I would have just kept her in our room all the time so I could look at her :) but Mike convinced me we should try to sleep). I woke up after she had been gone for 3 hours and just waited there, expecting Kallie to be back any second (since newborns are supposed to eat every 3 hours and all), but she never came. So I gave the nurses station a call after 4 hours and they told me she was asleep in the swing, and so they were going to let her continue sleeping and they would bring her back once she was awake. So I tried to get more sleep, but I couldn't help but think my poor little girl was starving, so I laid there and after another hour, gave them a call again. She was STILL asleep! It had been 5 hours since I fed her last, so I told them I thought I should feed her again. She must have gotten the Merkley sleeping genes (hooray!).
We had one more afternoon in the hospital, because they usually don't discharge you until 48 hours after the baby is born. So my friend Amber came to visit (I forgot to take a picture!) and we just relaxed and watched some football while the baby slept, and got some good pictures:
(GAME DAY!)
Before we could go home, they took Kallie and ran some final tests (she was just under the "limit" to have to bring her back to the hospital for jaundice treatments), and they brought her back to us and told us we could take her home! It was BYU Game Day, so we had to get a picture in our Game Day apparel:
She looks so tiny in her carseat:
We were so excited to be taking our new little baby girl home! Of course Mike had to joke around that he was surprised that they would let us take this baby home with us. He also teased the nurse who took us out to our car about "well, I guess there are no returns, huh?" and so she told him that if we were going to make a return to be sure to bring her back to that hospital so they could take care of her and find her a good home.....oh Mike! I guess our day can't be complete without a good joke from Mike! We certainly would never "return" her, she has been such a joy to have in our lives! She is such a sweet little angel!
I love this picture, because it reminds me of cooking with my parent when I was growing up. My Mom taught her kids how to count by having us count the cups of flour that she put into the bread; and we loved the times when my Dad would make cookies with us (usually when my Mom would go to a Relief Society activity or something). It's so fun making these memories with my little Kallie!
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