marveling at moss

saying goodbye.

2012-02-22T20:25:00.000-06:00

In January of 1995, Dan and I were 19 and 20 when we took a road trip from our first home together in Minneapolis (a house shared with 5 others...ahem) to Fergus Falls, Minnesota. An ad in the classifieds that morning caught my eye; "Bengal kittens for sale."

We arrived at the disheveled home of a strange woman named Kathy who led us up the stairs of her duplex to a dark bedroom containing the chaos of kittens far too young to be leaving home. And yet, here we were. One kitten wobbled over to us in the way kittens do and before long was asleep in Dan's arms. After instructions from Kathy about stopping at Burger King on the way home and tearing up a beef patty for our newest member, we left Fergus Falls with our tiny bundle, only stopping at Target along the way to pick up the essentials: food (read: not hamburgers), litter box, litter and scoop. And so it began.

Hank, we named him. A gorgeous fellow with huge, soulful eyes lined in black. Everyone commented on his eyes. And he was big, weighing in at 20 pounds at his peak. He didn't like many people it turned out, but he was tremendously loyal to his immediate family. He was an "always present" cat, not wanting people to pay him any attention, but just wanting to observe the action. When people were over, he would often lounge on the back of the couch, taking everything in with an adorable yet annoyed look on his face. Until Nedy entered the scene, he slept on my head every night with his paw over my face. And I loved it. He was my first baby.

When Nedy came along, he struggled at first, refusing to eat and hyper-salivating every time she came within a few feet of him. He tried to like her, I could tell, but he was scared silly of this small being. So while Nedy slept pretty well from the get-go, an unexpected blessing in terms of early-on in adoption, I got up at multiple times a night for a solid month to force-feed Hank while she slept. He came around eventually and he and Nedy became buds; he even seemed to enjoy her attention a little bit. (He'd never let on more than that anyway.) When Kamron entered the scene in April, Hank--at this point almost exclusively known as 'Mao Mao'--was an old pro with kids. Kam loved Mao Mao and was thrilled by his mere presence, even though Mao Mao never played anymore. Kam loved to say "kiss, kiss" and bend over to try reaching Hank's lips with his.

In Fall of 2011, I began to notice Hank's decline. He was losing weight and throwing up multiple times a day. At 16 years of age and given his history as an insulin dependent diabetic for a period in 2008, I suspected kidney failure. Hank absolutely hated going to the vet, despite our lovely vet's best efforts to calm him there. His folder was marked "danger" because of his loud resistance to the touch of strangers. Given his age, Dan and I decided to not put him through any more vet visits and agreed that we'd keep an eye on him, love him lots, and if the time came and he needed it, we would get a vet's help for a peaceful death.

The month of February brought with it a very quick decline in Mao Mao's health. He was moving more slowly, not eating as much, throwing up a lot, and acting oddly--though momentarily enjoyably--as he did as a kitten by reverting to long outgrown behaviors of rolling around in the bathtub meowing and emptying his water bowl all over the floor with his paw. I found that reversion so touching; happy and sad. And isn't that life?

By the second week of February, Mao Mao's diabetes had clearly returned evidenced by his water consumption, the resulting state of his litter box, and very rapid weight loss. His back felt like a mini mountain range. It was time. But the problem was that I couldn't bare the thought of his last moments being terrifying at the vet's office. I told a friend about this and he said, "I have a home-visiting vet, you know." And so I got in touch with Dr. Frank who owns a one-man show home-visiting vet practice called Special Care Veterinary Service. Dr. Frank spent 40 minutes talking to me on the phone about everything from how to decide when, to the process itself, to talking to the kids. It turns out Dr. Frank was the former business partner of our vet and had access to Hank's file and a fellow parent by adoption--what are the odds?! He told me he would review Hank's file and await our call for him to come.

Well, with kids to think about, Valentine's Day didn't seem right and Hank got an unexpected burst of energy that day, which I knew meant the time was close. The day after Valentine's Day is Nedy's Family Day. By the grace of God, Hank's energy spurt carried him through that day, giving us a beautiful time to remember. Late that night, after the kids went to bed, Hank really slowed down and vomited (sorry for the graphic stuff, but this is my therapy right now) a new kind of substance that we knew meant this was really the end. He crawled into my lap that night and I held him for hours. I thanked him for teaching me to be a Mama, for sticking it out as long as he did, and told him we loved him and wanted peace for him. I can't tell you how calm I felt in that moment; I am so thankful for that time.

On Thursday, February 17, Dan took charge. He knew I was ready, but that he needed to handle this part because, frankly, I'm a wimp. He called Dr. Frank and scheduled him to come that day. The long and short of it is that that afternoon Hank/Mao Mao died on Dan's lap in our home perfectly peacefully. Exactly as it should have been for him.

Dr. Frank was amazing. He examined Hank thoroughly in our family room and determined that Hank had an abdominal mass and advanced kidney failure, common in a cat of his age. He was there over an hour and Dan said he was such a great guy; such a kind person. Mao Mao apparently had the energy for one hiss when he first arrived, but seemed to be okay with him after that. I'm glad Mao Mao had a hiss left in him; that made me laugh through my tears as Dan told me the details that night. Dr. Frank took Hank's body for cremation.

Dan and I drove up to my Mom and Dad's that night to pick up the kids. We were running much later than they are usually picked up and when we got there our explanation of that was met with Nedy's tears and her questions about Mao Mao's passing. We had been preparing her for over a month, letting her know that Mao Mao was slowing down, that he would die soon, that he lived a long, good life and that it was his time to die. We talked about Heaven, about Mao Mao's version of Heaven, about God and his promises and, frankly, about death being part of life. And I'm happy to say that I think we prepared her really well. She is clear that he is not coming back, she understands life is a cycle, and she is comfortable talking about Mao Mao, about her memories of him, about missing him and being sad. And that is what I hoped for. (She also occasionally mentions that a good way to remember Mao Mao would be to get a kitten, though she knows we need to let some time pass. Clever girl.) As for my little lovey Kam, my Mom made him laminated pictures of Mao Mao. He walks around with them on occasion or flips to Mao's photo in his little album and says, "Mao Mao...died." Sad. But true. Life.

And so, a chapter ends and a new one begins. To my first baby, my eternal thanks for your love. You will never be forgotten. I hope the catnip fields are as lush as Nedy and I imagine. :)

Oshwabe

2012-02-12T20:48:00.002-06:00

For the better part of a year now, Nedy's had an imaginary friend. She named her Oshwabe. (Oh-shwah-bay.) I thought I should document Oshwabe's bio.

Oshwabe is 5 years old. She has lots of dance parties. She has contests at her house frequently and gives away medals for the winners. She has a little brother and he doesn't listen very well, but she's really nice to him anyway. Oshwabe loves talking on the phone and often asks Nedy if she wants to come over and play. Sometimes Oshwabe lives in the city by us and sometimes she lives far out in the country. Oshwabe is Chinese.

I have taken to calling Oshwabe "the Shwabster". Nedy always corrects me. "Ummmm, Mama. Her name is Oshwabe, not the Shwabster." But I can't help myself. It's funny to call your kid's imaginary friend "the Shwabster". Even if she doesn't think so.

Kamron knows Oshwabe's name, too. "Shwabe? Phone? Shwabe?" I looooove it. I had an imaginary friend named Michaela growing up. As I understand it, my sister Jackie asked to take her to school for 'show and tell' and came home after school with the news that Michaela had been hit by the bus. I hope Kamron doesn't borrow this move from the Aunt Jackie playbook... :)

Happy 2012!

2012-01-08T10:19:00.004-06:00

Ayic? Ayic?

2011-12-28T22:36:00.001-06:00

Yes, I am going to catch this darn blog up. Just you wait and see. But I didn't want to forget this adorable bit of Kamrony goodness before then.

