Welcome baby Allison!

So yesterday was the big day. Miss Allison Renee joined our family and big sister Hannah couldn't be more thrilled. She was born at 3:39 PM, weighing 8lbs 1 oz, 20 inches long. She's chubby and already has a double chin! We originally picked the name Allison because we liked it, but it seems to pretty fitting. It is a variation of the name Alice, which means noble...but we'll get to that part of the story later.

Labor and delivery went great. I thought Hannah came fast, and this one about cut Hannah's time in half. I'm feeling great, which has been nice!

Here are a few pictures of the new little one. Hannah LOVES her new baby. Right away she got excited about the baby and wanted to hold her. The only problem was that she didn't want to let little Allison go. So if you want to hold the new baby, you have to hold her big sister, too. Hannah ended up falling asleep in daddy's arms while holding her new baby...that's probably the only way we got her out of the hospital without throwing a fit!

So although mom is doing great, Allison has had a little bit harder time of things. It started off that when my water broke it was meconium stained...which is a sign of stress in the baby and can become an issue if the baby gets it into their lungs. So right after she was born they took her away from me :( to run a bunch of tests which all came back fine. So after a few hours she finally came back to our room, and miss Hannah came to visit. A few hours later they took her to give her a bath and the nurse thought she was looking pale and that she heard a slight heart murmur. Her blood oxygen levels were low, and would come up only when she was given extra oxygen. So they called the doctor back, and she called the specialists in Des Moines and they decided that she needed to been seen by a specialist (not available in Carroll, IA.) So a busy afternoon turned into a long evening while they poked and prodded at little Allison and waited for the Life Flight helicopter to come and take her away. Around midnight she took her first helicopter flight down to Des Moines and is now at the children's hospital there. She seems to be doing well, and is needing less oxygen this morning. At this point they are not sure why she is having trouble...possibly and infection, fluid in her lungs, her heart murmur, or a combination a everything. Hopefully all she needs is a little extra time, and so far that looks to be the case. Luckily since things went so well for me, they are letting me go today, so by this afternoon we will be in Des Moines with Allison and then hopefully headed back to Carroll in just a few days!

All of this has been a little overwhelming and fast paced, but Allison is headed in the right direction and we will get to see her again shortly! Hopefully we have just been extra cautious...better safe than sorry! We will keep you all posted with updates when we know more.