Sunday, November 27, 2011

Happy Thanksgiving!! What a whirlwind these last two weeks have been. We are grateful for the comments, thoughts and prayers that have been offered on our behalf. Thanksgiving week was a joyous one spent with family and friends. Leigh worked on and off at the hospital throughout the week while Andrew enjoyed being able to play with the kids. (Strange to type that in the plural form...) We are doing our best to adjust to having a newborn and a very busy toddler.


This picture cracks us up. It's one of the few we have were Rorey is more than willing to smile at the camera and yet John is clearly not so visible. Oh well, hopefully we have many more years to attempt at pictures. 


Our growing family.

John went in for his 1 week check up and was back up to his birth weight, 6 lbs 8 oz. The doctor gave him a clean bill of health. Rorey and John will both be heading into the doctor next week for Rorey's 18 month check up and John's 2 week. Hopefully Rorey has managed to climb back onto the weight scale.

 
                                                             Eyes open!! Success.

Rorey loves taking walks. She enjoys picking up all the leaves she can and bringing them to whomever she is walking with. She also loves to be lifted up to touch the hanging branches. (Rock climbing here we come!) This past week, it got a little cooler in temperature. Andrew let Rorey pick out a hoodie to go on their walk. This is what she went with....


                                                        Love our little monster. So fitting.

We have received many inquiries into why Andrew has a black eye in some of our recent photos. No, Leigh did not punch him. Andrew had a diabetic reaction that caused him to meet the floor in our kitchen in a rather unpleasant manner. He is doing better and for the most part has stopped scaring little children when they see his face. Here is a picture when his eye was at one of its better moments:


What a tough guy!

Our homestudy will be on December 6th. This is where they come and inspect our home to make sure it is a fit environment to raise a child in. They also ask us a long list of personal questions to determine that we have some iota of what we are getting ourselves into. (Who really knows what they are getting into when it comes to parenting? Really.) We will keep you posted as to how that turns out as we continue to count down the days until John can become part of our eternal family.


Post sponge bath for John. Love the curls. 

We hope that each of you had an amazing Thanksgiving and were able to celebrate with loved ones. We continue to be humbled and awestruck at the generosity of those around us. Thank you. We might not always get a chance to say it, but we always feel the gratitude in our hearts for those that have made the last few weeks such a success. 

Saturday, November 19, 2011

Life as we know it...

It has been far too long and we concede that. Sorry. Here are a couple of major things that have taken place in our life in the last few months.

1) Andrew graduated in May from Appalachian State with his Masters in College Student Development


2) We moved to Dallas for the summer to hang out with family and allow Andrew time to apply for jobs all over the country

3) Leigh went back to work at Medical City Children's Hospital in July

4) Rorey, Leigh and Leigh's family went to the UK for 16 days in August (Andrew was in the throws of interviewing with various universities and needed to be in the US)



5) Andrew accepted a job at Texas A&M University working for the Memorial Student Center as a Program Advisor and started at the end of September

6) Rorey and Leigh continue to commute to and from Dallas until January 1st when Andrew's health insurance kicks in

7) We received the paperwork to start the adoption process over again on October 1st

8) October 5th we received a phone call about a potential birth mother

9) Rorey was a one-eyed monster for Halloween




10) November 15th, 2011- Rorey turned 18 months old


10) November 16th, 2011- our son John Richard Carruth was born at 2:45 pm. He weighed in at 6 lbs 8oz and is 18.5 inches long.




Side note- We are currently in the process of adopting John. We have reached the first of multiple milestones that must be met in order for him to become permanently a part of our family. Here is a list of those milestones:

Birth
48 Hours- Birth mom can sign a relinquishment of her rights
32 Days- Our attorney will file to terminate birth father rights
45 Days- Our attorney will go to court to verify that all parental rights have been terminated
90 Days- We go to court to finalize and make John 100% non-refundable

We will also be completing a homestudy within the next few weeks.

We are grateful for all of the love and support that we have received these last few months. We ask that prayers continue to be offered on our behalf. Thank you for coming on this journey with us. We also ask that no mention of John be done on any social media sites (ie Facebook, Twitter, etc) until we have finalized the adoption.

Thank you...for everything.

                                                                Our Growing Family

                                                   
                                                      Our miracle worker: Dr Kim Vernon




                                              Rorey hanging out with her new little brother


                                                          Kisses!! What a good big sister!!