A lovely water birth on Halloween

Last night I got an update on the woman who had been contracting since 3am. Things were stronger, maybe 10 minutes apart. Cool beans. It was 9pm so I quickly hit the hay. At 11:30 my phone rang. It was the other midwife telling me this woman's contractions were every 3 minutes. Holy shit! They live about 45 minutes north of me. So I hit the road, said my little Driving-to-a-Birth prayer and listened to the radio. I heard at least 10 good songs on the way. And not just background noise, but 10 really good, sing-at-the-top-of-your-lungs type of songs. (Like the drunk girl at a party: OMIGAWD! I LOVE THIS SONG.....OMIGAWD! I LOVE THIS SONG TOO!)
I kept thinking: I'm going to miss this birth. This is baby #3. Contractions every 3 minutes? 45 minute drive? At least the music is good.
I made it there around 12:20am and the woman was still pregnant, still cooking in active labor. They were filling up the pool and Conan O'Brian was on the mute TV.
I helped the midwife set up and the woman got into the pool.
We all settled into the timelessness that is active/transition-y labor. Hip squeezes, affirmations, cool clothes on sweaty brow, sips of water, helping the dad, etc.
In the background Conan O'Brian turned into Carson Daly who then morphed into Entertainment Tonight. I really wanted to turn the TV off, because I had to fight my eyes from resting on the screen. It's like being at a doula birth in the hospital and you gotta just turn down the noise and site of the EFM screen, otherwise everyone is staring at it for the next contraction and to watch the bumpy, scratchy lines of the baby's heart tones.
The baby shifted, moved down in one fell movement. The bag of water broke and a little head was crowning in no time. This baby was coming 3 weeks early, and the other kids weren't big at birth. In just a few minutes, a little baby girl was born. I think she weighed 6# 14oz. A little peanut baby. This was this mama's first home birth and her first birth sans epidural. She did so great!
It was a really lovely, buttery birth. I was home by 6:30. Got S to school by 8:30; was able to sleep for a half hour before a prenatal here at the house. Now little E and I have just had lunch and I'm trying to convince him to walk with me to the farmer's market because it's lovely and sunny today, although really windy.

It's Halloween. We already have a ton of candy from last Friday night's Downtown Trick or Treat and little E's preschool party~ which, I have to make a quick comment about.
Our daughter S goes to a very lefty charter school and we love it.
Our son goes to a very blue collar preschool and we love it.
However, the two are *very* different. The charter school is having a Halloween party (and they're even calling it that!), but all treats need to be "healthy". Cool, I'm all for it. I made pumpkin apple muffins with whole wheat flour; I halved the sugar and omitted the streusel topping.
When I picked little E up yesterday from the party I forgot to dress him for, he was sitting in front of his own plate of Ruffles, Doritos, a sugar cookie, and a cup of orange Faygo. The teacher reminded me not to forget his goodie bag, which weighed about 3 pounds and was full of real-deal Halloween candy. I thought for sure I'd also find a little airplane bottle of booze and some ZigZag papers in there.

What the hell are they thinking?! Why on earth would you give 3 year olds THAT much candy the day before Halloween? The professors and hob nobs at our organic-gardening,earth-loving,compost-everything charter school would be calling a serious meeting about such a grab bag.
Me, I'm somewhere in between. I grew up in that blue collar world, where all parents smell like they've smoked a pack of Pall Malls in a closed car, and I've slowly been transitioning to Lefty Land since my teens. Both camps get on my tits for various reasons... we had a good laugh here about the wide range of ahem, "values". Whatever. As long as I get all the chocolate, it's all good.