It’s true! And she’s really lovely, currently lounging next to me as I write. Georgie has a face full of lipstick and is asking if I can get her a ladder so she can be a helper, lest you think it’s quiet around here.

Hildegard Ramona Guinn Anderson* was born on July 30th, after two external cephalic versions and a three day induction. She was an absolute pea compared to our other two: she weighed a teensy 7 pounds 10 ounces to her sisters’ 8lbs 10oz and 9lbs 3oz.

We were discharged a quick 24 hours after she was born, but had to return the next day because of her (pretty intense) jaundice. And then–after some sweet light treatment, including a glowing blanket– we were home, again.

She’s started sleeping longer stretches, and I’ve started sleeping longer stretches, and she’s also started staying awake more, just looking out the window (light is crazy, y’all) or at the wild and crazy high contrast baby books I arrange nearish her face.

Winnie started kindergarten last week (!!!) and Georgie has started mom-ergarten, which primarily involves fetching diapers and watching Ruff Ruff, Tweet, and Dave.

We’ve been so cocooned by the generosity and warmth of our community– almost FORTY FLIPPIN PEOPLE have signed up to bring us food, which leaves us to do such wild and crazy things as sleep, feed the baby, and take our oldest child to school.

And in those three days of induction is a birth story, one with a slow start and a fierce ending.

*The girls picked Hilde’s name (pronounced hill-dee) from Mike and my short list. They really loved the book we read about Hildegard von Bingen, and luckily it was our favorite, too. And then we ran the middle names by them: Adelaide, Araminta, Ruth, Dorothy, Ramona, and Justice. The girls immediately fell in love with Hildegard Justice (if you know us, you know that we love justice a lottttttt), and when we told them that we had picked Ramona (there is another story behind this, but we were shooting for the initials HR in memory of Michael’s grandfather, Harold Roland, and the Beezus [Georgette Beatrice] and Ramona thing was just a happy coincidence ), they told us that her name was Hildegard Justice. Full stop. So she has a family name and a legal name, and that’s just the way it is.