As you all know, we started our adoption journey back in August 2020. We were ready and able to embrace the 18-month long process, but fate decided to speed things up a bit. On Monday, February 15, 2021 our daughter, Olivia Ray, was born. You’re probably thinking…

“Whoa! What just happened! Did they just have a baby?!”

The answer is yes! If you want to know what’s been going on the past 6 months, click here. The TLDR: We brought Olivia home from the hospital on February 17th and by the end of this year, we’ll be her official adoptive parents!

We named her Olivia because we just like the name and it has a plethora of nicknames like: Olly, Liv, Olallieberry, Olive, Ollyollyoxenfree! She got her middle name from Shelby’s grandfather Ray Driscoll and because she continues to be our ray of hope.

An olallieberry has the physical characteristics of the classic blackberry, but it is genetically about two-thirds blackberry and one-third red raspberry.