Protective Coloration

Christmas on the Beach

These are a couple of shots taken at Carolina Beach where we spent Christmas with the Phelps family. There's just something about beach pictures.

Flying!!!

I just love the way this picture turned out!

Can You Tell Which is Which?

When Benjamin was first born, I thought he looked just like Jacob as a newborn. But after looking at their pictures side-by-side, I'm not so sure. What do you think? The two pictures just above are Jacob and Benjamin on the day they were born. The other two are when they are a couple of weeks old.

First and Second Christmas

Jacob vs. The Ball Pit

For Christmas, Jacob's Aunt Kelly and Uncle Ian gave him this inflatable ball pit. We figured he'd love it, but his enthusiasm exceeded even our expectations!

Introducing Benjamin Walker Phelps!!

I am finally getting around to updating our blog!! Benjamin Walker Phelps was born on November 15, 2008 at 3:27 am. The above picture was taken a few hours before we went to the hospital. I had been having contractions all day the day before, but they were inconsistent until that evening. We had plans to go out to dinner that night and I seriously considered cancelling, but the contractions still weren't close enough together, so I figured I may as well go out instead of sitting at home. At our childbirth education refresher course, they told us not to go to the hospital until our contractions were 3-5 minutes apart. So we kept timing all evening until about 1:30 am when they hit 5-6 minutes apart. Finally I decided we needed to call our friend to come over and watch Jacob and we headed to the hospital. At that point, I was REALLY looking forward to getting an epidural. We got to the hospital about 2:30am. They put us in a room to wait for a nurse to check me and I started getting really desperate for drugs. The pain was terrible. I kept begging DJ to go grab someone to give me epidural, but of course he couldn't do anything. That didn't stop me from getting mad at him for NOT doing anything! Finally, a nurse came in and checked me and I was six centimeters. I was excited that I was finally going to get something for the pain, but she cautioned me that there may not be time. I ignored this last part and held onto the hope that my suffering would be over soon. Which it was, but not before things got a lot worse. They took me into labor and delivery and DJ could tell by the way everyone was rushing around that I was probably NOT going to get an epidural. I was oblivious of course. They weren't even sure the doctor was going to get there in time. The whole time I kept asking when I was going to get the stinking epidural and the nurses were strangely non-committal. When they had an ETA for the doctor, they excitedly told me that as soon as he arrived, I could start pushing. This statement was missing a vital piece of information, mainly, "WHERE WAS THE ANESTHESIOLOGIST??!!" But Benjamin was coming and there was no time for anything but pushing. I think I pushed about four times and he was there. I couldn't believe it. A friend of mine who had a similar experience described it this way, "Hell momentarily engulfed the room. But it didn't last." I think that about sums it up. He weighed 7lbs 4 oz and was 21 inches long. And he is one of a VERY small percentage of babies (3%) who actually arrived on his due date. He's a great baby and we are very thankful.