welcome baby Colin - the story of how i spent my memorial day weekend.

following the Murphy's law, labor began on Saturday after we had stocked up for our holiday weekend, hamburger patties, buns, a watermelon, etc.  i felt contractions starting at about 11am, so of course I cleaned the house, took a shower, got dressed, went to Target, got a few last minute essentials, and generally freaked Jason out.  by 4 or 5 the contractions started to be less than 5 minutes apart.  now, i didn't feel ready to go to the hospital, but Avery came so quickly we were both afraid of having this baby at home.  so we started getting the girls squared away.  by 7 we were in triage, being told I may have to go home.  lucky for me, the nurse was a mother of 4 and got my drift on why i thought i should stay.  by 11 I was officially admitted, and after a rough "event" with the epidural, our SON was born at 1:56 am, Sunday, May 29th.  he was just one day shy of his due date.  (though the Dr. thinks he may have been a week or so over actually)

 needless to say, we were SHOCKED to actually have a boy.  of course we knew it was a possibility, it just didn't seem like it would really happen.  everyone was excited to see how much he weighed because clearly he was a big boy.  9lbs, 10oz, 23.8 inches long!  a whopper!

 he had come too fast for me to get a full round of antibiotics before he was born, so he had to be in the nursery to get an iv for the first day.  once i got him back, i couldn't take my eyes off him!

 the girls were over the moon excited.  i told my parents they could tell them what we had, but Jason said they were so excited he wanted to wait until they came to the hospital!  they were over the moon.  i know they would have been just as excited for a girl, but a BOY, we were all blown away. 

our first family photo:

 we were showered with family, gifts and flowers.

 then came the naming process.  by now we have realized that we have to spend time getting to know our infants before we can name them.  so, we came to the table with basically nothing.  that is except the fact that for over a year the girls have been talking about their baby brother "Colin".  last march while we were on vacation, they literally drew hundreds of pictures of our family, including a baby boy named Colin.  we thought nothing of it.  we set out to think of some names, we even liked a few.  but when it came down to it, we realized the girls had named this baby a long time ago.  once we submitted to the obvious, it felt great. 

Colin Beardsley Earl!

 this baby is almost never put down on his own, he is held around the clock!

we adore you baby Colin, welcome to the family!!!