Welcome Ewan James Colin Moss

June 2nd 2006, 17:05 P.S.T, Ewan James Colin Moss arrived into our world weighing 7lb 1oz and measuring 21 inches long.

Despite arriving 4 days before his official due date, he was not in a hurry to appear after Jennifer's waters gently broke at about 01:30. Once we were sure things were really happening, Fraser packed up the bags and gathered everything we would need in the hospital and at about 02:45 we informed Grandma Colleen (who had only arrived in Pasadena about 6 hours earlier from England) that we were off to the hospital as we thought this was really it.

We arrived at Huntingdon Memorial Hospital in Pasadena at about 03:00 and were admitted to triage in the labor and delivery ward. Jennifer was monitored for about 90 minutes and was then admitted after the nurses confirmed we were on our way for real.

Her contractions were not that strong or regular, so the doctors opted to put her on Pitocin to induce stronger labor and speed things along because her waters were already broken but she was only 1 cm dilated. Up to this point Jennifer had been doing extremely well, but the effects of the Pitocin were strong and immediate, and the contractions were very painful. This is the point she opted to utilize the wonder that is the epidural. Once the epidural was in life was much easier, and she was able to "relax" for a few hours in relative comfort while the labor progressed.

The Pitocin was however still a double-edged sword. Jennifer was dilating well at about 1.5 cm an hour, but the baby was not descending and his heart beat was dropping somewhat alarmingly during the contractions. The dose was reduced for a while, and things slowed down accordingly, but baby was happier as a result.

Finally at about 15:00, it was time to start pushing. Jen was fully dilated and Ewan had finally descended into the right position. Fraser was appointed chief time keeper during the pushes by the nurse and holder of her now limp left leg, while a student nurse took up the equally limp right leg....and we were off.

16:45 - Jen is still pushing!! Ewan's head is visible, but he does not seem to be making that final progress needed to emerge. We would expect that he was pretty annoyed himself at this point. His heart rate was doing ok but was not brilliant and the doctor had attached a cranial monitor because the one strapped to Jen's belly kept losing him. How would you like a short curly metal pin screwed into your head?

The doctor informed us about this time that he was seriously considering prepping to a Cesaerian section. We didn't like that news but recognized that we did not want Ewan to be in distress. However, he would try the vacuum extractor first (a glorified sink plunger with a vacuum line attached), but was not going to apply too much force as there would be a chance that he could get the head out, but the shoulders would become stuck, and that would be a real complication!

Thankfully, a couple of pushes with the vacuum extractor applied and Ewan emerged with a healthy cry at 17:05. With the long labor and the vacuum extractor his skull was a somewhat stretched but that would soon recover and we had a beautiful healthy baby boy. Once Jennifer was able to hold him for the first time we decided that we were certain that we would call him Ewan (meaning young warrior). His other names would be James, after his Great Grandfather Montgomery and Colin after his Granddad Moss.

Both Ewan and Jennifer were doing great after the delivery and we were phoning around all the family members of the news. However the one person we could not get hold of was the person located closest to the hospital. Grandma Colleen, who although she was staying at our apartment in Pasadena had accidentally left the phone off the hook from an earlier phone call to Grandma Kristi in Ohio! Despite the mix of euphoria and tiredness, Fraser managed a bit of lateral thinking and phoned one of Jennifer's colleagues Ben, who in turn phoned another friend and one of our neighbors and fellow Caltech Postdoc, Rachel, who was able to go round to our apartment and knock our door to tell Colleen the news.

We all moved to the maternity ward about 60 minutes later. Once in the maternity ward, the nurses whisked Ewan off to the nursery for monitoring for 4 hours. Grandma Colleen was able to get a lift to the hospital from Rachel after the phone was back on the hook and spent 45 minutes with us before visiting hours ended. Ewan was confined to the nursery for this time, but she was able to watch him through the window.

And so our routine of 2-3 hourly wake-up-calls for feeding began. Fortunately, Ewan is a very good boy and as long as he has a full stomach sleeps very well. We were made all the more aware of this with the frequent cries of the new babies in the rooms either side of us, and are counting our blessings.....so far!