Care package #8 and program update

I was excited to put together this month's care package because one of my "friends" in my agency that I met through facebook is hand delivering the package this week to Eastern Social Welfare Services (ESWS).  She is  travelling to go get her little girl finally and is taking care packages for several of us waiting families.  ESWS is the Korean partner agency my U.S. based agency works with and is where Grant goes every month for his well visits.  Sending it with someone in our agency on their trip to Korea is a lot nicer because you don't have to deal with a two month lag time that usually occurs if you send it through our U.S. agency (therefore making it difficult to plan correct clothes sizes and seasons).  Also, when we send directly with traveling friends we can slip in some goodies for the foster mother and treats for our child which our U.S. based agency doesn't allow for some reason.  Now that there is a steady flow of families traveling to Korea to get their kiddos, I hope to be able to keep sending packages this way.  Typically, traveling families have one big empty suitcase on the way to Korea because they are going to fill it with any clothes/stuff their child comes home with as well as souvenirs on the return flight.  So, it isn't an inconvenience for them to fill it with care packages on the way there.  And you get to feel like Santa Claus when you get to ESWS:-)

Since my friend will be arriving a few days after Grant goes into ESWS (goes in on the 20th usually) this month, he won't get this package until September 20th so I wanted to make sure I sent fall clothes.  I went through Auden's old stuff and found a couple of my favorite long sleeve shirts along with a pair of jeans and navy pants.  Hopefully they should fit Grant well.  Grant's growth chart is very similar to Auden's, he is just a little bit heavier than Auden was at his age.  I threw in a cute Vera Bradley (I heard that brand is popular in Korea) small pouch along with Starbucks Instant Iced Coffee for Grant's foster mom.  I'm sure Grant is used to getting toys every time he goes to ESWS from our care packages, so I was able to squeeze in a couple toy cars for him too:-)

And the end of last month we received super precious 15 month pictures of Grant!  It was the first time we have seen him standing up in a picture and could see his cute little legs!  His foster mom dressed him in the adorable OshKosh B'Gosh plaid overalls I was hoping so badly to see on him.  Every month I love this woman more because it's like she can read my mind.  His bangs grew in from his hair cut the month prior and his hair looked so nice.  I'm thankful we got these pictures at the end of last month because right after we got them ESWS announced they would not be sending picture updates for two months in efforts to work really hard at getting files ready for submission to the Ministry (government).  So far, they have been doing just that and the process (knock on wood) has been starting to move faster.  Thank God.  I hope they can keep it up.  One would think after the Ministry sees the same forms over and over they can start to move quickly once they know what they are doing with the new law and requirements.  If they can keep up this pace we hope to be in Korea right before Grant's second birthday in April.  Fingers  and toes crossed!!!

New Friends and Care Package #7

A wonderful bonus to this adoption process are all the awesome new friends I have been making that are in the same boat as we are- waiting for our son to come home!  Through the magic of facebook I have been able to connect with parents from our agency which has an east and west coast office.  Me and the ladies that I've become closest to have been able to meet for several happy hours the past few months since we all live or work in northern VA.  With the exception of our west coast friend who was awesome enough to stop through the DC area on her last flight to the east coast.  Since she was in town all the couples were able to go to a nice dinner in Arlington.  It was great to get the husbands together too and spend time with friends that are on the same rollercoaster of a journey that is the Korean adoption process.  We all can't wait to take the same picture with all of our sons home one day.  And how amazing that Grant will grow up having friends that are also adopted from Korea and in transracial families...this is invaluable. 

