I remember when Chelsea and I first sat down to talk about her pregnancy. I kind of hinted at the idea of being there for it to watch and photograph the experience, and she smiled and told me she was totally up for that. As time got closer, she kept telling me she knew she’d go before her due date, so I blocked off the entire first week and a half of October for her just as a cushion so I could peace out as soon as I got the call. Butterflies grew in my stomach more and more with each day closer to October 1st, and finally I decided it was time to pack my bags and haul it to the car for safe keeping. On Saturday (the 5th), my cousin Becky and I were talking, and she said Chelsea joked that I should just come on up because contractions were happening about ten minutes apart. I immediately called Chelsea, and we decided that Sunday morning I’d go ahead up there! When I arrived, contractions had slowed back down, but she pulled my hand over for one so I could feel how everything tightens up (medical nerd in me was excited). As the days went on, I grew anxious about this baby’s arrival. I knew it’d be anytime, but I had to leave Wednesday night due to prior obligations back at home, but Becky just held my hand and assured me that if it’s meant to be, it will be, and there isn’t anything that can be done other than to have patience and accept things as they were. On Tuesday, Chelsea and I headed off to get our toes done. Her sorority has a mommy group, and it’s tradition to get their toes painted in a cute and crazy way for when it’s time to go to the hospital (they call them hospital toes), so Chelsea sat in her massage chair and asked them to do hot pink with white polka dots everywhere 🙂 After we left there, her contractions started up again, and we decided to take some precautions and packed the car with everything as well as taking Owen on to Miss Maggie’s house (he loooooves her and oh is she fabulous!) so he’d be squared away just in case. Around 10pm, Chelsea called her doctor up to explain what was happening and see what she needed to do, only to be told to go on to the hospital. However, this little girl was playing us! Suddenly everything ceased yet again. Chelsea came out and told us how silly she felt for jumping the gun on everything, but I told her that at least she would have a night to just chill out now without any worries or distractions…. But here’s where things got real. I had just finished up editing a wedding and had gone on to bed when I suddenly heard someone in the kitchen messing around. It was 1:30am. Something was up. I sat in bed and just waited… and then I heard it! “Hey girls?” Mike called out….”YES?!?!!?” I answered…. “It’s time to go to the hospital!” I literally did a dance. I ran upstairs to get Becky, and we rushed about grabbing everything we could before running out the door. Mike does not play around when it comes to Chelsea or his family, so he was BOOKIN it, yo. Becky and I followed behind, got caught at the light, turned down the wrong street, and then made an executive decision to go down a one way street the wrong way to get parked properly. Oh yea. We rock.
After everyone got situated (time was 2:15), we were all handed a copy of the birth plan. My strong, incredible, and beautiful cousin was doing this totally natural – something that I am not sure I’d be able to do. As the contractions got stronger, we began praying over her and the baby. Becky turned on some light worship music, and we turned the lights down to just calm the room. Chelsea kept such a positive attitude about everything, and after each contraction ended, she’d smile and say, “One step closer!”
At 4:30, contractions had gotten stronger though Chelsea played it off like it was nothing (did I mention how amazing she is yet??), but she suddenly started quivering and said she felt something. The doctor had just checked her, so the nurse said she’d hook her back up to the monitor to see how things looked… except when she went to do this, her water broke! It was such a shock that we all jumped, but then cheered 🙂 Time is now 4:46am. The doctor came back in, asked Chelsea to lay back, and said she could go ahead and start pushing with contractions while she got the bed set up and some gloves on… only when she turned back around from grabbing gloves, there was a head! This baby was COMING. Chelsea literally pushed once at this point. The doctor called other nurses to come in to help, and we didn’t even have time to get the bed set before this beautiful little girl made her entrance into the world at 4:50am on October 9th, weighing in at 8 pounds 13 ounces, and 20 3/4″ long. Tears filled our eyes, but we all smiled and laughed out of total shock. Nobody expected things to progress so quickly. Our laughter turned into cracking up even more after we realized the song that was playing when she was born was ‘Into the Light’… Of course!! Chelsea and Mike held this baby and began discussing her name. Mike said he was open to a suggestion made, but Chelsea turned to him and asked him to say it out loud… At that moment, it was decided that this beautiful little girl would be blessed with the name Layla Jean Wojcik – Layla meaning ‘Dark Beauty favored by God’ and Jean after Mike’s grandmother 🙂 We spent the rest of the morning taking in all that had happened and being thankful for this new life bundled up and in the arms of her family.
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