BELLA ARRIVES!!!!!

On July 3rd Ashley and I were staying at her parents' house in Santa Cruz as we didn't want to battle the beach traffic on July 4th. What we didn't know was that our plans would be foiled, and we would end up driving back to San Jose at around 3 in the morning. At 2:45 am Ash woke me up because she thought that her water had broken. 10 minutes later we piled in the car with our dogs and headed home. We told the family that we would call them when we knew it was the real deal. Almost immediately once we got in the car the contractions started coming. They were consistent and coming only 2 minutes apart. If I were a smarter guy I would have called the fam and said, I think this is the real deal, and you guys should probably head over NOW...but I didn't. Instead we made a pit stop at the house to pick up our hospital bag (that had been packed the day before!) and drop off our dogs. We certainly didn't expect to be going into labor 3 weeks early. We arrived and checked into the hospital at about 4am.

Once they hooked Ash up to the monitors, she turned into a superhero, because she pretty much stopped having contractions...and began having one non stop contraction. The first time the midwife checked Ash she was already at 6 centimeters, at which point I promptly called the family and our doula. They hopped in the car to make the 30 minute trip to the hospital. Unfortunately, 30 minutes would prove to be too long. At 5:06 am on July 4th, 2009 Isabella Sole (So-lay) Cosentino was born. And she was a lunker...a whopping 6 pounds and 18 inches long. And at 5:08 am, Ashley's mom and sister came flying into the delivery room in total shock that Bella was already here.

When Bella came out and they laid her on the bed I was totally shocked. About 90 seconds later when they had her wrapped up and put her on Ash's chest I instantly became a mess. There were 8 women in the room (Ash, her mom, her sister, Bella, 3 nurses, and one midwife) yet I was the only one crying? I couldn't even look at Bella for more than about 5 seconds before the water works came on. This process repeated itself a couple of times before I could actually take a prolonged look at her. You will be able to see that I was crying in one of those photos below.

This is Ash at about 10 pm July 3rd enjoying a fire in her dad's new fire pit...

This is about 5 minutes after Bella was born. Bella came out with a crooked nose because when she came through the canal, her hand was pressed to her face. It has slowly started to straighten out...

Here is Bella with her emotionally strong...crying dad.

Bella, Ashley, and her Mimi shortly after birth. Bella is the first grandchild on the Payne side of the family...

Dad looking at his little girl.

Most of the immediate family (Wes is in North Carolina)

Bella with grandma Edna. (Or Grandma EdMa) Bella is also the first grandchild on my side of the family.

"Mimi and Papa" with Bella...

Bella in her first outfit. She is swimming in it, all 6 pounds of her.

Bella and her Auntie Lauren.

Mama checking out Bella's in her fly new duds

Ashley refueling on a bean and cheese burrito after labor.

Dad finally strong enough to look at her without getting watery eyes.

I was too excited to update the blog so I don't have everyone's photos, but as soon as we collect them all, we will add more to the blog, as well as the slideshow.

I know that this should be in the first line of the blog, but we do need to thank God for how much he has blessed us. Not just with a beautiful daughter, whom we are so amazingly in love with, but also for our family and friends who have supported us so much. We thank Him for a healthy mama and baby, and that he gave Ash the strength to get through an intense, yet abnormally short labor.