Here we are after dinner at an Arlington Frozen Yogurt (and sorbet!) place:-) 

Care package #7:

I decided not to send clothes this care package because it sometimes takes two months to get to Korea via our agency and I couldn't bring myself to send fall clothes yet.  So, I went with a little laptop with lots of fun music, shapes and words when you press the buttons.  Maybe he'll get used to some english words:-)  We included a stuffed animal Elmo and a cute little wind-up frog that does flips (thanks to cousin Lana for giving it to Auden last week).  Also since I saw that Grant has his four top teeth in his last update picture I decided it was time for his first electric toothbruth.  I'm a big fan of electric toothbrushes and every dentist I've talked to is as well.  Auden loves his electric toothbrushes so hopefully Grant will get used to them too.  The crayola one came with fun stickers so I could spell out his Korean name Joon Hyeok and Grant on it with other decorations.  Lastly, we threw in some toddler toothpaste so his foster mom doesn't have to worry about getting it.   

Care Package #6

Last week we sent our 6th care package to Grant.  As for clothes, we sent him three cute graphic t-shirts, two pairs of shorts and a bathing suit.  I was on the fence about sending a bathing suit in the last care package because I didn't know what kind of access he would have to any kind of water since he is living 20 minutes outside of Seoul.  However, a family that met their new son in Korea this past month had a meeting at a spray park/fountains in Seoul where lots of kids could enjoy the water so I decided to go ahead and send one.  I also sent sandals that Auden never fit in during the right months, hopefully Grant can get some use out of them. 

Cody had a good idea to take close up pictures of ourselves individually (as unflattering as they may be, ha) to put in a kid friendly album since those are the kind of pictures we get of Grant.  So, I found an adorable album on Amazon to put six pictures in: close-ups of Me, Cody, Auden, outside of our house, our family room and the playroom.  We are hoping that if Grant looks at these pictures often they will be familiar to him when he sees them in real life for the first time, ourselves included:-)  The last thing I included was a bit of an experiment to see if I get "in trouble" haha.  We are told that we shouldn't include gifts for the foster mother in our care packages.  However, other agencies are encouraged to send small gifts.  This bothers me that different agencies have different rules.  Anyway, I was talking with a new friend I made at our agency and she said she's been able to send small things without getting in trouble so I decided to try it to:-)  So I threw in 6 packets of the Starbucks VIA instant coffee...I've been told that Koreans love their Starbucks.  So, we shall see what happens:-)  Oh, and my high school friend translated a nice letter that I included to Gran'ts fostermom regarding his wonderful professional birthday pictures. 

In other news, we unexpectedly got Grant's 14 month update pictures very fast last week!  Looks like he got his first haircut because his bangs are shorter.  He is sitting on his fostermom's lap with a big grin in one of the pictures:-)  He seems like such a happy little soul all the time, I can't wait until I can hear the sound of his laugh one day. 


 

Auden goes to Preschool

This week Auden started "real" preschool! 

When we moved to Vienna we found a home daycare/preschool that was Montessori based.  It was larger than his last home daycare in Arlington and she actually was certified to teach kids until Kindergarten, however, it seemed like most parents took their kids out by age 4.  We had a few issues with it, primarily the lack of outdoor time and space.  Additionally, although the teachers there were so loving unfortunately their English was not great and it was rubbing off on Auden.  So, Cody gets the gold star because before we even found a house in Vienna, Cody researched the best preschools and put Auden on the waitlist at Appletree, the school he just started.  We were offered one of the few summer slots because we were high up on the list.  The school has ages 3-5 in the preschool program and then they actually have Kindergarten too for kids that may not be ready for the elementary school yet.  It has a great weekly music class and special activities you can sign up for like gymnastics and ballet for additional cost.  We are thrilled with the school and Auden LOVED his first two days so far!

Last Friday Auden got to pick out his backpack and boy was he excited for it!  In fact, he wore it everywhere...in the store, playing in the house, going on walks, picking blackberries with Daddy and in his pjs watching tv.  Perhaps Auden and his backpack spent too much time together because on Sunday night he put his doggie backpack in time-out on the step (where Auden has to go for his time-outs).  We asked what his doggie backpack did wrong and he said doggie wasn't listening to him:-)

        

I think I was more nervous on the first day than he was!  He was already pretty excited to go because we took him by on Sunday to peek over the fence and look at the awesome huge playground.  Also, he knows his neighbor Gianna goes there and they are good buddies.  She is a year old than him and her parents talked to her about taking care of Auden on the first day and showing him the ropes.  She did such a wonderful job and was waiting for us as we got onto the playground which is where the kids go in the morning until everyone arrives. She swept him off to the merry-go-round almost before he had a chance to say hello to his new teacher.  I stuck around to talk to his teacher and another new parent and by the time I wanted to leave I couldn't even find him and Gianna.  Eventually, I found them in a little tunnel.  Auden kissed me goodbye and had no reservations about me leaving (which is bittersweet of course!).  So then I went inside and scoped out his classroom and took some pictures. 