Late Christmas morning I began to have a panic attack about the incredible amount of toys that are slowly overtaking every square inch of the house. I sent Dan to the attic to get some Rubbermaid bins down so I could begin dividing toys into a 'keep for posterity' pile and a 'donate to church' pile. I guess we haven't opened the attic trap door in a while, because clearly Kam has existed under it for months now without ever knowing of its (amazing) existence. You should have seen the look on his face when the ceiling pulled down in the hallway and out popped a ladder!

So Dan and Nedy scurried up the ladder to hand down the bins all while Kam stood below, gazing up, drunk with wonder. "Baby? Go? BABY?! Peeeeeeaaaaase?!?!" I let him climb up the ladder a bit--turns out he's skilled at ladder climbing--and peek into the wonderland (read: mass of boxes) above.

And then I got nervous and made him come down. And then he threw a toddler fit. I looooove toddler fits. (insert sarcastic tone)

When he recovered, he looked at me with the sweetest little face he could muster and said, "Ayic? Ayic??" And I said in my silly, deep tone, "Noooooooooooo."

So for the past week, he's had a new joke. He randomly asks, "Ayic? Ayic??" and answers himself in a near-perfect mimicry of my tone, "Noooooooooo" with the biggest, dimple-inducing smile on his face. Ohmygosh, it is sooooooo funny.

And last night, I rocked him to sleep--or so I thought--and put him in his crib. So why did I hear, "Ayic? Ayic?? Noooooooooo" coming from his room for the next 10 minutes?

Oh, the boy cracks me up.

Pum Pum...again!

2011-12-20T20:15:00.001-06:00

I'm a big fan of Christmas music. Come mid-November, Christmas tunes are near-constant background noise at our house.

Remember this?

Well, it seems Kam has taken a play right out of Nedy's book; his love for The Little Drummer Boy rivals that of his big sister. (Who, incidentally, has broadened her horizons a bit this year with a new favorite, Feliz Navidad.)

Kam is nothing short of a Little Drummer Boy (a.k.a. 'Pum Pum') junkie. He can be completely occupied making "num nums" at the toy kitchen or "zooooom!"ing his car all over the floor and cease all activity the instant he hears even the first 2 "ding dings" of the Little Drummer Boy. "Pum pum!!! Pum pum!" Absolute pure delight.

So the other night I was rocking him to sleep and he was in his usual three-minutes-into-rocking-eyes-closed-about-to-nod-off state when the darned Drummer Boy comes on the radio. I may as well have given him a Pixie Stick (or seven) in his bottle. "PUM PUM!! PUM PUM!! PUM PUM!!!!"...all the while clapping his hands with the biggest, goofiest smile on his face you can imagine. And then the child who usually falls asleep within mere minutes is wide awake, full of the giggles and random exclamations of "PUM PUM!" for the next 15 minutes.

And would you believe the exact same scenario played out the next night?! What are the odds that that song would come on while I'm rocking him to sleep two nights in a row?!

And, more notably, what is it with my kids and that song?!?! ;)

Court!

2011-12-13T00:00:00.000-06:00

Korea's adoption process is, legally speaking, a lot different from China's. With Nedy's adoption, she was legally adopted by us in China and we became her legal parents right from the get-go. She came to the U.S. on a visa type (IR3, if you care of such details) that made her an automatic citizen upon entry. With Kam's adoption, because of Korea's process, we technically became his foster parents when he was placed with us. He came to the U.S. on a visa type (IR4) that granted him permanent residency status in the U.S., but not automatic citizenship. (Kam has a Green Card, in case you're wondering.)

While we readopted Ned in our court system for the purposes of obtaining a local certification of her birth in China, we did not legally have to do that. We were already her parents with full parental rights. This was not the case with Kam. After completion of three post placement procedures with our social worker over a 6 month period, we were eligible to file with Children's Court to legally adopt him. Our court date was scheduled for December 13, 2011.

The court appointment was short and sweet. The judge heard our social worker Gale's remarks on us, reviewed our paperwork, asked a few clarifying questions, gave a few thoughtful remarks on families, and signed and sealed the Order of Adoption. Needless to say, December 13 was an important day for our family. Kam became our son in the eyes of the law. (Of course, in our eyes, Kam was ours the moment we took placement of him, but that doesn't mean that having the law on our side isn't a welcome event.) Kam's name was legally changed to that which we chose for him, including keeping his full birth name as his middle name.

Kam's thoughts on his big day? He was mostly bored, intrigued momentarily by the big bailiff and the ankle shackles under the table... The court did give him a Brio train to celebrate, and he thought that was pretty cool. And he really enjoyed his celebratory lunch out, too. :)

We love you, Kamronbear! While December 13, 2011 is just a legal thing in our minds, it was a milestone day of celebrating you and how lucky we are to be your family.

Up next? After we receive Kam's local certification of birth facts, we then file for citizenship on his behalf. As I understand it, the processing of the request can take 6 months, but is relatively straight-forward. And then? Officially done. I like officially done. Officially done is a good thing. :)

a Girl and her Nana

2011-12-11T00:00:00.011-06:00

My Mom and my Ned. These two make my heart super happy.

St. Nick

2011-12-06T00:00:00.007-06:00

Southeastern Wisconsin and St. Nick. I still remember being shocked when I went to college in Minneapolis and found out that (*gasp*) St. Nick had a "regional preference."

Glad we live here is all I have to say 'bout that. ;)

the rest of Nedy's 4th birthday...while it's still November...

2011-11-30T21:40:00.018-06:00

I have to be honest here.

Truth is, I can't blame my lack of blogging on the whole 2 kids making me crazy thing. We've got our routine pretty well set and we're all humming along nicely. Most of the time it's pretty fun around here, what with the hilariously witty gal and the great mimic himself who is adding words daily. (For the record, I am talking about the kids here...but I am hilariously witty and Dan continues to broaden his vocabulary, too. Just so you know.)

Anyway, I'm not blogging more because once the adorable little beings retire for the evening, I've been...how do I say this?...sitting on the couch with a drink in hand watching reruns of Criminal Minds. There. I admit it.

Moving on.

So it's still November for another couple hours and I'm adding more pics from Nedy's birthday. (From the day of her birthday, that is. Her party is coming in a separate post. Maybe in February. Kidding. Kind of.)

Dan and I decided a couple years ago that we would always take off work on the kids' birthdays and let them pick their special celebration for the day. Nedy decided a few weeks before her birthday that she wanted to spend her day at the Milwaukee Art Museum and then "go eat lots and lots of spaghetti for lunch." Awesome, right?!

So here it is; Ned's idea of a good time:

Teething. Poor baby.
Occasionally I give in to Nedy's requests to try the "big camera." (Yes, I let her. Yes, I know there will undoubtedly be a broken camera blog post in my future.)
"Gog! Gog!" Kamron loooooves dogs. He spotted this one right away.
Nedy was open minded about this series. "Mama, what's that really about?" Searching for a deeper meaning in three primary colored canvases. Love that kid. I made up some line about the beauty of color itself and that the simplicity of the paintings allows us to focus on the color. She played along.
Peek!
"Mama, that looks just like a dandelion when it goes to seed! I should blow on it and you should take my picture."
Preview of the Christmas photo. This isn't it, but it's close to the one I chose. (And yes, Dan is wearing that orange shirt again. I swear he owns more shirts, but Ned specifically requested he wear the orange one on her birthday because orange is her favorite color.)
After a nice morning at the museum, we did "lots and lots of spaghetti" right and went to Buca for lunch.
Cheers!
Happy Birthday, Ned! You may be four, but you'll always be my baby girl.

Four!

2011-11-10T07:05:00.012-06:00

Guess who turned 4 yesterday? (insert Mama's *sigh* here)

This will be quick post of some shots from Ned's annual birthday photo shoot yesterday. Our usual warehouse lot photo shoot didn't mesh well with a rainy, windy, 40 degree day, so this year's photos were taken at the Milwaukee Art Museum; convenient, since that's where Ned wanted to spend her birthday anyway. More later on the rest of her big day. :)

(If I do say so myself, subjects don't get any easier than my baby girl.)

