Well, heres the scoop. Jacob Bear Gensic, born 855am, 19 Nov 2009, 7lbs 8oz, 21 1/2 inches long. The last 36 hours or so have been a whirlwind. Melissa starting having heavy contractions at 7pm on the 18th. I got all of our stuff together because I had a feeling it was going to be a very short night. We finally fell asleep at 11pm, and by 1 Melissa’s contractions were too heavy for her to sleep through. We were out the door shortly thereafter and on our way up to Boise to the birthing center. We arrived around 230am and got melissa in her room. She was checked upon arrival and was 80% effaced, 4cm dilated, and plus 1 station. We spent a couple hours in the bathroom, she would sit between contractions, and stand during. She moved to the bed and layed down for a couple hours, me massaging her back all throughout the process. She got checked again and was only 5cm, 100% effaced, plus 2 station and from my perspective was in an incredible amount of pain. Imagine that! Our midwife filled a tub of warm water up for her and Melissa moved to the tub. Immediately her pain during contractions were better.  The tub had this little waterfall faucet thingy, so whenever she had a contraction, we would turn on the faucet and run warm water over her belly. It seemed to do the trick for awhile. She spent a couple hours in the tub, I eventually joined her to hold her up so she could totally relax during contractions. After a couple of hours she finally went through transition, as she went through some contractions of earth shattering proportions. Luckily she had me, and I had the presence of mind to turn on the cold water during one of the contractions. Thats gotta rank pretty high on my all time dumb-ass moves.  We got her out of the tub after she started to have the urge to push. She got checked again and was only 7cm….and she started to cry. Two contractions later she really wanted to push, so the midwife checked again and she was all the way dialated! We pushed a little bit on the bed, but then she moved to the a birthing stool. Which is a stool that allows her to push from the squatting position. She pushed for a couple hours and finally out he came!

Melissa decided early in her pregnancy that she wanted to delivery naturally, with no drugs to induce labor or for pain. Because she wanted to birth naturally we took a 12 week class on “The Bradley Birthing Method” where we learned all about pregnancy, labor, and I learned to be a birthing “coach” (which means I got to be at her side through the entire process, massaging, talking, encouraging, and relaxing her. It was comforting for Mel, but it was definitely a sure fire way for me to feel pretty helpless). I’m so proud of her! Shes one amazing woman!!!!! Melissa was so strong throughout the entire process, I can’t believe the amount of pain that you women have to endure for the sake of your babies!!

We spent all of yesterday in the birthing center, napping and loving little bear. At about 6pm or so we loaded the car and came back to Mountain Home to spend our first night alone with him!! He’s breast feeding great and sleeping great too. THANKYOU everyone for your thoughts and prayers. A special thanks to midwives at “The Baby Place”! We love you all!!!!! We are so blessed to have you all as friends and family. Praise the Lord, for blessing us with you all, and with a healthy baby boy. We are so thankful!!  I’ll post pictures as soon as I can find my camera from yesterday.

Disregard that last post. Evidently I made it sound like Melissa gave birth….whyever would you think that???? Actually we bought a sleep number matress, king size. Its pretty amazing, we slept like babies last night. Not so sure we’re going to tonight, seems like Melissa’s contactions are picking up. A little stronger. Looks like theres a good chance little Jacob will be out sometime tomorrow! Lets hope! He’ll be a birthday twin with his big uncle Sam I am. I’ll keep you all posted the best I can. Love you all!

 

Hey guys! Sorry I forgot to update you all yesterday on our delivery! Yesterday morning around 7:00am we had a special delivery. Melissa has been such a trooper the last few months and I’m so proud of her for sticking it out for so long. Melissa is so excited, as she has been so uncomfortable at night and now she can finally sleep soundly without little aches and weird pressure points waking her up. Hes definitely a big guy, 7-6.  We’ll post pictures as soon as we can. Love you all!

So mom flew out here today! YAY! She was calling all week checking in to make sure that the little guy hadn’t gotten here yet, as she really wanted to be here when he comes. Now theres two generations of momma Gensics in this house, and all the better for me too, as they just spent over an hour talking about what food they were going to make this week, and I got a batch of mini cheesecakes baked for me while they were chatting.

Ok, so I keep meaning to post a picture of the nursery, its pretty much done, I’ve still got to hang a couple picture frames up for Melissa, even though there aren’t any pictures in there yet, we’ll put some pictures of little bear in there. I’ll put pictures of the other side of the room up once I hang the pictures. Thanks everybody for the prayers and thoughts, Melissa is feeling great, I’m thinking its only going to be a couple days! (I Hope!)

Jake. You the man. Just in time too….Melissa is in labor………………………………………………………………………not really……..but maybe………

So…we’ve recently discovered Skype, much like the rest of our loving families. We bought a $30 camera and downloaded the Skype program from their website. Free calls Skype to Skype. We’re thinking that its going to such a blessing as our little guy grows up. What a great way to get to talk to family and see them too!! The thought that he’ll get to see his grandparents, aunts and uncles, and cousins even though they are (and we are) all over the country.

Melissa and I had a baby shower this morning with Dale, Gina, Grandma Loyce, and Rita, over Skype! We got lots of things that are going to be so useful! A couple homemade blankets from Grandma, a fishing outfit, blanket, and book from Rita, and TONS of stuff from Dale and Gina (wipes, outfits, bibs, little socks, and a couple winter outfits that are adorable!) THANK YOU SO MUCH EVERYBODY!!!

Below is a picture from the internet shower today!

T-Menus 3 weeks until Melissa’s due date and I still don’t have the Dex. Not a knock off Dex. A real Dex. Sam had one for Evie! Why can’t I have one for Jacob Bear?

Matt. You need to boycott any of Jake’s phone calls to the island until he forks over the Dex.

Sam and Ben. You need to put together a covert mission “gollum style” to the Lake James house and get me the Dex.

Abbie. Please help. you can start by secretly shaving jake’s jungle leg hair at night.

Jake. If you are reading this, then you know what you must do. I want THE DEX and I want it now. Don’t try to skirt the issue. just hand it over. I’m naming my son partly after you for pete’s sake.

Pete. for your sake I’m naming my son partly after jake.

Mom and Dad. Please stop being proud of your son until he hands it over to me.

Allright. So I guess its time to get serious since Sam keeps bugging me to “blog about it”. So from here on out is our honest attempt at this, since we set this up in March and haven’t touched it since!

Melissa is chugging along just fine. She is at 34 weeks and 5 days. We have been counting our blessings, because up to this point she has had no real complications, no real discomfort, no real anything, except for a belly thats slowly getting in the way. Actually, she was having some contractions at 27-29 weeks but we were able to get them to stop with some herbal drops, at the advice of our midwife.  Oh yeah, and this week she laughed and peed in her pants because she can’t hold it in very well any more, ha ha! Too funny for me! More to come for sure. Love you guys!

Melissa is pregnant, and it didn’t take very long either. Although it may have come as a suprise to some of you, it wasn’t for us, as we were definitely trying. We went back to the Rapp Rd Gensic Homestead for Christmas 2008 and were able to spend some quality time with our beautiful niece Evelyn and it was all over from there. We had been teeter tottering between adopting first or having our own. Playing with Evelyn and seeing what a joy she was for Sam and Jess put us over the top. Melissa is now 9 weeks along and feeling fantastic. As we’ve been telling most of our friends and family, it hasn’t really sunk in yet that there is a life growing inside her. Crazy! We are so excited to be parents!

Does is look like she's already starting to show??