Kason Anthony Sloat

He is here! The long anticipated arrival of our first son came early Wednesday evening! Kason Anthony Sloat was born on July 30, 2008 at 5:30 pm. He weighed 7 lbs. 7 ozs. and was 22 inches long.

We went to the hospital at 12:30 on Wednesday to be induced because that Monday at my doctors appointment I was dilated to four and we decided it would be best to help move things along. When we got there they hooked me up to some monitors which showed that I was having regular contractions (about 5 minutes apart), but I wasn't feeling them. The doctor came in and broke my water at about 1:30 at which point we discovered I was dilated to a 6, but I still wasn't feeling the contractions. Its funny to note that about this time the nurse predicted, if everything went pretty fast, Kason would be born around nine or ten that night. They finally put in an IV and started the petocin medication which really got the ball rolling. I started felling the contractions at this point and they became stronger and stronger and was able to breath through a few, but I finally asked for an epidural and was promptly numbed up by the anesthesiologist. Shortly after this the nurse noticed that Kason's heart beat was dropping with my contractions instead of rising as it had been doing. She said this usually only happens once I am fully dilated and the baby has dropped into "ready to be pushed" position, but she couldn't imagine that had already happened, so she was a little nervous (they hadn't even called my doctor yet). She decided to check me and found out that I was indeed ready to push. She called my doctor, got the okay, and I began pushing at about 5:00 pm. Reed, my mom, and Becky were all in the room with me throughout the afternoon and stayed for the birth. Becky took pictures, my mom counted my pushing and Reed and one of the nurses held my legs. The doctor got there just in time and Kason was born at 5:30 pm. He swallowed a lot of amniotic fluid (which he was still choking on the next night) so they gave him some oxygen and whisked him away to be suctioned. Reed went with him to get shots and get cleaned up and brought him back happy and pink and ready to eat. We stayed two nights at the hospital and brought him home early Friday afternoon.

He is all arms and legs with long toes and fingers! He has his dad's height, cheeks, and brow, and his mom's chin and nose (we are still undecided on the eyes). He's been with us now for almost a week and is doing great! We are so happy to be parents. Reed is such a good dad and helps out a lot. He seems to have a strong paternal instinct that makes him an amazing help! Reed took his last final of his last semester as an undergraduate yesterday morning and is now carefree and ready to fully enjoy being a dad. He did go back to work last night and will work for the rest of this week. My mom is staying with me at nights (cooking dinner and helping with Kason while Reed is gone) for the rest of the week and then next week and the week after Reed is taking off of work and we will have fun being a family!