Halloween!

2011-10-31T20:22:00.019-05:00

Okay, okay, at least it's still October, right? I mean, haven't missed a month entirely yet...doesn't that count for something? (Juli, you can't say anything. Your blog is rather...how shall we say...silent these days. Renee doesn't even have a blog for me to follow along on the adventures of Bob-Bob and NeNe. And Elisabeth, is this when I comment that you are waaaaaaay too crazy organized, on-top-of-everything, and flat out calm to mother a crew of 4? And that you make me somewhat reluctant to complain how 2 kiddos are kickin' my rear? Don't worry, I said it makes me reluctant, not that it would actually stop me.)

They're kickin' my rear, people. I stand by my theory. 1 + 1 = 3. Our neighbors just had their second child and I have for months now been feeding my theory to Rob in preparation. He confirmed a week after the child's birth that indeed, 1 + 1 = 3. (Unless you're cut from Elisabeth's over-achieving cloth. She'd be... hmmmm... Gortex? Or perhaps just a good ol' hardworking hemp. Organic hemp that is, dyed with organic root vegetables grown in her own garden...you get the point. Elisabeth is my hero.)

Back to my point. I promise I will get back to regular blogging. I will. Really.

In the meantime, can I tide you over with some Halloween photos? Good.

Yes, I realize Nedy is carving pumpkins in her Kai-Lan underpants. What? Kam thinks it's funny.
Kam is pretty amazing on the language front. His vocabulary grows by the day it seems. Hot, cold, warm, cup, water, milk, cracker, cookie, up, down, car, dog, eat, break, rip, sock, shoe, ball, bottle, bag, box, toy, cow, cat, gate, sit, etc. His receptive language is awesome, too. He can follow most simple instructions. I love it. Language development is one of my greatest parenting joys. I laughed when Kam saw the goop that comes out of pumpkins. "MESH!" (mess), he announced.
Mesh, indeed. :)
Artsy mesh. :)
Just look at her face. Ohmygosh, they may be kickin' my rear these days, but I adore these little beings to the moon a million times over.
Nedy's pumpkin design. She drew it on with marker and Baba carved it out.
And the moment you've been waiting for. Darth Vader Nedy. Thanks to cousin John-John for the costume. While most of the other gals were bland in their (lame) princess get-ups, the Nedster rocked Vader somethin' fierce. That's my girl!
Neighbor buds.
I take a photo of Ned and Maddy every year on Halloween. They are starting to look...old. Sigh.
And my Yoda guy up from his nap!
He was initially weirded out by the gobs of people running around in costumes in the rain but quickly decided this is his idea of a good time.
Classic. What else needs to be said?
Cute baby. Cute, cute, cute.
Nana and Papa came over to hang out and eat dinner after trick-or-treating.
Little did Papa know that Nedy had planned an hour-long physical for him. He got checked out and even got shots. Lots of 'em. But she bandaged his arm and told him he'd be fine in a couple weeks. Papa was such a good sport. She's serious about her doctor play and still says her plan is to be a "doctor, scientist and race car driver" when she grows up.

So that was Halloween Sunday! And I have an October blog post up! Yay for me. ;)

Door County 2011

2011-09-15T02:14:00.000-05:00

And I'm back! :)

I can't believe it has taken me two weeks to get the Door County post up. Goodness. Thanks to Juli for the gentle prodding resulting in this 2am post; I am so behind on blogging it's ridiculous. (In my defense, our geriatric laptop's many "senior moments" of late haven't correlated well to my patience level. Not wanting to hurt the machine--i.e. "Dang! How did my coffee spill all over this thing?!"--I've mostly stayed away. Dan assures me he has purchased whatever we need to make this dinosaur function reasonably. Now all he needs is the time to install it. BUT ANYWAY.)

Door County! So my side of our family makes an annual trek to Door County for a Labor Day weekend getaway. This is our...hmmmm...5th year? Maybe more? It's always a good time of goofing around and enjoying the kids enjoying a giant sleepover with their cousins. This year was a bit disappointing in terms of weather; we usually spend hours and hours at the beach but this year found it just too chilly for more than a single afternoon of play. Sadly, when everyone else was at the beach playing, Ned and Kam were napping. We did manage to make it out there afterward for an hour until a storm blew in.

Otherwise we spent the weekend hanging out, eating, playing, hanging out, eating, playing, eating...you get the picture. Speaking of pictures, I'll let them do the rest of the talking. I'm tired. Juli, I blame you for this. ;)

Early morning tie-dying--can you believe I didn't get a pic of the kiddos in the finished product?!
Mini golf! Nedy loooooves mini golf. I think she thinks you can only mini golf in Door County because it's an automatic association for her; as in "Door County is next month! That means miniature golfing!!!"
This little guy looooooves vacation. He slept great (a big worry I had) and really enjoyed interacting with everyone.
Ice cream for lunch! (Don't they look like they know they're getting away with something?)
Kam's sideways glance. I love this face.
Bingo time! Nedy was excited that she didn't need help this year and actually won a game. Papa gives gold dollar prizes. (As an aside, a gold dollar may as well be a $50 bill to kids. Funny. Maybe they think they're actually gold?)
Bingo time came with stern sisterly warnings about choking hazards. Eagles Eyes Ned.
The next morning worked out decently for our annual photos; chilly, but decent lighting. Now is when I say that adding 2 babies to the mix made getting the perfect shot a huge challenge...but I guess now that I think about it, this shot is pretty much perfect, isn't it? Dang, we have cute kids.
My brother John's family:
My sister Jackie's family:
My sister Lisa's family:
And us. I should note that I haven't edited or cropped any of these pics yet, so stop looking at Dan's shoes. They'll be gone soon. ;)
Dad and us kids:
Kam taking a break from photo hell to stick his head in the sand. Smart boy.
Everyone. (Wow, there are a lot of us.)
Cute, right? I love this shot.
Cute, right? ;) I can't believe how big my first baby is getting.
Kam does this thing where he winks when the light is bright. It's hilariously adorable. Look at those sandy feet.
Our bit of beach time.
How cute are they? Be still my beating heart.
Board games! Nedy is totally into board games. And playing with her older cousins? Icing on the cake.
Kam and his new cousin, Yubin. Yubin is 4 months older. I can't wait to see their friendship develop over the years. (They don't have a choice in the matter in case you're wondering.)
Kam loooooooves Papa. He says, "Puh-puh" and bows when he sees him. It's so cute.
Some sort of robotic bugs racing on a pizza pan. I'm telling you, we know how to have a good time. ;)
Kam feeding Nana soggy Fruit Loops. Yep, that's love.
Uncle Johnny and Kam discussing their hairlines.

And there you have it. Door County 2011 documented. (Most importantly, a post with recent pictures.)

I'm going to bed now. In case you're wondering. ;)

Baby cuteness.

2011-08-12T17:48:00.003-05:00

I have a ton of updates to do, but wanted to post this pic my friend Holly took of Kam--how cute is this?! (For the record, we did promptly remove the dirty hose from his mouth after the photo was snapped...just sayin'.) (More to come! I just need a couple more hours in the day, that's all.)

Finally an update.

2011-07-18T22:07:00.000-05:00

Look at me! I'm up for the Bad Blogger of the Year Award! ;)

Sorry for my lack of updates. Truly, we've settled into our new normal fairly well and I'd like to say I have an excuse for my blogging hiatus. But I don't. (Well, besides just being busy in our new "1+1=3" scenario.)

The last few weeks have been so interesting. Up until then, Kamron's mode of operation was consistently stoic. He'd mill about and explore, but overall seemed to be keeping his new life at arm's length. I kind of felt like if he could talk he might say, "Yeah, y'all (yes, he'd have a southern twang...) are real nice and all and I've had some fun times, but I'm ready to go back home now. 'kay?"

