I was expecting our first child on June 20, 1996. When I woke up that morning at around 10, I felt some lower back pain (although this was not new to me, with chronic back problems!) Since I had a doctor's appointment that afternoon, I wasn't worrying when the back pain was getting worse, and coming and going. At about 2pm, it was quite painful, so I had Geoff (my husband) take me to the hospital. Since I didn't think that it was labour, I had Geoff leave the bags in the car. When I was examined at about 2:30, I was told that I was about 8 cm dilated! Geoff was told by the nurse to go get the bags (with the camera, camcorder, etc.) Things progressed fast, but I would not push until my doctor arrived, although fully dilated. When the doctor arrived, he broke my water, and less than 5 minutes later, we had our beautiful daughter, complete with a full head of dark hair! Blake Kristina weighed 7 pounds 13 ounces, and was 21" long.

= Nearly 2 years to the day after we had our baby girl, I was expecting our 2nd baby on June 4, 1998. The due date passed, and finally on June 8, the sound of Geoff's alarm clock woke me at around 6am. Geoff was nearly ready to go to work when I asked him to stay home because I wasn't feeling quite "right". I knew I had a doctor's appointment at 9am, so I asked him to take me to it. I decided to have a bath, and while I was in there, I had 3 contractions in about 10 minutes. Shortly after 7 am I phoned my mother and asked her to come and stay with Blake (who was still snoozing in bed) because I was in labour! The contractions were coming really fast, and by the time my mother arrived at 7:45, they were every 2 minutes. It was a speedy 5 minute drive to the hospital. I got into the bed at the hospital at around 8 am, and was 9 1/2 cm dilated. My water broke, and this time I was not waiting for the doctor to arrive. I started to push, and the baby's head was out before the doctor arrived. He made it just in time to deliver our son at 8:32am. We were so thrilled to have a daughter and a son! Brayden Geoffrey weighed exactly 8 pounds and was 20 1/2" long. He had beautiful strawberry blond hair.