So many visitors!!!

I can't believe we have had Alex home with us for over a week now! The days really fly by. He is such a good baby and we are totally loving being his mom and dad.

We have had lots of visitors since we got home. Family and friends have come over almost every day since we brought AJ home. It has been so great to be able to show him off and see everyone be so genuinely happy and excited for us. We also went to my brother's house for our nephew's birthday dinner and took a big family picture. Our dog, Buddy even posed for the picture!

The grandparents all are in love, and his cousins seem to adore him already. There is no way I could post all of the pictures we have taken since we brought AJ home (we have taken about 300!!). But I will post some pictures of the family with him.

Here are Alex's Grandparents:
And his Great-Grandparents:


And some of his cousins:


And one of us:

We miss you Bella!

Last night we had to say goodbye to our dog, Bella. She has had health problems since we adopted her 4 1/2 years ago. But she has been happy. We always knew the day would come when she would die but why now? Well, I can tell you with complete faith that she waited for us to bring our baby home...

A few months ago, when we were finishing up our homestudy process for the adoption, Bella got a huge growth on her leg and the doctor said it would likely be fatal, either from the tumor or from complications related form the treatment since she has a bad heart. We thought we had to make a decision then and we were not ready. Jay kept saying that we needed to get a family picture of us, both dogs (Bella & Buddy) and our future baby. We had to bring our baby on a walk with Bella and Buddy. She couldn't die yet. And she didn't. She actually healed and I knew that God was giving us more time.

Now that we have Alex, we've gone on 2 walks with him and the dogs and we finally got that family picture 2 days ago.
Last night Bella had a seizure and we rushed her to the emergency vets. Her lungs were filled with fluid and her heart was working overboard and not doing very good. She waited for our baby to come home, and now it was her time to go Home.

It is so hard being home without our Princess Bella. But we are thankful that we had her for as long as we did, and that we got to introduce Alex to her and go for that walk and have that picture. It truely is the circle of life.

We will always remember her cute ways...how she loved running in the snow, how she would nudge our hands to keep petting her, how sweet and laid back she was. And Buddy will miss her so much - he loves his Bella! But now she is not itching and making herself bleed, she can breath normally, she is not in any pain. And we gave her a happy life.

We miss you Bella! We will never forget you, sweetie! Go Home now Bella...GO BELLA GO!

Photo Session :-)

Our friend Heather is a photographer and she took some photos of our Forever Family on AJ's 1 week old bday. We were not expecting this so we were not all done up or anything but we think they came so nice!

THANKS SO MUCH HEATHER!

WE ARE HOME!

I am sorry I have not posted on here until now. As you can imagine these last few days have been very full. We got up bright and early Friday morning to leave for Long Island at 4:30am. Our videeo camera stopped working (luckily we tested it before leaving) so we drove to Jay's dad/step-mom's house to borrow theirs (Thank God they answered their phone!) We got to our hotel around 1:30 and had to be at the hospital at 2pm. Not much time to freshen up, or even think about what was about to happen. We arrived at the hospital and had to wait awhile in the lobby for K to finish up the paperwork. We were getting VERY nervous pacing, staring at the elevator hoping the next person that came off was coming to get us to meet our son. Hoping and praying he was still going to be our son. Finally it happened. And it was so memorable. I don't really know the perfect word to describe the moments we had with K and her mom as she handed me Alex and we got to know each other better. It was overwhelming, amazing, awesome, and sad.

After an emotional meeting and saying goodbye, Jay and I headed back to the hotel to get to know our son and take all the events of this last week in.

Alex is so wonderful! he is absolutely perfect! We are LOVING being his parents. He has to eat every 3 hours, even during the night to help him put on some weight, so that is tiring but overall it's been pretty easy. We've both eased right into being his Mommy and Daddy. It just feels so natural!


We decided to drive back home yesterday morning. Before we left we went down to the harbor in port Jefferson, NY where we stayed. We took a walk with Alex and took some pictures. We wanted to be able to tell him about where we spent our first day with him.



When we got home we introduced our dogs, Bella and Buddy to Alex and went for a short walk with them. Then family came to visit. We had more visitors today - more family and some of Jay's friends. It was a really good day. Life is good!

It is amazing how instantly you can love someone. But Jay and I are totally and completely in love with this lil guy. He has become the center of our world. And just when I think that I couldn't love him more, my heart grows bigger and I do!

I mean, just look at this face! How could you not just absolutely adore him?

The papers are signed......

...well, sorta. Jay and I drove to Buffalo today to sign our papers. It was an emotional day for both of us but in the end, not only are we so excited to meet our son tomorrow, but I fell more in love with my husband today. As most of you know, Jay's a quiet guy. But today he spoke from his heart and it was so wonderful to hear! Alex is gonna have the best Daddy!

We will leave for Long Island around 4am tomorrow morning...YIKES! We better get to bed. We are already way behind in sleep. We plan to arrive at our hotel around noon. Then K will be signing the surrender papers at 1pm and we will arrive at the hospital at 2pm to meet our son and K. I know it is going to be an emotional day for everyone!

We are only staying over one night in LI and will be home sometime Saturday evening. Not sure when we will be able to update this blog next. It may not be until Sunday.

Say lots of prayers for us!