Isabella Ruth

We are blessed indeed to welcome

Isabella Ruth Di Silvestri

February 22, 2007, 3:21pm

7lbs 13oz, 20"

So many of you have been praying for her healthy arrival, and we thank you very much! We needed these prayers to get us through a long and sometimes scary pregnancy and labor. We are richly blessed in family and friends, and I have never been more aware and grateful for this than now.

Isabella (we will likely call her Izzie--my maiden name is Izzi--but have also been calling her Bella and Isabella, so who knows how it will ultimately shake out) was not ready to come when the doctors were ready to have her. Two days of attempted induction via multiple treatments of Cervadil and Pitocin netted no change whatsoever (except some painful yet completely unproductive contractions). Just a few hours before the c-section deadline, and long after all medicine had been abandoned and I had been officially removed from the "laboring" board, my body decided to begin contracting for real and it went really fast from there, thank goodness, just a few hours.

This experience was such a shock to us, as we had become used to 4-6 hour labors with our last several babies and expected more of the same. The team of grandparents who, with little warning, had to abandon their own lives and take on four days of managing our household, puppy and all, are nothing short of heroic. To add to it all, three of our kids became sick and required trips to the urgent care in our absence. Two kids ended up on antibiotics and only one regularly went to school, so they really had their hands full! We are so, so blessed to have all of the grandparents, near and far. We really feel your love and support, each one of you.

A few more photos, just for fun...

Isabella's first look at the world:

Mom, delighted to be leaving (and feeling deceptively thin, too!):

Dad, the closest he will ever come to experiencing pregnancy himself:

Thank you again for your prayers, check in calls, meals and emotional support. But most of all, thank you, God, for the blessing that is this child. There is no greater gift.