Is it really almost Christmas?

Happy Holidays! How in the world is Christmas less than one week away? I feel like I blinked my eyes on Halloween and now here we are. Whew! What a busy time it's been. We're a bit late with our monthly photo, but as you can see below, Faith is now 11 months old. Well actually she's really almost a year old. Let me repeat that because I barely believe it myself. Faith will be one year old in less than 3 weeks. And ironically exactly one year ago today Randy & I received an email from our social worker asking if we'd like to be considered for a potential birth mom they were meeting with later that week. I still remember every moment of that day like it just happened yesterday. Randy claims he knew the moment we got that email that she was our daughter. And now here we are one year later with the most beautiful and amazing almost one year old daughter. Wow! All day I kept staring at Faith and just smiling or picking her up for an extra hug and kiss. Life truly is amazing and we try very hard not to take for granted how blessed we are.

Now, onto what you're really interested in hearing about. Faith! It's hard to even put into words the personality that this girl has. She is so sweet, is constantly busy, wants to touch EVERYTHING, is very independent, and has a lot to say all the time. Thank goodness we finally have our living room back - floor and all - because she is not only crawling, walking (by holding onto things) and standing on her own, but she also decided this week that she would teach herself how to climb the stairs. And boy is she quick. I can't get enough of watching her learn new things. One day she is standing at the bottom of the steps trying to lift her leg and getting frustrated when she can't get up. And the next day she figures out how to get onto the bottom step. By the third day she is literally flying up to the top. That gate we ordered should be here tomorrow - thank goodness! 

We've been busy as usual - unfortunately mostly with house projects like painting & laying flooring, but we did sneak in some family time. Faith got to meet Santa last weekend and to our surprise she didn't shed a tear. She was fascinated with him and sat on his lap content just staring at his face. We could barely get her attention for a picture and she wouldn't even look away long enough to crack a smile for us (which as you know is very unusual for her). She was mesmerized! And then a few days later, she got a letter from Santa in the mail! We also spent an evening in Annapolis for the Eastport Yacht Club's annual Parade of Lights. They decorate all of the sailboats and parade them around the harbor. It was beautiful and we got lucky with a warn night to spend outside. Plus we just love Annapolis so it might be a new family tradition! 

The highlight of the month was getting to have a visit with Faith's birth family. We saw her birth mother, her sister (who is 4) and her grandmother for a great visit at our adoption agency. We spent a couple of hours exchanging presents, stories, pictures and hugs. It's always such an emotional roller coaster and we're all pretty exhausted afterwards, but we are very lucky to be able to spend time together. 

Let's see, what else is new? Faith has four teeth, lots more hair (enough for bows finally), and eats everything you put in front of her (as long as she can pick it up herself). Just this past weekend she mastered raising her arms for "So Big!" She talks constantly and can clearly say a few words (dada, done, hi, yeah), but most of the time we're just guessing at what she's saying. We're teaching her some sign language too and she's starting to pick up on "help", "more" and "all done". We are desperately trying to get her to understand the word no. Actually we're pretty sure she knows what the word means when we say it, but little miss independent already likes to push the limits by trying it over and over and over again. She's also mastered the pouty lip and the I'm up to no good grin already. I can feel my gray hair forming as I type this. But for every deep breath I have to take each day (and trust me some days there are many) I wouldn't trade a second for the joy that she brings to our world. Especially after such a horrific event last week in Connecticut. I don't have words to describe my complex thoughts and feelings on what happened there, but I can say that I'm more thankful than ever for every second of every day (even the hard ones) as we are reminded that life is so short and so precious. 

We are counting the days and hours to our first Christmas as a family and will be sure to post lots of pictures. There's lots of wrapping, baking, cleaning and packing to be done in that short time, but thankfully no more shopping. That part is all done as Faith would say. We have plans to see much of our extended family over the next week so it's going to be a busy time, but we're looking forward to every minute and will write again when we can. 

Much Love and Merry Christmas! 

The Groves

11 months old! 

If you didn't get our Christmas card (which I'm guessing most of you did considering how many we sent) this was the photo! 

I can stand on my chair and you can't stop me.

Please mom, stop with the pictures.

Meeting Santa

Looking like a little puppy with her teether

Such a happy girl

She loves her swim dates with Daddy

Hanging out in Annapolis

Having fun after seeing all of the sailboats

Trying her first candy cane

Someone is walking!

November Recap

Happy Thanksgiving!! 

It's hard to believe there are only 2 days left in November. Whew! It's been a busy month. We celebrated Daddy's birthday with a family dinner, some presents, and a homemade carrot cake. Faith even helped Daddy blow out his candles. She needs the practice since her 1st birthday is just around the corner. Yikes! We also headed to York to celebrate Thanksgiving with family. Mommy just had to make a feather headband for Faith to wear. I remember having those as a kid and wanted to pass along the tradition. Surprisingly she didn't really mind it or try to take it off so we got some great photos! 

We had a great Thanksgiving and got to see many family members. We wish we could have seen everyone! Faith got to try turkey, gravy and lima beans for the first time. Oddly enough - she really wasn't into the food. She usually eats anything you put in front of her, but not that day. That was until we got out dessert. Then she decided she was hungry so we gave her a bite of pumpkin pie. She LOVED it and ate almost a whole piece - even pieces of crust. She would have kept going, but we didn't want her to get sick. 

In other news, we had a big day today. Mommy discovered two teeth coming in on the top to match her cute bottom teeth. One has already broken through. Maybe by Christmas she'll have four teeth! And not only is she continuing to pull up ALL the time. But now she like to let go for a few seconds and stand on her own. She's so strong and does a really good job of sitting down gracefully when she looses her balance. It's so much fun to watch her test herself and get a little bit better every time. She does not or should I say can not sit still. So we decided it's time for gates & child proof locks on our cabinets. She actually loves the gates because they give her something else to pull up on. She stands against the bars and we joke that it's her "jail". Joey on the other hand is totally confused. If we have the gate across the kitchen he gets stuck out or in. Poor guy! He just sits there and meows until someone comes to free him. 

We are gearing up for Christmas now and are excited to get our house back together. We will be putting the floors back in mid-December with the help of some awesome family! And then we just need to decide if it's still worth buying a tree for such a short time. 

Much Love,

Jess

Birthday photo with Daddy

Helping Daddy blow out his candles

Silly Daddy. Faith is thinking "what is wrong with you?"

Checking out Mommy

Thanksgiving family photo

All dressed up 

Such a happy girl

Ready for Thanksgiving food

Trying turkey and other goodies

My new "jail"

10 months old (a little late)

Things in the Grove house have been extra busy these days, which explains why this post is 12 days late. Our beautiful girl is 10 months old and becoming more and more independent every day! She has quite the amazing personality and sure does keep us on our toes. One of her new favorite things to do is take off her bib in the middle of eating. She understands the word no and when you tell her to stop she just looks at you with the most adorable smile you've ever seen. We can tell already that we going to have a hard time disciplining this girl. There will be lots of biting our tongues to keep from laughing or smiling. 

We feel like she's changing by leaps and bounds every day and is such a big girl. She is filled with giggles and loves to clap her hands. She also likes to feed herself and sometimes will refuse to eat anything you try to give her from a spoon. If you put that same piece of food on her tray so she can pick it up herself, she eats it immediately. She still eats just about anything you give her and is so over pureed baby food. Her new favorite is sweet potato fries. Oh and we discovered she has a good arm earlier this week. Faith was eating meatballs for lunch when all of sudden she picked one up and literally chucked it at mommy's head. Faith thought it was hilarious and Jess did everything she could to look mad and not burst out laughing. Oh boy! 

Our biggest news is that not only can she crawl (backwards AND forwards), but she can pull herself up. Actually she chooses to stand most of the time these days and can figure out how to pull up on anything in site. As you can see in one of the pictures below, she also does her own baby version of the yoga pose downward facing dog. Today mommy was on a phone call for work while she was playing on the floor in the kitchen. Jess turned around to find she had crawled under the table and pulled up on the support bars and was literally standing underneath the table with a huge, proud grin on her face. Unfortunately Jess wasn't quick enough with the camera to capture the moment. We're a little afraid she's going to be walking before her first birthday! 

In all seriousness, she's been such a little trooper. Our house is still a mess from the flood and our living room floor is cement. But we managed to set up a safe play area for Faith using an old carpet, some foam floor pieces and a portable play yard gate. We feel slightly guilty for creating a cage, but it gives her a safe place to play so that's all that matters. She actually loves the gate because it gives her something to pull up on all around her. We're hoping to get our floor back in before Christmas and with any luck we'll have things almost back to normal in time for Santa. We've got lots of cleaning, painting and work to do in those few weeks, but we're determined to get things back to normal in time for the holiday. A big shout out to everyone that has helped or will help in the coming weeks! We're so grateful to you all! 

We're gearing up for Faith's first Thanksgiving. She's excited to try turkey, stuffing and maybe even a little pumpkin pie. Faith & Mommy have their last Music Together class of the semester tomorrow morning and then we're headed to PA to spend a few days at Grandma & Pop Pop Chaney's house. They'll be lots of family time and maybe even a little shopping - for mommy at least. 

From our family to yours - Happy Thanksgiving! We have so much to be thankful for this year and those beautiful blue eyes are at the top of the list!

Much Love,

The Groves 

PS - A shout out to Faith's Auntie Hannah who had surgery on her neck today. We love you Auntie Hannah!! 

Practicing downward facing dog

I can type too - just like Mommy & Daddy!

Happy Soggy Halloween!

Happy (belated) Halloween from our little strawberry! I wanted to post these pictures yesterday, but it's been a long and interesting week in the Grove house. We started off Monday morning nervous, but happy to all be home and stocked up waiting for hurricane Sandy to reach shore. We had raked our leaves & prepared the yard and house as best we could over the weekend and all that was left to do was wait. We took naps and watched movies until about 5:30 pm when things got a little more exciting - and not in a good way! Randy said the famous last words "We have water!" as I turned around to see water pouring out from underneath the oven in our kitchen. By the time I got back downstairs with towels - water was already coming in from the other wall of the kitchen & had made it almost half way across the floor. And then the panic began! Randy kept his cool and was absolutely amazing! We must have had a premonition because we had dug our wet/dry vac out of the shed & had it ready & waiting in the kitchen. So we started sucking up water and long story short - within 5 minutes we had water coming in every wall and all four corners of our main lowest level (which is our kitchen & living room). We couldn't suck it up fast enough or keep the towels dry long enough, but somehow we managed to get into a rhythm of vacuuming water and drying towels to keep the water low and under control until we finally got the leaks stopped around midnight. Thanks to our neighbor and friends who helped dig trenches (in a hurricane no less) and move all of our belongings to the second floor, we didn't loose any furniture. It was one of the scariest nights of my life, but in the end we were VERY lucky it wasn't any worse. You only have to watch the news for two minutes to see so many who lost so much more. So now we wait for things to dry out, figure out what happened (since we've never had a drop of water in the 7 years we've lived there) and then start to replace flooring and eventually move back into those rooms. I really must have known something was going to happen because (and this is creepy) I took pictures of our house on Monday morning before the storm because I remembered that you're supposed to have pictures of what things looked like for insurance - just in case. So I actually have a picture of our living room that morning and then 12 hours later it was in chaos! 

Faith has been a trooper! As you can imagine the whole event on Monday was pretty traumatic - for all of us including Joey who been trapped in our bedroom for a lot of the time. Poor Faith can really only play in her room since her play room was destroyed and filled with fans & dehumidifiers. Faith and I evacuated to Grandma & Pappy's for a few days - at least until the cleaners get their equipment out of there. We still celebrated Halloween at home and Faith got to attend her first Halloween party. She and mommy go to music class every Wednesday morning (with Music Together) and since her class fell on Halloween she got to wear her strawberry costume & celebrate with her friends. We had some trick or treaters so she dressed up to help give out candy with Daddy too! 

For the most part - she hasn't really noticed the chaos (which is good because it won't be fixed any time soon). She is getting more teeth so has a pretty constant flow of drool coming off her chin. She is still crawling backwards, but now is more interested in pulling up on things than anything else. She can easily get to her knees and loves to stand with our help. She may just skip forward crawling all together. Oh boy! Oh and her new favorite toy is the lid of a plastic coffee can - go figure.

Rewinding to before the hurricane - we were actually in Ocean City, MD and Bethany Beach, DE the weekend before the storm. Randy has a state teacher conference there every year so Faith and I went with him. I hope that the beach is still there when we go back. Then as soon as we came home Faith got to meet our dear friends Uncle Dave & Aunt Sabra. We had pancakes & went to the park to play on the swings and slides. 

You might not hear from us very much in the next few weeks and months. But we'll try to post pictures when we can. Our goal is to have the new flooring and the house back to normal by Christmas. For now it's one day and one step at a time. We're so grateful for our amazing family and friends who have helped or will help in the coming weeks. 

We hope that all of you are safe and dry wherever you are! Our thoughts and prayers are with those whose lives were devastated and suffered so much loss. Our situation is terrible but can't even be compared to those images on the news.  

Much Love,

The Groves 

Daddy is under my spell!

Mommy's little pumpkin

Out for a stroll

Hanging out on the beach on a beautiful October day

It won't be long before I'm standing

Such a happy girl

I love swinging!

Playing in the leaves that Daddy raked

Pre-hurricane snuggling

A picture of our living room the morning before the hurricane...

And then just 12 hours later

Some of the trenches Randy dug in our yard

This picture sums up our week - these guys were our heroes! 

Pumpkins, Pumpkins, Everywhere!

As promised, here are some photos from our visit to Cox Farms over the weekend. We had a great time with Aunt Andi, Uncle Michael and Connor. And we met our friends Emily and Andrew there and got to meet their sweet daughter Evey. She is 6 months old and I think Evey & Faith will be great friends one day! It was a bit chilly when we first arrived, but by lunch time the sun was shining & we were taking off our coats and hats to enjoy the beautiful day! We went on a hay ride, saw cows, pigs, goats plus lots of other animals, and we even drank apple cider and root beer floats (well only adults did that last one). But the highlight of the day was when Daddy took Faith down the huge slide on a burlap sack. Before we left, we picked out a few pumpkins and might even manage to carve them this year. We can't wait to go back again next year! 

Happy Fall! 

Love,

The Groves

PS - I swore that I wasn't going to buy Faith a Halloween costume. It just seemed like a ridiculous waste of money to me since she can't go Trick-or-Treating yet and will only wear it one time for me to snap a few photos. And then I made a trip to Babies R Us with my mom and sister. The costumes were marked 40% off and well, you can imagine the end result. Stay tuned. It's bound to be super cute!