Having walked this adoption road before--and in the not-so-distant past at that--I knew this sort of "operating at the periphery" was normal for many kids, Nedy included, and that this too shall pass. On a related note, I am amazed at how much I am able to draw from our experience with Nedy as we navigate these early days with Kamron. With Ned, I was constantly worried about her emotional state of being. (Actually, worried is probably an understatement. Obsessed is more accurate.) I would read and read and then read some more and get progressively more entrenched in all that "could be wrong" with our attachment. If you've ever read anything on attachment, you know how quickly you can assign issues. In doing so, I was hyper-alert at all times, looking for symptoms and signs and generally driving. myself. insane. What did I learn from it? Not to do it again! Really. What I failed to fully understand the first time around is that "instant attachment" is a lie. Many parents claim it on blogs (example: "Day 3. She is attaching perfectly.") but then when you get to know them and talk it out in real life, you find that, more often than not, they were afraid to voice the "real deal" because undoubtedly someone would respond by telling them, "But this is what you wanted." As if the fact that it is HARD makes you want the child less. Goodness. But I digress.

My point is, Kamron's early months of cautious stoicism are normal and--dare I say it--good. He's not seeking to flirt for fear that without it his needs would go unmet. I believe, because of the excellent care he received from his loving foster family, that he expects we will take care of him. I am so thankful for that. He's smartly approaching us with cautiousness because, while I think he knows we will meet his every need, I am pretty sure he's wondering who will pop into his life next to take over that caretaking. Given his early experiences, I'd say cautiousness is a completely fair and appropriate approach.

And now to what makes the past couple weeks interesting. Basically, he's coming out of his shell. He started smiling...a lot. (Oh my gosh, his dimples are just adorable. And he has this way of smiling where the very corners of his mouth turn down to form the cutest smirk.) And he's laughing out loud. (His foster family told us he did this, and now we finally get to hear it!) And he comes over to greet me when I get in from work. And he's hugging back. And occasionally planting an open-mouth, wet-as-heck kiss on my lips. He remains resistant to close eye contact when he's being held, but his eye contact otherwise is steadily improving, so I expect this will come with time, too. Day by day, he's allowing us in more and more. I learned through experience with Nedy that true attachment is a months and years long process, not an event. Having "walked the road" before is allowing me to experience our process with Kamron differently; more patiently...more sanely. ;)

In other news, Kamron began cruising a lot and taking steps a couple weeks ago. He is taking his time, practicing here and there, and as you saw in my video post a couple days ago, recently began wobbly walking distances of 10 steps or more, to which Nedy and I squeal a harmonious chorus of "YAAAAYYYYYY, KAMRON!"

The development of his communication is so fun to watch. He can say Mama, but never on command. I think he's got a bit of a stubborn streak. :) He can say Mao Mao (our cat Hank has been "Mao Mao" since Nedy was little), can "meeeoooow" to the cat, can say dog (gog), cup (guk), coo coo like our clock (goo goo) and a few other one-time mimicries. When I sing "Itsy Bitsy Spider" he moves his hands in the spider motion and even puts his hands over his head for the "out comes the sun" part. He loves singing and songs, especially the ABC song. The letters S ("ssssss") and V ("vvv-vvv-veeee" with a tickle) always make him laugh. When he is done with eating he motions "all done" in sign language and knows the word ("mow") and sign for "more", too.

Last Thursday he had his 12-month well baby check. He is in the 99th percentile for height and weight. He is almost 28 pounds now! He is healthy and on-track developmentally. (Of course, as always happens three days following a trip to the pediatrician's office, he now has a horrible chest cold complete with wheezing and terrible coughing. Our Sunday morning trip to urgent care revealed that dreaded "it's viral, nothing to do but wait it out" diagnosis. Poor baby.)

Nedy is a Rockstar of a big sister. She has so seamlessly adjusted to sharing her world with her brother. And the funny stuff that comes out of her mouth is just icing on the cake. For instance:

Nedy: "Mama, how do babies get out of ladies' tummies?"

Me: "Through their girl parts. They push the baby out."

Nedy: "I'm confused."

Me: "Well, it's kind of like when you need to make a poop. Your body tells you that it's time and you go to the toilet and push it out. When a lady's body tells her that it's time for the baby to come out, she gets some help from a doctor or some other baby helper and they tell her when to push. And then the baby comes out."

Nedy: "From her girl parts?"

Me: "Yes."

Nedy: (long pause...thinking...) "I'm definitely adopting my kids because sometimes when I push a poop out my butt hurts and babies are bigger than poopers."

Does it get any funnier? You should have seen Dan's face behind Nedy as this conversation is happening. It was priceless.

So that's it for now. I will try to get some pictures up sometime soon. I need to get back to my weekly blogging. I am hoping by saying that out loud I will actually do it...

Life is good. :)

someone has something to show you... :)

2011-07-17T15:19:00.007-05:00

Yay Kamron! He is so proud of himself. Trust me when I say the feeling is mutual. :)

(And I am still working on a real post with actual words, but my free time these days is...limited. Stay tuned.)

Kamron's 1st Birthday Party

2011-06-20T10:33:00.026-05:00

In Korea, first birthdays are a big deal. A really big deal--an important right of passage in the Korean culture to be celebrated in a BIG way. It usually involves elaborate decorating/food preparation and the rental of a hall to accommodate the many guests. Think wedding. That big.

Initially--as in many, many months ago--I had this grand plan to throw Kamron a more traditional dol. We were going to go to the Korean bakery in Chicago and pick up all of the traditional baked goods and have it catered by a Korean restaurant, etc., etc. I thought maybe 70 guests or so.

Yeah, not the best plan for an introverted (whether by personality or by current circumstance?) kiddo who is still adjusting to his new day-to-day. I really, really struggled with how to handle his first birthday. In the end we decided to follow our gut and throw him a very small family party...on a boat! My sister Lisa did the research for us to charter the Milwaukee Maiden on Father's Day. I think it was a really good decision for Kamron. Aside from some minor upset when he was dressed in his hanbok, I think he enjoyed himself.

Kamron enjoyed crawling around the boat and cruising around from chair to chair. Exploring new surroundings circled by familiar people is Kamron's idea of a good time, I think.
See what I mean about upset around the hanbok? I guess Kam isn't a fan of getting dressed up. Look closely--big crocodile tears and everything.
Mama to the rescue. His hanbok is lovely--and particularly special because his foster family gave it to him. (As an aside, pink and purple are not associated with girls in Korea. It's refreshing. They're just colors like all the other colors.)
Time for the dol jabi ritual where Kamron would choose his future! We all gathered around to see what would attract him. First choice? Drum roll, please...
The bowl of rice! There seem to be various meanings--all related--associated with some selections. The most commonly held meaning associated with choosing rice means the child will always have food and shelter.
Kamron was pleased to finally be able to mouth his sister's play rice. He's had his eye on it for some time now.
I think Kamron could have stopped at the rice. He was satisfied. Nedy decided to encourage him a bit by playing with some of the stuff herself.
He fell for it! He's back in the game! What would his second choice be? Knife (good cook), stethoscope (doctor), money (rich)...??? Such a tough choice. I thought for a second it was going to be the knife, but he passed it over and came around to...
The book! Scholarly! I like it.
And finally, the ruler was his third choice. A ruler means good at handiwork/making things. Score!
The crowd is pleased! Good work, Kam!
Later on he decided the paintbrush was super cool; he held it for a loooooong time. Artist maybe? :)
Cake time!
How funny. The child who gets into absolutely everything decides to go at the cake all gingerly. (He was probably shocked that no one was saying, "Nooooooooooo, Kamron...")
Yuuuuuuuummmmmmmm.
For the record, gift opening on a boat is just more fun. :)
생일 축하해, Kamron!

Guess who's one?

2011-06-14T20:57:00.023-05:00

Kamron turned one today! We must have sang 'happy birthday' to him 50 times--turns out he likes that song a lot. (Not as much as the theme song to Angelina Ballerina, but that's for another post...) Anyway, after his usual marathon morning nap, Nana and Papa surprised us by bringing Josiah, Samuel and Julia over to share in the birthday cheer. They even brought a tiny heart-shaped cake!