There are 8 kids in his class altogether, they are called the "blue ducklings."  Auden is in one of two 3 year old classes that started this week, the rest start in the fall.   

 

 

                

 

 Considering Auden isn't ready to leave when I come pick him up (unlike all his daycares), I would say we've had a very successful first two days at preschool!  The cutest part, that I don't have a picture of yet, is that his school has a small  outdoor atrium that has a coy pond with turtles that we look at on our way out everyday.  We are so happy he loves it and he will be here until he starts Kindergarten in September of 2015 (yikes, let's not think about that yet!). 

Another year, another homestudy update

Well, somehow another year has passed since we were first approved for adoption.  It's been two whole years since we did our original homestudy and under VA state law we have to update it every year.  Unfortunately I'm getting pretty good at gathering the documents they need: child abuse clearances, DMV driving records, FBI fingerprinting, employment letters, medical physicals, tax returns, financial plans, and on and on...We also had to have our agency social worker come out to the house to check in and meet with us.  We discussed with her how we haven't told Auden about Grant yet and thought about how we should handle it.  We agreed that we should start generally teaching him about the concept of adoption- how some parents can have a child that didn't grow in the mommy's tummy, rather another woman's tummy.  So we are going to research some good books for kids that can help with this.  Then when we do decide to tell him about Grant he can hopefully understand it a little better.   

We hope and pray that this is our last and final homestudy update before Grant comes home. 

Care Package #5

For this care package we included some summer pajamas, two t-shirts, cargo shorts and one of my favorite button-downs of Auden's that is nice and lightweight and perfect for hot weather.  We threw in a toy phone, bus and cute wooden book.  I also wanted to include two pictures for Grant's foster mom of us celebrating his birthday.   

June is an exciting month because finally the new process has kicked off and lots of families are in Korea right now or will be going to Korea soon for their court days and a couple weeks thereafter finally be able to bring their children home!  By the end of the month, more than 100 children should be just about home with their forever families.  This is wonderful progress after over a six month break to figure out the new Court process.  The agencies are reporting back that the judges seemed shocked at how long these children have been waiting and it seems like they want to do everything possible to keep things moving along.  We are praying that this is the case!

1st Birthday Pictures!

On Friday we got the BEST 1st Birthday pictures of Grant!  He full of smiles, wearing the birthday hat we sent him and has the microphone in his hand that he picked for his DOL ceremony.  He is wearing a beautiful hanbok (traditional Korean outfit) which is emerald green and white on top and pinkish colored pants (pink is common for boys on their 1st birthday).  Typically, foster moms give parents the hanbok when they go to Korea to pick up their child...if we are fortunate enough to get it I would like to have Grant baptized in it.  We are so lucky to see Grant's big beautiful smiles, as many of my waiting parent friends with our agency aren't as fortune to get such smiles and only get three pictures (we got 6).  After all, we are talking about a 12 month old dressed in a heavy garment and usually silly hat...smiling for a posed picture is usually the last thing they want to do (I've been there and done that with Auden, ha).  So, I'm not sure what his foster mom did to get such wonderful pictures...perhaps made goofy faces or waved silly toys like I've been known to do, but I sure do love her for it!  We will cherish these pictures forever.

It was perfect timing to get these pictures as we were able to show them off to the McCormick side of the family since we had a cousin's graduation party this past weekend.  If anyone else would like to see the pictures, shoot me an email:-)