On Christmas Eve Jude Keith Jarman was born. He was a bit unexpected because my due date was Jan. 7th, but he was coming whether we liked it or not. I waited a really long time to go to the hhospital. I really didn't want to go on Christmas Eve, so I was hoping the contractions would just go away. Of course they didn't. So as I was having contractions I was getting last minute Christmas stuff done, doing the dishes, etc. Then I finally decided we needed to go soon. The plan was to drive the girls out to my parent's house, since we were planning on spending the evening there, and then going to the hospital when we needed to. We never got to my parent's. Almost as soon as we got in the car my contractions jumped to three minutes apart and got very painful. We eneded up going to the hospital and having my parents pick the girls up there. We got to the entrance of the hospital and I somehow walked in there while Will carried both girls (they had no shoes on and were desperately in need of a bath). They got me up to a room very quickly when they learned that it was my third kid, and when they checked me I was dilated to 7 1/2 cm. They asked if I wanted an epidural, I said yes, and they told me the anesthesiologist was 20 minutes away. Luckily she was in the hospital already and could come right away or else I would not have gotten the epidural. I was very grateful for it at that point. Jude was born about 2 1/2 hours after I arrived at the hospital. It was pretty quick and easy. He weighed 8 lbs. 7 oz. and was perfect in every way. One of the nurses came in after he was born and sang and played "Silent Night" on her guitar. It was really cool, and it was a great experience altogether.

The girls had an unconventional Christmas since Santa decided to deliver all the presents to the hospital. I think they were okay with it. Except Opal was convinced that Santa was still coming the next day, no matter how much we told her that Christmas was over. All in all we were so grateful for a wonderful, perfect, healthy baby boy, that it didn't matter what day he came. We love him so much and it really seems like he has been here forever and was always meant to be with us. I will try to get more recent pics on here soon.

I know this post is super long and boring, but it is mostly for my own records. So I don't forget the details.