My niece is here!

My sister delivered a healthy baby girl last night at 9:04.  Natalie Mae weighed 7 pounds 14 ounces and is 20 inches long.  Mom and baby are both doing very well.  The baby is precious!!  She has chubby little cheeks and looks like my brother-in-law.  My sister's labor was overall pretty easy.  She didn't make much progress at first considering that she had been 3 cm for the past few weeks.  But she went from 6 cm to delivering a baby in 2 and a half hours, so the end was quick.  Total, she was in labor for about 13 hours.

I was able to sneak up to the hospital for about 20 minutes before my doctor's appointment this morning.  (More to come on that tomorrow!)  After school, M and Evie met me at the hospital again so that Evie could meet her new cousin.  She was very interested in the baby.  She thought it was cool to touch her hand and give her a kiss.  After she touched her, she would stand back and say, "oooooohhhh!!!" and make this adorable excited/surprised face.  It was awesome to see her interact with a baby like that.  It was an interesting preview to what we will see in November.  :)

I could not be happier for my sister and her husband.  This baby was about 18 months in the making, and that was even before conception.  As an outsider, seeing their struggles in trying to conceive broke my heart.  She lost faith so many times.  Some days I think she hated me for being optimistic, but I couldn't ever lose hope that someday she would be a mom.  Last night, their dreams and all of my prayers for them came true.