ezekiel john

our new little man, ezekiel john, entered the real world on sunday july 19 at 6:04 am. words are hard to wrap around the experience of having a baby because i think it is a miracle on so many levels and this makes it beyond my imagination how everything is orchestrated to come together. having a baby is such a holy experience of seeing God's hand at work through the creation of this infant, to preparing me to give birth and bringing him into the world. like a friend shared the "40" weeks are God's special number of weeks where he shows himself and we learn about trust and his strength and timing. ezekiel is here (chrissy, joel and pamela win the prize for guessing his name). he is already bringing joy to our lives and making an impression in his own way as a tiny infant.

so his arrival story in short...i spent a lot of time on saturday with the boys while ryan finished some remodel projects. in the morning my friend taffy did a belly cast for me - about as close as you can get to the end. in the afternoon the boys and i went swimming with taffy and her boys. ryan was hard at work painting, putting in doors and finishing the molding & base boards. he did all the nesting work! we all took a break for pizza and then the boys and i went to a drive in movie night at our friends church. at the end of the movie i started feeling my "contractions" move lower. got home at 10 and let ryan know that labor might be starting. he had just finished all the projects and cleaning up - and kind of thought i was kidding. nope. we both tried to get a little sleep -although mine was a bit restless. you know at the end of pregnancy the day will come but it still feels unexpected in many ways and just surreal that you are about to meet your baby. At 2 am I woke up feeling like a couple contractions were actually starting to hurt a bit and we called our doula again to let her know she could come over. last time i went into labor i was in denial at how fast it was going, so having processed that experience, i knew i needed to leave for the hospital a little earlier this time...so we left at 2:45 and you probably would have thought it was too soon (ryan did) but when we got to the hospital we checked in and i was already 6/7 cm dilated. so i of course threw the nurse off her routine when i told her i didn't want an iv or a hep lock - she hesitated but in the end we all got on the same page with the no meds and just having a baby through relaxation. not that contractions don't hurt, they do but we have decided that no meds works well for us and the pain is actually fruitful in the end. :) so we labored for almost 3 hours in the hospital, standing and then finally at the end laying down. ryan was able to deliver ezekiel with the dr. standing by after i pushed for 7 minutes. he arrived with a little cry and is doing amazing. he was 8 lbs. 13 oz and 20.5 inches.

malachi and abram are adoring big brothers. abram in particular loves babies and the minute he held ezekiel was "talking" with him. we are thankful for their transition so far and anticipate the honeymoon stage wearing off after a week... ryan has been home all week with and he and the older boys have had some fun bonding time while ezekiel and i hang out. our friends are bringing delicious meals each night and we feel so loved and taken care of!!

incredible to be parents of 3 boys - we feel overwhelmed with blessing. i was reading Psalm 8 in the Message and this is what it says, very fitting for our life:

God, brilliant Lord,
yours is a household name.
Nursing infants gurgle choruses about you;
toddlers shout the songs
That drown out enemy talk,
and silence atheist babble.
I look up at your macro-skies, dark and enormous
your handmade sky jewelry,
Moon and stars mounted in their settings.
Then I look at my micro-self and wonder,
Why do you bother with us?
Why take a second look our way?
Yet we've so narrowly missed being gods,
bright with Eden's dawn light.
You put us in charge of your handcrafted world,
repeated to us you Genesis-charge,
Made us lords of sheep and cattle,
even animals out in the wild,
Birds flying and fish swimming,
whales singing in the ocean deeps.

God, brilliant Lord,
your name echoes around the world.

click on the photo below to see the photo album

ezekiel john's arrival