Bonne Anniversaire, Sophie!

7 years ago today my little sweetheart was born. We called her our "10 pound Valentine," because she weighed exactly 10 pounds, zero ounces.

We didn't know what sex our baby was, but we could only come up with girl names. Dave seemed to be stuck on "Emma" right away, but I was not convinced. It seemed like everyone was naming their baby Emma and so I kept suggesting other names, but to no avail.

Thankfully, the Saturday before the Wednesday she was born, something great happened. We had painted the baby's room yellow and were taking a break in the kitchen when Dave said, "What do you think of the name "Sophie"?

"I LOVE IT!" I practically shouted and could not express enough excitement over the fact he had realized that Emma would not be the name of one of our children. Good thing she was a girl!

The night before she was born, I went to "Girls Night Out" at the Cheesecake Factory with the ladies in my neighborhood. At one point toward the end of the evening I waddled to the bathroom and I overheard my friend who was a labor and delivery nurse say to another friend "she is DEFINITELY having that baby tomorrow." I was only 38 weeks, but I was definitely ready!

At 3 o'clock in the morning I thought I had a contraction. I wasn't sure, because with Abby, my water broke and then nothing happened for two hours. When it did, it was full flown, 2 minutes apart heavy contractions that ended in a c-section. This was definitely not that . . . but I hadn't slept well all night, so this was very exciting! I laid in bed for 20 minutes, feeling my skin stretch and back cramp before I jumped in the shower. I took my trusty Timex digital watch with me, and soon enough those contractions were 2 minutes apart.

When Dave came in because he heard the water, he said, "what's going on?". "I'm in labor!" I said, with total excitement that quickly turned to panic. This was starting to hurt! Luckily the hospital was literally two minutes away. I timed it on my Timex from the moment we left to driveway to the moment we hit the parking lot at Paradise Valley Hospital. It was 4 a.m.

Unfortunately the hospital was not ready for me. I thought for sure I had registered online, but they had no record of me. Is it really a good idea to ask a woman in labor to fill out some forms at the emergency room window? Luckily a nice intern came along and offered me a wheelchair and told me I could fill out the forms upstairs.

What was waiting upstairs was worse! A nurse just about to finish her shift was cranky and cross, threw one of those crazy gowns at me, "put this on" she barked. Too bad none of the snaps were done up, so I had no idea how to do that!! Sleeves? Not unless you create them by snapping all the snaps. Things looked up after the shift change, and at first check I was already 6 cm dilated. Hooray!

I had no idea what was in store for me after that. Abby's labor resulted in a c-section and I really didn't want to do that again. It seemed headed that way after an hour or so and she was in the same position as Abby. I had already said NO WAY to the forceps, but the doctor said there was no way she was coming out without some help. So she got out the "plunger." She told me she could only use it three times, and so I decided that on the third time I would not stop pushing until I had a baby.

After a push that seemed to last 2 minutes, literally everyone in the room was yelling at me to stop pushing because she was out. In her marked New York accent, my doctor said, "She's MASSIVE! I bet she weighs ten pounds." She was right! Ten pounds of angel that has gotten cuter and cuter every year since she was born!

We love you, Sophie!