Welcome to the World

So it's taken me a few days, but I'm finally posting about about Ryan's debut.

First, the stats:

Born on November 9, 2009 at 2:19 p.m.
7lbs 2 oz.

20 in.

Perfect

We went to the hospital Sunday evening at 5:30 for my induction. It was a long night, but my contractions started around 2 am. We had a bit of scare because our baby's heart rate kept dropping. To take some stress off of him, they gave me an epidural quite early, which made the whole labor much more bearable for me, but didn't have the desired effect for baby. For most of the day I had to stay on my left side because that's the only position that kept baby's heart rate at a constant and safe level. Because of his low heart rate, the doctor was anxious to make the pushing phase as short as possible so they used a suction cup on his head and I pushed even in between contractions. Overall, it was less than 15 minutes, but then Ryan Wheeler Shaw decided to enter the world. It took a little while to get him breathing, but since then, he's been doing just fine. We are so happy to have this beautiful baby boy.

Today was his first doctor's visit and only 4 short days after his birth, Ryan is almost back to his birth weight. Everything is looking really good and we are so happy to have a healthy baby. He's very good at sleeping during the day, and even better and staying awake at night. Both Mom and Dad have had a few long nights and are hoping that Ryan will soon get his days and nights figured out.

Getting closer

We had an appointment with a doctor this week and scheduled our induction for Sunday evening, meaning that we should probably have this little boy sometime Monday. Our due date is Saturday and I doubt he is going to be here by then. Our doctor doesn't want us to go over a week past our due date, but he only does inductions on Monday and Tuesday, so we get to meet this little boy sooner than I expected.

We are very excited and very nervous. We will be sure to post pictures so keep an eye out for them.