(From this angle it totally looks like a hamburger bun, but I assure you it was indeed a small heart-shaped pound cake.)

After that, per our family tradition, we put Kam through the torture of taking more photos than he was interested in being part of, though given his young age and short time with us, we only subjected him to 15 minutes or so. We did let him know that next year he would be fully tortured with the full hour plus session. :)

Taking photos was so funny today--the difference between a child "trained" by my ever-present camera for two years and one who is still adjusting to his new family was...well...very evident. :) Kamron is such a serious little guy whenever we are out and about, though he has begun to ham it up quite a bit at home. His smile is so adorable--it lights up his whole face--but you'll have to take my word for it, because Kam decided to be mostly stoic for his one year old birthday pics. (And as you can see, Ned was not at all stoic about celebrating her little brother's first birthday. Ned is, after all, rarely described by the word "stoic.")

Our first stop was that concrete wall at UWM again. I love that wall for background contrast and I just wasn't happy with the last round of pics there. (Guess what? I'm not satisfied with these either, but I need to wait for Kam to be home a while longer before I try again. I was hoping to capture the smiles we get at home here, but when he's away from home he clams up a bit. Brave little guy, such a huge series of life adjustments for such a little being. And then there's that dang teething...ugh.)

Handsome little fella.
We appliqued the "1" on his shirt. Dan and I have to work on our appliqueing skills. :)
Just look at that face.
And big sister, who, after inspecting Kamron's shirt this morning (and pointing out it's flaws, I might add) announced, "Hey Mama, I'm gonna wear my 3 shirt today and that way me and Kamron are both wearing numbers and we'll know how old we are when we look at these pictures, okay?" That Ned. She's a thinker.
I had to go to work for a couple hours this afternoon after the brief stop at the concrete wall. When I got home, everyone was rested and ready to go so we walked to Big Bay Park for some time at the lake. Kamron has been to the lake a few times. He likes it a lot. He likes the sound of waves and would eat the entire beach of sand if we let him. (I'll never understand that--why do kids repeatedly try to eat sand? One try I get--heck it might be sugar for goodness sake--but after that first gritty tongue coating? I mean, they go back for more?!?) Needless to say, no photos of Kam on the sand because it takes all of us to police his sand-eating ways.
Feet! Soooooo cute. He crosses his feet a lot.
Kam likes the breakwater. He laughs and laughs when I run him out on it.
And we brought the tripod for some family shots! I think these came out super cute.
Ned's "scrunched nose" look of irritation. It's sooooooo funny.Happy birthday, Kam. We love you. We can't wait to watch you bloom over the next year.

Covered Bridge Park

2011-06-06T21:33:00.016-05:00

Photos from an impromptu stop at Covered Bridge Park in Cedarburg Saturday--good thing my camera is almost always in the car. I just looooove the series of Kam and his chubby little dimpled hands. And the last shot on the post--let's just say heart melting into a puddle of goo. :)

I should have an update post up sometime this week. In short, multiple kiddo illness aside, we are doing really well. Dare I say it, we might even be getting the hang of this two kiddo thing...knock on wood. :)

the view from here

2011-05-31T21:45:00.013-05:00

finding a groove

2011-05-22T11:37:00.004-05:00

Sorry for my blogging gap--transitions have a way of messing with my blogging. In any event, we've been home a month and I wanted to give an update on where we're at in finding our groove as a family of four.

In short, we're still finding our groove. If you know where it is, let us know. We'd like to have it back. :) Seriously, one of my friends told me that when dealing with kids under 3 years old, in her experience, 1 + 1 = 3. Yeah, I can totally relate to that. I never feel like there is quite enough of me to do everything I want to for each of them. I guess that's where the guilt inherent to parenthood comes in. Though I am trying very hard to avoid the beast called guilt. I'm not perfect. My kids won't be perfect. I'm going to mess up. They're going to blame me for it down the road. It is what it is. Who am I to deny them the future opportunity to talk about the shortcomings of their (well-intended) Mom? :)

Our 14 hour flight home from Korea was smooth. Kamron had a rough night the night before and finally crashed for an extended period (9 hours) on the flight. I didn't sleep, though. I just kept looking at him, waiting for him to start wailing. Let me tell you, Kamron has a really loooouuuud cry when he's really upset. I had spent much of the night before listening to it and trying, without success, to calm him. My biggest fear was a repeat episode on the plane. Thankfully, it never happened. When he was awake, I put him in the Ergo and walked up and down the aisle with him while stuffing bread and cheese in him. Ahhhh, food, the international language of love. ;)

We got home at around 10pm that Friday and introduced Kamron to his new home. Let me just say that he liked the house a heck of a lot better than the car seat. ;) We stayed up playing until 4am or so and then crashed--Kam until 7am and Ned and Dan until 9am. Me? Yeah, not so much. East-to-west jet lag and I are mortal enemies. For real. Like, with swords and everything.

Kamron busted through jet lag within a couple days and was sleeping pretty well. Dan did the same. Ned did okay, with just a week or so of midnight wake-ups asking me, "Mama? Is it lunch time?" As a result, Ned and I spent several midnights sitting on the kitchen floor in our PJs eating ham and cheese. :) And me? No sleep for about 4 days followed by a week of a couple hours of sleep. And all of that was while using sleep meds. Mortal enemies, me and jet lag. Mortal enemies. :)

After a two week "honeymoon" period, Kamron's sleep patterns fell apart and he began waking every 45 minutes or so. I would get up right away and tend to him, which instantly resulted in a wide-awake, jabbering baby. This went on for a week or so, meaning he was netting just a few hours sleep in total at night and I was sleepless again, making for a crabby daytime baby and Mama. What to do? The adoption books all say, "meet the need!" and discourage sleep training, but my gut said a modified sleep training was needed here so that everyone could get some sleep. I mean, how is bonding to occur during waking hours if everyone is exhausted and irritable? So we did it. And it worked. (Knock on wood.) After a couple nights of him waking repeatedly, me tending to him saying, "it's time for night-nights, let's go to sleep" and some back patting followed by my exit and his crying response (lather, rinse, repeat, of course), Kam is now sleeping through the night. And we're all more joyful during the day. There are some very heated opinions about sleep training, but I do know this: sleep is important for coping with change. A child (and parent, for that matter) who is not sleeping well will be ill-equipped to effectively process a change of this magnitude.

Kamron has been "slow to warm up"--we went for weeks with very little in terms of response to our baby "goo goo" antics. That was HARD. I didn't realize how much we humans are "fed" by the responses of babies. It was hard to keep going with our "goo-goo/gaa-gaas" without so much as a smile or a bit of eye contact. But we kept it up. And kept it up. And kept it up some more. And then, about three weeks in, Kamron woke up one morning responding--smiling, laughing with a full toothy grin, and maintaining eye contact from distances of a foot or more. And that's where we are now. We have pretty joyful days overall. We are still working on close eye contact--he's hesitant to look at us in the eyes while we hold him, for instance--but we know how much trust it takes to do that and we're confident time and continued love and care will be the remedy as it was with Nedy. Day by day and step by step.

Kam's current sleeping schedule is morning nap from 9:30-12:30ish, afternoon nap from 3:00-4:30ish, and bedtime from 8:30 through about 6:30am.

As far as eating goes, some days are better than others, most likely related to his teething. Days he chews on his hand more are the days he eats less. Overall, he's not picky and tries new things all the time. His favorites are Cheerios by the spoonful (eaten as cereal rather than toddler finger food), kiwi, strawberries, cheese, bread, yogurt, and ginger snaps. He drinks about 3 - 8 ounce bottles a day. He transitioned seamlessly from Korean formula to Similac.

