Riley arrives

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Around 8:00 on Friday night, while we were having dinner at home, Laura’s water broke.  We were sort of surprised; this was the first sign we had that
she was going into labor.  While we gathered our stuff and headed to the hospital, she started getting more painful contractions. They got stronger over the next couple of hours, while we got checked in, evaluated, and finally moved into a birthing suite.

Laura got an epidural at around 11:00 pm, which made a world of difference.  Sometime around 1:00 am, things got to the point where she could start actively pushing.  She was amazing.  At 1:33 Saturday morning, our baby was born.  He weighed 7 lbs 3 oz, and was 19.5 inches long.

I will never forget how it felt to see him for the first time.  Nor will I ever be able to describe it adequately.  I was just overcome with joy and excitement.

It took us a couple of days to settle finally on his name, but we’re calling him Riley.  There are a few photos here. I’ll add more there soon. It’s hard to catch him when he’s not sleeping or eating, but now that we’re home we’ll hopefully have better luck with the photo ops.

Everyone’s doing fine.  Laura’s pretty tired, but feeling better each day.  Riley’s eating well, and is in good shape all around.  I’m very proud of them both — much more than I feel like I deserve to be, given that I was basically a spectator for the whole thing. :)  But I’m doing what I can to keep him settled between feedings so that Laura can sleep then.

We’re both very grateful to have Laura’s mom staying with us for a while.  Without her help we would probably have left our wits’ ends far behind by now.  Instead, we get to focus on the baby and eat very well. :)

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Well, it’s a good thing my LiveJournal isn’t a potted plant.

There’ve been some pretty major events since my last update:

  1. We had a second ultrasound and discovered that we’re having a boy. All his digits and such are accounted for, and developmentally he’s on target for his age. (I put a few scans here.)
  2. We flew out to Missouri for a few days to visit my family. We had lots of fun, especially with my little nephews. They also gave us a baby shower. Little by little the baby’s room is starting to take shape. We still have a lot to do, though.
  3. I got laid off. It was kind of a surprise, since it was unrelated to my job performance, but I think in the long run it’ll end up being good for me. I had been with the same company for kind of a long time by software industry standards. Now I’m interviewing again for the first time in eight and a half years, oh joy. I had been using their laptop as my main computer, so I was offline for a while getting my old one upgraded (then for another while, because we painted the little home office room).

Now we’re going to see a twilight showing of the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. The commercials on television have me salivating. I’m leaving all my fanboy expectations behind and giving it a clean slate. I expect I’ll have some things to say about it later.

Experts predict youthful shift in Bryceland demographics.

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At this point it’s pretty safe to announce that my wife Laura and I are expecting a baby. Now I know how some of you feel about kids, so don’t feel like you have to gush enthusiasm, but I am very happy about this.

The due date is August 20; we’re at eleven weeks now. We had an ultrasound a little over a week ago. It was still too early to determine a gender or anything, but it was really amazing to see the little arms and legs moving around in real time. (I scanned the still images they gave us and put them here.)

We’ve known for about a month and a half. In some ways, it’s still sinking in.