Seattle with a Chance of Sun

What is it that comes to mind on a sunny day in late March? Anything? Well if you've frequented the University of Washington campus for a combined thirteen years like Bri and Ben or if you're Japanese, you're thinking Get the kids! Cherry Blossoms! Now!

That's right, for a few weeks in late march - early April the cherries on the quad are in bloom. Mix that short window with Seattle weather, and you have a total of about 50 hours of quality photograph time a year. So when the skies opened yesterday the Wilsons were scrambling for the camera and getting the girls into dresses. We reached the quad about half-an-hour after the clouds parted (about a ten minute walk from our apartment). It was still relatively empty but Japanese Seattlites were already pouring in from all entrances. Kids were being placed in trees and couples were posing in the blossoms. The best photo spots soon formed lines. Our first goal was a repeat of Ginny's baby pictures from two years ago with Violet. Can you tell which is which? Neither one looks too happy to be there...

Ginny 4 days old, Violet 5 days old, Same tree Next it was time to get cute family shots and let Ginny run around. Luckily Japanese are good photographers. We stayed for about twenty minutes then headed out as the clouds moved in again. The people we passed coming in on our way out were already too late. We thought it was funny how many people saw the sun and made a b-line for the quad like us. Here are some parting shots.

Ginny Breaks loose across the Quad, still just beginning to fill
Mom and Violet
Dad and Ginny

The Family

Baby Sister Arrives

After 49 rib kicks, 31 pre-labor contractions, 64,451 extra calories in Bri's diet, and 6 days 7 hours and 7 minutes past due, Baby Sister made her long anticipated debut in the Wilson Family. The short story:

+Everything went well

+Mother and baby are recovering nicely

+baby weighed 9 pounds - 5 ounces

+Name: Violet Iris Wilson

Now for all of you delivery junkies who love the gory details, this is how it all went down...

Sunday 3:50pm: Bri heads to the kitchen during a game of Monopoly for a slice of Cindy's cake. She chokes on a bite, starts coughing, and her water breaks. Plans are made and Bri and Ben head to Swedish, arriving sometime around 5:00pm.

7:00pm: After having to wait in line to enter delivery triage, being hooked up to monitors for two hours, and numerous not-so-glamorous tests its what we thought. The doctors don't believe that Bri's water broke because she's not having contractions. This happened with Ginny too. At that time we finally convinced them after two hours by showing them the puddle on the bed that Bri was sitting on. But there's no puddle this time. Not wanting to send us home they tell us to walk around for an hour to try and start contractions. Still nothing. Finally the fact that Bri is already dilated 5cm compels them to admit us. We reach the birthing suite at 9:00pm.

Monday 1:30am: After a whole lot of deliberating by nurses to see if Bri will start contractions on her own and receiving some antibiotics Bri is FINALLY induced (note: 9 hours after the hospital was first contacted!). Contractions start around 2am, an epidural is received at around 4am.

With the epidural doing it's thing, the mood is light in the birthing sweet as Ben's sister-in-law Ashley arrives around 5:30am. Bri has reached 10cm and we're lettin' the contractions do their thing before Bri starts pushing. The pushing starts at about 6:30. Bri has been taken off of pitocin so her contractions are about 5 minutes apart. Bri is in such a good mood and the pace is so leasurely that we actually miss pushing on a few contractions because we're shooting the breeze with the doctor and nurses. It only takes 30 minutes or about 7 contractions worth of pushing to get the baby out. Compare this to the 90 minutes and about 45 contractions with Ginny.

The baby arrives at 7:07am and the scale reads 9 pounds-4.8 ounces. A sharp increase over Ginny's 7-12. Imagine if they had let Bri go longer. Baby-Sister looks just like Ginny did only a bit chunkier. After more than 24 hours of deliberation the name Violet Iris sticks. It was hard because she looked so much like Ginny that it was hard to come up with an original name. Enjoy the pics and footage and thank you to all the helpers and well-wishers!

Bri able to enjoy Baby Sister's first moments thanks to an awesome epidural

Baby Sister chills out after the post-delivery trauma. What a cutey!

Ginny meets Baby Sister

The Bunny Cometh

Spring has sprung, the grass has riz. The Easter Bunny made his annual visit to the Wilson home one day early, per the parents' request. In case you're wondering, no baby yet; four days passed due and counting. Here is some footage of Ginny finding the eggs. Note her correct color identification (orange and blue). It has been a lot of work but she now doesn't call every color blue.

Afterwards Ginny enjoyed the spoils of victory. Here are some photos.

Ginny collecting eggs.

Ginny munching some treats.

Happy Easter!

Ginny Update

It is amazing to me how creative little kids are. I didnt know they were so smart. Here is a video of Ginny being a horse and one of her and her best friend Riley playing "Ring Around the Rosie." Enjoy!

Also for your viewing enjoyment, can you tell who is who? There is one of Ginny, one of Me and one of my sister Lily. All in the same outfit!