Wordless Wednesday

Christmas Day

Our day began early....Miss Kylee & Mister Keller are both early risers. And Kylee went to check out what Santa left her before coming to wake us. I think she was expecting to actually see Santa visit our home. But nonetheless she was pleased with what he brought her. Keller was not into opening gifts. He was awake because he wanted to eat. Once his presents were out of the boxes he was more into playing with them. It was a fun morning. I think Kylee's favorite gifts are her pink computer from Uncle Rick & Aunt Shannon & the Dr Seuss books with CD's from Mamaw. Keller's favorites seem to be the dump truck & tractor from Grandma & Grandpa O. But they really love everything they received! Thank you to all the family & friends that sent gifts!
The Simon's and Sharon's Mom (Bettie) joined us for Christmas Dinner.
It was a Merry Christmas with so much to be grateful for!
We are enjoying a few more days as a family before Daddy returns to the office. Kylee & are planning to go see "The Princess & The Frog" tomorrow and the 4 of us are planning to go to "ICE" at the Gaylord on Wed or Thurs.

Christmas Eve

Today Kylee & Mommy did our first Gingerbread House. She was so excited and did such a great job! I hope we will make this a Christmas Eve Tradition. We enjoyed a nice family day. This evening we let the kids open a couple gifts. As sugar plums danced in their heads we finished wrapping & assembling gifts & stuffing stockings. Kylee is so into Christmas this year, such pure joy & wonder! I can't wait until tomorrow. Kylee requested that we have cinnamon rolls for breakfast & put a candle in one for Jesus' Birthday & sing to Him. We wish you a very Merry Christmas from our family to yours!

Holiday Dance

Here's some holiday dancing for your giggles. These two do love music & dancing!

Snow Days

We are enjoying our days as a family of 4 & are encouraged by better & better days. It is nice to have Daddy home from work too! He is a huge help for Mommy as she feels a little unready to be mom to two by herself all day. But are we ever really ready? God is good and we are so incredibly blessed!
We were thrilled to have about 2 feet of snow fall this weekend (a record for the DC area in December). Growing up in TX I rarely saw snow, much less this much. And who doesn't love the beautiful white stuff at least once in a while, especially at Christmas time. Keller wasn't as thrilled as the rest of us, but when you are that little & that bundled up, you can barely move. Kylee on the other hand played outside with Dad for probably 2 hours on Sunday afternoon. They shoveled & shoveled & made a perfect snowman. We would have gone sledding, but we don't own one & all the stores were sold out. I promised Kylee we would be more prepared next time.
We look forward to Christmas this week. It will be different for us, not being with extended family. But it will be a nice time making memories together. Sorry we haven't gotten Christmas cards out this year. Maybe New Years cards will come. We have been a little busy :o) & we wanted to include a certain little someone in our pictures. We are loving getting all of your cards & pictures. Have a wonderful week and blessed Christmas, celebrating the Birthday of our Savior.

Last Day in Korea Pics

Here are some pictures from our last day & a half in Korea. We took the kids to an aquarium and rode the gondola up to Seoul Tower.

Adjustments

Sorry for the Silence! We are safely back home. The flights went pretty well. It was a long exhausting day, but the actual flights could have been much worse. Keller slept pretty well on the flights except for the last 3 hr leg. We are still very jet-lagged and Kylee & Joel haven't been feeling the best. We all have alot of adjustments to go through. But we will eventually get there. God is taking care of us all and holding us close in this new phase of our family. Thank you again for your prayers thus far and for your continued prayers. I will get some pics up when I can. We have some from the last day of sight-seeing in Seoul-on the Simon's camera. And we will share some snapshots from home. We did find our camera. It was sitting in the front seat of our car in a public parking lot all week. Oh well. Again, so thankful for the Simon's. And we can't even express how grateful we are to them for making the trip with us and for all of their love and support of us! We are truly blessed by their friendship!

Gotcha Day

We are now officially a family of 4! Keller Joel Hyunsoo was placed in our arms around 11:45am. It was a very emotional time for us and the foster mother, as we expected. I think we all shed some tears. We were able to give her a hug as we were leaving. Poor little Keller cried his heart out for the next 45min to an hour. Poor taxi driver too. Keller was very distraught. We saw him go from arching his back mad and pushing us away to just sad and mourning. After returning to our room we gave him a little to eat as he cried between bites. Then I went and got Kylee from our friend's room. I explained to her that he was very sad. When she saw him (he was still crying), she burst into tears. I picked her up and snuggled her for just a minute and then she was fine. I'm not sure if she was upset that he was crying or that it all just hit her.
My Mom and Joel's Mom have both told us several times over the last few months that they believed Kylee would be a huge help in Keller's adjustment. Well we are already seeing that come true. Within probably 5-10 minutes his and her demeanor changed dramatically! They were both laughing and smiling from ear to ear. He thinks she is pretty funny. And she thinks, "he is so cute." Praise God! They played for almost an hour then we got them both down for a nap. They are both now sleeping peacefully on the bed side by side.
Thank you all so much for your prayers! We had prayer together this morning as a family of 3 and then we had prayer with the Simon's. It has been a good day full of God's blessings & answered prayers.
We didn't take pictures this morning. There was just too much emotion and it didn't seem an appropriate time to do so. We have a few cute ones of Kylee & Keller getting acquainted this afternoon. And we will take some later today as a family of 4.
As usual, we will post the pics once we get them uploaded from the Simon's camera.