Nedy is doing great in her role as big sister. She is very protective, always guiding Kam to appropriate toys for him (he is unbelievably attracted to things he should not have--they should make baby toys that look more...well, not like baby toys...). I was needlessly worried about her adjustment to sharing our attention. She has been helpful, kind and overall very patient. I am really proud of her and very grateful, as growing from a family of 3 to a family of 4 is demanding enough without 3 year-old drama on top of it! :) Nedy has taken to calling Kamron "Kamrony"--a nod to her own nickname I suppose. It's cute.

Kamron is content to be carried around in the Ergo, so we spend a lot of time like that. We try to get to the park every other day at least so Ned can burn off some energy and Kam can watch the kids at play. He is interested in his environment; very watchful and curious. It's funny when he mimics the "caaaaawww" of a crow or the "woof woof" of a dog. He is a skilled mimic, especially of funny faces. He has caught on to several bits of language. When I ask him, "How big is Kamron?" he holds up both arms high in the air and smiles when I say, "Sooooo biiiiiiig." He can also wave "hi" and "bye" and uses slow, open-handed pets when I tell him, "Gentle, gentle." Hank is VERY thankful he caught on to the word gentle after losing a few tufts of fur to Kam's excited hands. He looooooves animals. He squeals with delight every time he sees Hank and works hard to crawl to him. Of course, Hank waits for Kam to get within inches and then darts off. He's such an old tease. :)

Kam is now crawling "baby book style" most of the time now and is able to pull himself up to standing. Dan said he saw him creep earlier today. His feet now stand firmly flat on the ground rather than on his tip-toes or heels. I wonder when he'll walk...and wonder how much more I'll have to move out of his reach! :) He is much, much more of an environment explorer than Nedy was as a baby. As our neighbor says, "He's a boy!" Not sure I buy the whole gender-ingrained differences idea, but I will say he is much more active/busy than Ned.

I think that's it for now! I want to get some photos up, but sadly I haven't had as much time to take photos the past few weeks. I need to remedy that--these kids are growing up before my eyes! Maybe tomorrow?? :)

Ooooh, those cheeks.

2011-05-08T10:31:00.001-05:00

Cute, cute, cute. Just sayin'.

Happy Mama's Day

2011-05-08T10:12:00.011-05:00

We spent 10 minutes yesterday at yet another random city wall. :) (Hey, at least we've moved from brick to concrete.) Lessons? I need a lot more practice photographing two kiddos and babies don't smile when you want them to. Nonetheless, here are a few. If I do say so myself, this Mama has some adorable sprouts.
For the record, Dan is perched behind Kamron holding him up on the wall shots. I'm not that crazy for a good shot. Close, but not quite. ;)

Easter, jet-lag style

2011-04-28T12:25:00.000-05:00

Seoul Day 7: Family Day

2011-04-28T11:43:00.013-05:00

Thursday morning we woke up to Ned asking, "Hey, today is Thursday, right? Dat means it's Kamron day!" I had long been considering the transfer of Kamron to our care and how that might play out with Ned. That morning decided to ask Lisa and Josiah to ride with us over to the SWS offices and then take Nedy out for a walk during our meeting. Thankfully they agreed!

When we arrived at the SWS offices at 11:00am, we worked out that we would meet up with Lisa, Josiah and Ned at the nearby Starbucks (how appropriate, right?) at around noon. We headed up to the 7th floor and saw Kamron's Foster Mom changing him. The social worker met us at the door and said that Kam still needed his exit physical at the clinic downstairs, and asked if we would like to see the 'Baby Reception Home'. This is where babies who are entrusted to SWS's care live for the first month or so until a Foster Family is located and approved. We were excited to see it, especially since Kam spent a few weeks here.

The number of babies there--near 40--surprised me. The social worker who accompanied us said that they are always full. She noted that single parenting in Korea is not an option for many women, as support is not available and societal pressures strongly discourage parenting out of wedlock. I asked her about domestic adoption within Korea and she responded that the attitude is generally improving, but slowly. Focus for Korean agencies is to attempt placement of children domestically for a period of 6 months before referring children for international adoption. The social worker told me about half of the children we saw would be adopted domestically.
After our visit, we headed back next door to the SWS offices. Kam was back from his physical by then. We sat down with the Foster Mother and Father and reviewed all of his care particulars we had learned a few days before. SWS gave us a written report. We were walked through the bags of things they were sending with us--his favorite toys, a mobile, several sets of clothes, his bowl and utensils, lots of bottles, 3 cans of formula, diapers, and several portions of jook (rice porridge) to take the pressure off us for his next meals. Kamron's Foster Family put a lot of effort into bringing everything they thought he might need as he transitioned to our care. We are so appreciative of that.
With tears in her eyes, Kam's Foster Mother told us, through the social worker who interpreted, that she gave him her best care and lots of love. What a wonderful family.
SWS likes to keep these transfer meetings relatively short and controlled, which makes sense given the intensity of emotion in an experience like this. After about 40 minutes, we were told it was time to go. We walked with everyone to the elevator, where I had the chance to give his Foster Mother and Father big hugs. I put on our Ergo and Kamron was transferred to me. He didn't cry, just looked at my face curiously as we were immediately shepherded into the elevator; we were told the Foster Family would stay back until we were out of sight.

Out of the elevator, we said good bye to the social worker who had escorted us down and walked down the street, me with a confused baby on my front and Dan loaded to the gills with bags of stuff. We kept waiting for the crying to start, but it didn't. "Calm before the storm", I remarked to Dan.

Down the road at Starbucks, Ned ran to greet us, "LITTLE BRUDDER!!! It's youuuuuuu!!!" She checked him out, he checked her out. And so it begins.
On the cab ride back to our hotel, Kam fell asleep. And stayed that way for hours. So we went for a walk in the park.
Afterward, we headed back to the hotel where Kam woke up and starting playing. Dan said, "Maybe he's just calm?" To which I responded, "Calm before the storm, buddy. Calm before the storm." And, as if on cue, Kam starting screaming. And I mean top-of-his-lungs, ear-piercing, painful-to-witness screams. Poor baby. But I was glad for those screams. Because he should have been be screaming and scared.

All night he screamed. We tried everything we knew to do, knowing full well that he needed time to scream and grieve and just tell us how mad he was, but as parents, even to a child you've only known for a few hours, you just want to fix their hurt. Tough times. I remember those times with Ned clearly and, in my most difficult moments that night, I thought about Ned and the love we've built since then and found much comfort, for him and me, in that.

Thankfully, there was a Korean War veteran event at our hotel and our immediate neighbor told me not to worry about the noise because he couldn't hear anyway. Pheeew. ;)

After what seemed an eternity, the morning light came. Korea is known as the 'land of morning calm', and thankfully, that was our experience Friday morning. Probably due to sheer exhaustion, but calm nonetheless. But that's another post, because someone just woke up. :)

What's with me and cliff-hangers?!

2011-04-24T21:16:00.003-05:00

I know, I know. The post-adoption cliff-hangers on this blog are now two too many. :)

We are home and adjusting well, despite four horrible cases of jet lag! We've made the best of it with a couple middle of the night marathon play sessions, but I am hopeful tonight we will turn a corner and everyone will get the sleep we all need.

Kamron is such a lovable, squishy and delightful guy. He was tremendously serious at first, but the past couple of days we have seen more and more of his goofy side as he giggles and plays. He loves to play with toys and go for walks outside. Oh, and he loves to eat. This morning he pounded back an entire waffle and a handful of peeled and chopped grapes. With 6 teeth. Tonight he ate 10 sweet potato gnocchi and some toast. Amazing. He's only 10 months, but he's been enjoying table food for a while now and knows what he's doing with those 6 teeth!

Ned is doing a great job. She handled the trip like a pro and, even in the midst of terrible jet lag, has been very patient and kind with Kam...until he starts chewing on her clothes, that is. "Kamwun, dat gwoss! Don't suck on clothes; they're for wearing, not eating."

Good times. Anyway, more to come over the next couple days, but wanted to at least get a small update out there to say all is well! Stay tuned.

