New Baby

Surprise, Mom: It's a girl!

At 7:42 p.m. on March 29, 2002, we welcomed our new baby into the world. All mouths hung open as we discovered that the little critter -- which an ultrasound had "conclusively shown" to be another boy -- turned out to be a girl. Looks like the baby's official due date (April 1) turned out to be appropriate. As it is, she was born on her uncle Joe's birthday.

It was an evening of surprises. We had decided to have Melanie induced out of fear that this would be another monster child, perhaps even bigger than Nathan's 9 pounds, 13 ounces. The hospital called us just after lunch to tell us that a room was available, so we quickly packed up and went. The petosin began pumping at about 1:45, and Melanie began feeling regular contractions at 2:15. But not much changed over the next several hours, while we waited for the doctor to come and break her water.

Once that happened, at about 5:30, things sped up considerably. Melanie got an epidural soon after the water broke. She was dilated to 5 centimeters at around 6:30. At 7:30, she began to feel extreme discomfort, very different from the labor she had been having. The nurse checked, and discovered that the kid was on its way. The doctor was summoned, and thankfully came quickly. Four pushes and the head was through.

Everyone remarked about how beautiful "he" looked. Then the doctor held the baby up and we realized it was a beautiful girl. We were flabbergasted. In addition, she weighed in at a relatively puny 8 pounds. Here are all of the pertinent stats:

• Date: Friday, March 29, 2002.
• Time: 7:42 p.m.
• Location: Logan Regional Medical Center, Logan, Utah
• Weight: 8 pounds, 0.6 ounces
• Length: 19-1/2 inches
• Gender: Female

Both Mom and the baby are doing great. We still have no name for this little surprise. You can view a gallery of pictures on our New Baby page.

What's New?

Everything's new! Pretty much everything in my life has changed in some way in the past few months. If you haven't checked in recently, you'll want to read all about my departure from the Braun gulag. Now that that nightmare is over, things are going great. Here are a few examples:

Read about my new job:

Read about my new quartet:

Read about my new chorus:

See pictures of the kids: