Coming Out Party

Our church recently hosted a coming out party for Carolina. We had such a great time! My mother had bought Carolina this lovely dress and sort of insinuated that I ought to use it for the party. I didn't need much convincing though - she's gorgeous in it.


My friend Casey has a friend who does cakes, and she had this beautiful one made. After I made a cake for another friend who was having a baby shower, I now know the pain and time involved in something this large. This cake was really delicious and after eating on it for a week, I can honestly say it was really moist. The icing even had a hint of almond flavor to it. Yum yum.


Our neighbor came and loved on Sam for a long time too. Another friend made Sam the largest fruit salad plate I have ever seen and he finished it in about five minutes. This boy loves his fruit.

Some other friends of ours who came must have realized heard through the grapevine that Carolina loves balls. This one was the largest ball she's ever seen and she immediately latched onto it. She plays with it every single day. Oh, and if you look closely, you can see Angelina Ballerina in the form of a tattoo on her arm (I've never seen the show!). We had a nice visit to Tweetsie the day before the party. Those tattoos take forever to get off!


I am not sure what Sam was up to here, but I can see our friends watching him closely. I thought this was a very funny pictures depicting his normal comings and goings. He's always got admirers, but some of them are a bit more suspicious than others!


They had set up a little rocking chair for Carolina and a big one for me. But, of course, the kids were all over the place, so we just sat on the floor eventually. Carolina got so many goodies! I just went through a lot of them today and cannot believe how long she is set for. In this photo, she's getting her very first baby doll. I bought her a baby doll stroller yesterday and she's been pushing it around with her doll since we opened it up. She's still unsure of how to handle a baby doll, but at least she knows she can hug it.

I always save the best for last. I love this photo. Sam just loved that Carolina was stuck up on the log and he enjoyed hugging and kissing her after sliding. It took a bit of coaxing at first, but after a bit, he was on board.

Every day is a better day than the last with these two. I can't imagine how good it is going to get, actually. Of course, we have days where we regress, but for the most part, we're a happy family. Just today when we got home from eating lunch with Bill, I caught Sam helping Carolina take her shoes off. It was such a sweet moment that I wish I could have caught it on film.

On a distinctly sadder note, we took a trip to Greensboro yesterday to see Sam's cardiologist. We learned that the miracle we had been praying for happened - the number on his lead went up from 2.3 to 4 (not sad, right?).

However, the number needed to be 5 or above for our cardiologist to feel comfortable with skipping the surgery. In the almost two years that Sam has had his defibrillator, that number has steadily been going down - so for it to have gone up is a real wonder. But, we are heading into cold and flu season and Sam's cardiologist wants him to be completely protected in case he gets a high fever this Fall or Winter and if that number is too low, his defibrillator could possibly miss an arrhythmia.

His doctor is planning on speaking to a Medtronics representative as well as his surgeon, but unless they feel otherwise, the surgery is still planned for August 18th. It's highly unlikely anything will change, but we are still hoping for a miracle. You can join us in praying.