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On July 21, after attending a cookout with friends, we decided to catch the always-awesome annual fireworks display at the Aquatennial festival in downtown Minneapolis. Cathy's due date was more than two weeks away, and we expected the baby to come early, but we felt we were safe to attend.
Long story short -- Cathy was feeling a little discomfort as we sat in the couple hours before the show started, but nothing worse than she'd been feeling for the past few weeks as the baby shifted around. Since our first baby came so quickly, we knew we had to keep a watch on things, but she insisted she was fine. So we watched the fireworks, which were awesome. And about halfway through the show, Cathy's water broke. So here we were, with lawn chairs, blankets, radio, food, etc. strewn about everywhere, in the thick of the crowd, with a large, loud fireworks display going on, with William (almost 3) and Tim's mom, who doesn't walk nearly as quick as she used to, and about 4 blocks from our vehicle. Mom and Tim calmly started packing things up.
It was clear that we weren't going to make it to the car, so Tim flagged down a nearby police officer. He tried talking to us, but the fireworks were so loud that Tim couldn't even hear what he was saying. He asked which hospital we were to go to, and wisked Cathy away, since there was no way to get an ambulance into the area... Mom and Tim headed back to the car with William and headed toward the hospital, not knowing exactly what else to do...
But evidently the baby insisted on seeing the fireworks. Because Cathy delivered the baby, on the ground, before the ambulance was able to meet up with the police and firefighters that came to help out. Grandma and Tim received a call on the cell phone en route to the hospital that Mom and New Baby were doing great, much to Dad's shock, as only about 20 minutes had passed since this all started.
Andrew Harrison Fischer
Born 7/21/07 at 10:39 pm (with firework accompaniment)
6 lbs, 7 oz
20 1/2 inches
13 1/4 head circumference
Andrew is named after Cathy's mom's maiden name (Andrews) and Cathy's maiden name (Harrison).
KARE-11, a local TV station even picked up the story. And then again 6 weeks later, when we were at the Minnesota State Fair, we dropped by the KARE-11 booth to say "hi" and introduce the baby to the anchors, and they dragged us onto another newscast. Man, Andrew's quite the star for a 6-week-old...
Since we obviously weren't prepared for the birth that night, we didn't have our cameras packed. As luck would have it, Target was giving away free disposable cameras at the Aquatennial fireworks. So all of the following pictures are complements of Target's cameras. Being disposable cameras, the quality leaves a bit to be desired. But we're just glad we have some pictures of the crazy night.
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