Seoul Day 6: Insadong

2011-04-20T09:01:00.024-05:00

Day 6. Wednesday. The day before Kamron joins our family. I hope I remember how babies work! :)

In the morning, we had plans to take the subway to Insadong to have a chop made for Josiah and pick up a few gifts. An then there was that little outstanding issue for me and Dan of finding just the right piece of art to remember this trip by. We had seen some things we liked, but not anything yet that was an instant "that's it!" for us. So we thought we'd spend a couple hours in the morning, while it was still quiet, in Insadong.

First things first, we wanted to visit the Buddhist temple there. Buddha's birthday is coming up in May and the preparations we've seen around the city have been really neat; brightly colored lanterns seem to be multiplying overnight! When we arrived at the temple, a service was underway and the chanting combined with the spectacle of the magnificent lantern display (still under construction) was a really neat experience.
I mean, really, can you believe how cool looking this is?!? Now imagine standing under this canopy and listening to the chants of the monks while the lantern tags blow in the breeze. Neat.
A group of ladies worked together to craft lanterns in front of the temple. They did every part of the process starting with bending the wire frame.
After the temple, it was chop time. Josiah really liked Kamron's chop and wanted one of his own. Dan decided to take a back alley to cut through to the chop shop when we came upon this fantastic little one-artist gallery. And there it was. The piece. The artist carves stone to make stamps and then does block prints of them. He sells the prints (they're gorgeous), but he also works a few of his retired stamps into wall hangings. And that's what caught our eye. The piece is a small piece of dark wood with a stone stamp set into it. The stamp is of two simplistic owls, one littler and one a tad bigger, and there is ink staining of blue and green on the stone stamp. And get this. I started talking to the artist about the piece and he said it was called "Owl Brother" and that owls mean good fortune in Korean culture. How perfect is that? So now that I've described it (ooooh, it is soooooo cool), I really wish I had a photo of it to put up. But it's sitting next to me bubble-wrapped to the max. I think I might sleep with it. Kidding. Well, kind of. :) So here's a photo of the artist by his shop. He is such a cool guy.
Now on to Josiah's chop. He and Lisa sat and watched the artist carve it and then Josiah got a lesson in using the ink properly.
That brush/chop shop is such a delight for a photojunkie's eyes. I mean, just look at these chops.
And check out these bunches of calligraphy brushes. Man oh man, I could have photographed in there for a while.
Remember when I wrote that we planned to be in Insadong for a couple hours? Yeah, well, Insadong is really cool. And somehow a couple hours turned into, oh, ummmm...all day. I think we all enjoyed the wandering and relative "down time" given our busy past few days. And you can't beat the street food options. Josiah, Nedy, Dan and I are ga-ga over these fried peanut butter and honey doughy things--sort of like a really hot greasy doughnut stuffed with peanut butter and honey. Had a few of those today. And Dan discovered a new favorite this afternoon in the form of some sort of bean paste fried dumplings.
Oh, and it happened again. I swear, Dan is a freakin' magnet for kids working on their English interviewing projects. It's hilarious, given that he's the shy one.
Before catching the shuttle back to the hotel, we stopped at Tapgol Park for a little stroll. Dan brought Nedy and Josiah here yesterday and they wanted to show us what they saw. See that stone pagoda? It's 500 years old and is a relic of a Buddhist temple that sat where the park is now. It is protected by this really modern glass structure; interesting.
I love these next couple photos--they're just so Ned.
So that's about it for today. Sorry for the abbreviated post, but it was just a relaxing, hanging out kind of day as we await that change that tomorrow brings...!!! Next post will be from a family of 4!

Seoul Day 5: Seoul Tower, Namdaemun Market, Kamron's chop

2011-04-20T06:04:00.036-05:00

We woke up Tuesday morning to another lovely day of 60 degrees and sun. We have been so lucky in the weather department! Our attempt to take the cable car up to Seoul Tower Sunday night had been a bust with the line wrapping around the building's multiple levels given the beautiful weekend day. Tuesday morning we decided to give it another try and climbed up the hill to the cable car station again. On our way, we stopped at the outdoor portion of the Seoul Cartoon Museum.
And then it was time to continue our trek up to the cable car station. Nedy and Josiah were both pretty excited about riding the cable car that "floats" through the air on cables above, much like a ski lift only with a very large enclosed car that holds maybe 50 people, to reach the base of the Seoul Tower. Thankfully, we were there early enough and there were just a few other people in line ahead of us. We bought our tickets and climbed aboard the cable car. Nedy went over by the window to look out when a huge tourist group plowed (and I do mean PLOWED) into the car and separated us. "Mamaaaaaaaa!!!," she yelled. "Nedy, follow the sound of my voice! Nedyyyyyyyyyy!!!," I yelled to her. And before long her tear-streaked cheeks pushed through the many legs surrounding her and she hopped up into my arms and buried her little face. "Mama, I soooooo scared when dose people push us apart and den I remember we talk about if I get yost at a store and I start yelling for you just yike you said and den I found you!" Wow, I guess she does listen to me sometimes. :) Poor baby, she was was so scared.
Up at the tower's base, we bought tickets to ride the crazy elevator up another 700-some feet to the observation deck, but not before making Ned and Josiah pose for more photos.
At the top, the views were magnificent. Obviously, Seoul is a huge city. But seeing Seoul from this vantage really gave perspective on just how huge this city is. And, let me tell you, it's HUGE. It goes on and on seemingly endlessly in all directions.
I heard that the bathroom was the coolest bathroom on earth. It's a nice place to do your business, that's for sure. Nedy even decided, "I wash my hands not one time, not two times, THREE times because dis is neat in here. I can see all da city in dis bathroom. And I can weach da sink all by myself with no stool! Well, on my tippy toes."
After the ear-popping elevator ride back down, Dan gave Ned and Josiah each a padlock we brought from home to take part in the tradition of affixing a "love padlock" to the fence and topiary forms at the tower's base. The tradition is really supposed to be about lovers attaching a lock and throwing away the key as a symbol of their undying love, but we used it more as an "I was here" kind of thing. They both thought it was super cool.
Funny thing. Me, the person who photographs every freakin' thing somehow neglected to get a shot of the tower itself. So, you'll have to settle for the view of it as seen from our hotel room window:
After the tower, Lisa and I decided we wanted to brave the madness that is Namdaemun Market. Namdaemun is a market of 10,000 shops/vendors in a tight area of city blocks. We all walked down there together, but the crazy chaos of this place, even at 2:00 on a Tuesday afternoon, was too much for the kids--we feared losing them in the madness! Really, craziness. Vendors everywhere. Goods strewn all over the streets. Piles upon piles of clothing. Chatter and laughter everywhere. Absolutely vibrant.
Dan, the great guy that he is, offered to take the kids to Insadong to have Kamron's chop made while Lisa and I braved the chaos in search of the fantastic kids clothes that Korea is known for. And did we ever find them! An entire mall of children's clothing, only instead of traditional stores in a mall, the vendors sat booth next to booth, much like a flea-market style set-up. So booth after booth we blew won after won. Ohmygosh, did we find some amazing stuff--and had fun along the way attempting to communicate about sizes and bargaining for deals. Just look at the look on Lisa's face after finishing up two hours later:
So while we were planning our kids' wardrobes for the next 3 years, Dan and the kids went to a brush shop in Insadong (recommended to us by our friends back home) to have Kamron's chop made. This artist does a gorgeous job and carves the stone right there while you wait. It takes about 30 minutes. (Interesting that Nedy's chop from China is carved into hard wax on the end of the stone, but Kamron's is carved right into the stone; makes me wonder if this is related to the artist's quality or just a difference between Chinese and Korean chops...) Anyway, his chop came out beautifully. It's just gorgeous. Thanks, E, for the recommendation!
Lisa and I decided to pick up pizzas (yeah, I know) before catching a cab back to the hotel. And it's a darn good thing we did, as Dan and the kids were just about to head out the door for dinner of BOILED PIGS FEET at a place with a name that translates to "Fat Grandma's." Apparently Fat Grandma's specializes in boiled pigs feet. So we come in with pizza and Ned goes, "Awwww, Mama, nooooooooo! We were supposed to go to Fat Grandma's for pigs feet!" So we ate the pizza, but as we did Ned and Dan decided that maybe Kamron would like pigs feet and they would maybe take him on Friday. Hmmm, wonder what they're planning on doing with me? :)

Seoul Day 4: Meeting Kamron

2011-04-18T06:13:00.019-05:00

The day we've all been waiting for! :)

Nedy woke up at 4:00 this morning, shook my shoulder and whispered in her not-so-much-a-whisper whisper, "Hey Mama, dis is da day we go to da Foster Mudder's house and meet Kamron, right?" She didn't go back to sleep after I confirmed for her. "I sooooo esited!" she kept saying. Too cute.