Keller Playdate #2

We had a fun afternoon playing with our boy. It turns out that when a child is over a year the Korean Agency allows/encourages a second visit. I am guessing this is because the child is more aware and it can be more traumatic for them, leaving the only place and person they know & love. I am grateful for the way they are so concerned and diligent about doing what is best for the children.
We didn't see as many smiles today, because he was awaken from his nap early to meet & play with us. But still cute and sweet. This boy loves mandarin oranges and it seems they can solve almost any mood. I think I need to go buy some to have for the next several days! Foster Mom seemed a bit sad today as well. I can only imagine how difficult this is for her. It is very evident how much she loves him and he, her. She said that she has shown him our pictures everyday since she received them from us, which is so sweet. I am praying there is some recognition for him of us. I can see that the next few days are going to be difficult and emotional for all.
We were delighted to receive a packet of pictures beginning the first month of his life. He was a beautiful baby. There are lots of pictures including his 100 Day Celebration and his 1st Birthday (Tol)! What treasures for us to have these pictures. The 1st birthday is very important in Korean Culture. On their 1st birthday one of the traditions is to have them sit in front of several items. Then you allow them to pick up whatever attracts them. The items they choose are supposed to represent what they may become someday. Keller chose a pencil and money. The pencil symbolizes that the child will become a successful scholar. The money of course says he will be rich.
We plan to do some shopping this afternoon and then of course tomorrow is the big day of picking up our son! Thanks for your prayers and comments!

Sightseeing in Seoul

Today we took the opportunity to see a little of the city. Seoul is a fascinating place and so much to do and see. We definitely don't have enough time to do everything we would like to. Today we went to the Gyeongbokgung Palace, the Blue House (their White House) & walked through and were overwhelmed by Namdaemun Market. We also had a fabulous authentic Korean lunch at this tiny easily overlooked restaurant. The food was delicious (bulgogi & kimchi) & service was amazing. They found someone to translate for us & help us order. The ladies held and loved on baby Cooper while we ate our meal. We all enjoyed the food and the experience. We still hope to see a few more things before we head home. We hope to do a little shopping tomorrow afternoon and between Saturday & Sunday we plan to go on a DMZ (Demilitarized Zone, between N & S Korea) Tour and go up in Seoul Tower. We got a call from the Korean agency today letting us know that we could visit with little Keller again tomorrow. So of course we said yes and plan to be there around 11am. This is a special treat since we weren't expecting to see him again until Friday. Thanks for all of your comments and prayers! We all are still having a rough time adjusting to the time change. We will probably all be switched over just before we head back to Eastern Standard Time.

Keller

What a fun sweet little boy! We had a the pleasure of visiting/meeting our SON and his foster mom this afternoon. She was a very generous and gracious host. She served some delicious orange/lemon tea & some yummy treats. She obviously loves and has taken very good care of Keller. He is very, very happy! He smiles and laughs alot! He is very ticklish and loves peek-a-boo! We were able to spend about an hour watching and playing with little Keller. What a joy! He is very busy, which makes us a little nervous about the flight home. So I didn't get to hold him alot, because he wanted to be running around. But the few minutes that I picked him up and played with him, he snuggled right up to me and put his head on my shoulder. It melted my heart. It was sad to leave him, but we are so happy about where he is and and how well he is being taken care of. He smiled and waved to us. Now we have Friday to look forward to. We will be picking him up on Friday at 2pm!

Adding pics later tonight!

We Made It

We made it! We arrived into Inchon about 5:30 Monday evening.

Sunday started out kinda crazy. We all made it to the airport on time and such, but Joel & I got there with no camera!!! Of all trips to be without our camera and video camera! We aren’t even sure where it is. We think it is probably in our car back in Virginia. Thankfully Sharon & David have a nice camera, and if need be we could buy one. But will most likely be without video this time. Boohoo!

Then Sharon accidentally left her diaper bag at the Delta ticket counter, who then called the airport police for an unattended bag. Who knows where it went at that point, but we prayed it would find us. We finally and very gratefully received it just before takeoff! Korean Air was wonderful! The flight went well for the most part. No major melt downs by any of us, including the 3 little ones. But we were all definitely ready to be on the ground. There is a 14 hr time difference so as you can imagine after flying for 14+ hrs with little sleep, we were all ready for bed. We took a bus into Seoul and to our hotel, grabbed a quick bite to eat and then crashed. We slept ok, but were ready to get up by 4:30am. Kylee has been playing in the closet for about half an hour, because there is a light in there.

Waiting for us at the hotel was a fax with our scheduled appt to meet Keller. So today (Tuesday) at 1:30pm we will be on our way to see our boy! Kylee will be staying behind with the Simons. But she is so ready to meet him too! The moment our plane hit the ground last night she said, “Baby Brother, I’m here!” I just about lost it. I can’t believe how much love she has for him already.

Hopefully we will have some pictures for you later today! Thanks for everyone’s prayers! We feel them.