I spent the morning today trying to catch up the blog, wrapping gifts for the Foster Family and SWS staff, and mentally preparing for our big day. Dan and Nedy went for a long walk down by the river.

Our instructions were to meet at SWS (the agency in Korea) at 2:00 where we would be transported with Kamron's social worker to the Foster Family's home for our visit. We arrived at 1:45, a first for us to actually be early. :) The SWS office was an interesting place--many babies were there, I presume with their Foster Families, and we all enjoyed watching them interact while imagining what Kamron would be like.

At 2:00 we piled into the SWS van and rode 30 minutes across Seoul to the Foster Family's home. They live on the 15th floor of a high rise building. When we arrived, we were greeted by Kamron's Foster Mother and her adult daughter who is heavily involved in his care. They welcomed us so warmly to their beautiful home that we were immediately at ease.

And there he was, looking at us curiously and timidly and clinging to his Foster Sister. "They want you to know he is shy of new people," his social worker told us. Indeed he was. So we hung back and all sat down on the floor surrounding a large play blanket that was laid out for him. Nedy moved in by him and gave him a toy, a panda rattle she brought from home. She stroked his face a few times and helped him shake his rattle. And then she started bringing him toy after toy from his bin of toys on the floor near us. He looked right at her with such curiosity in his eyes. And when she got in close enough, he reached over and grabbed her arm. "He touched me, Mama!"

For the next hour and a half we asked questions and listened to the social worker translate the Foster Family's care instructions, all the while Kamron sat and watched, as if trying to figure out all that was going on.

The care he received from his Foster Family was no doubt outstanding. The love and nurture this mother and daughter team provide him is very evident in their every interaction with him. He is so loved by this family. We are so grateful to them and are very hopeful for a continuing relationship so they can be part of his life as he grows older.

Kamron's Foster Family gave us a photo album containing photos of him in chronological order. It is wonderful to have such a nice record of his earlier months. They also gave us the most stunningly gorgeous hanbok for Kamron's first birthday celebration. Oh my goodness, it is just gorgeous. Really, really beautiful.

After we were there a while, Foster Mother brought out a table with a variety of traditional Korean baked goods (YUM!), strawberries, kiwi and juice. They were so kind and wonderful to us. I feel so lucky to have had the experience of meeting with them in their home and seeing where Kamron's early months were spent. Foster Mother also brought out a bowl of fruit for Kamron. She began feeding him pieces of strawberry and kiwi and then asked me to come over and feed him. I did so, and he accepted pieces, albeit hesitantly. Nedy decided she wanted a turn and I gave her the small plastic fork. She fed him a few pieces and was so pleased with herself. But then he turned his head and she accidentally poked him with the fork, which upset him just a bit. She felt bad about that. "I'm sorry, baby. I didn't mean to hurt you!"

The social workers from SWS took notes, allowing us to focus on being there in the moment. They will provide us a written report when Kamron is transferred to our care. Speaking of which, it was interesting how that date was set. The social worker asked us when we would like to have Kamron in our care, and of course part of me wanted to say, "Is now okay?", but seeing the love and care he is receiving and knowing how hard it will be for both Kamron and his Foster Family to deal with the separation, I said, "Whatever is best for the Foster Family." In consultation with the family, it was decided Kamron would transition to our care on Thursday at 11:00 a.m. at the SWS office, meaning we will have him a full day and then some before boarding the plane on Friday. There is something about him that tells me he is a sensitive soul, and just thinking about the change ahead of him makes my heart hurt for him. While I know he will grow to trust and love us with time, I am hopeful that at the least in the immediate we do a good job meeting his needs and providing him comfort.

Before leaving, I gave gifts to the Foster Family. I explained to the social worker that one of the gifts in particular was very special, as it was an art piece crafted by Dan's Dad. Foster Mother opened it right then and was so happy with it, commenting that she would hang it on her wall. That was a neat moment, knowing that one of Dan's Dad's pieces would be hanging in the home of this amazing family.

As we were walking out the door, I got the chance to hold Kamron for a bit. He wasn't quite sure how he felt about that, looking intently at me as if to say, "Uh, lady? Why are you holding me?" He is such a sweet, adorable baby. His disposition seems timid and calm. It sure will be fun to see what develops as he gets to know us over the next few months.

Our ride back to SWS was nice. I sat in the back of the van with Nedy and the social worker and we just gabbed about all sorts of stuff. Come to find out, she remembers our nephew Samuel from when he was in the care of SWS from baby until age three. Her face lit up when I said his Korean name (incorrectly, I should note, but she understood me anyway) and she was happy to hear how well he is doing now. Small world.

We could not have asked for a better visit. We came back to the hotel after a brief stop for dinner and coffee and met up with Lisa and Josiah (who spent the day at markets and the aquarium) to share our news, photos, and videos of the day.

And finally, photos! (Sorry for the blur factor. Sadly, in our rush to be on time, we forgot our flash today. I know, of all days, right?!?)

Seoul Day 3: Namsan Park, Namsangol Hanok Village, Bukcheong Lion Dance

2011-04-17T21:15:00.038-05:00

Our third day in Seoul began with a long walk from our hotel up through Namsan Park and down to Namsangol Hanok Village. Along the way, we walked through Pet Row. (Shopping here is a stitch. Shops selling like goods tend to be grouped together, making shopping for the best deal very convenient for the consumer no doubt, but leaving us wondering how any shop owner manages the competition...interesting. But I digress.) So, back to Pet Row. Pet shop after pet shop, all showing their most adorable puppies in their windows. I think Ned said, "Oh, he's so cuuuuuuuuuuute" like 200 times.
Namsan Park is essentially the foothills of Mt. Namsan, on which the Seoul Tower sits. It's a lovely park with commanding city views and gorgeous cherry blossoms this time of year.
And gorgeous magpie nests, too. :) Walking here is a really nice way to escape the energy of Seoul for a mind-clearing morning stroll.
Namsangol Hanok Village was our next stop. It's a mini folk village with a nice collection of restored traditional Korean houses. One the day we visited, there just so happened to be a traditional wedding happening and it was open to the public. (Ooooooh! Korean wedding crashing!) The service was long and as ritualistic as any other wedding service. I still need to look up what everything means. I do know that guy below holding the duck is the groom.
And that woman who held her arms to block her face like that (for an insanely long time, I might add) is the bride.
After the service, we checked everything out. Seriously, it was totally like Pioneer Village Korean-style.
Josiah tried his hand at some traditional games. He was really great at this one. It involved spinning a top and then smacking it with that whip to keep it in motion.
Nedy decided she wanted to try her hand at crafting a danso, a traditional Korean flute.
She worked hard to drill out the holes.
Then she sanded the rough edges and Baba attached the decorative strings.
Finally it was time to give it a try. I think the woman helping us was a bit blown away that Ned could actually blow across the danso with a tight enough embouchure to make it sound!
Look at the mutual thrill on those faces!
Josiah tried his hand at traditional kite-making. Kite-making is painstaking. And that's all I'm sayin' 'bout that. He did stick it out and now has a great souvenir for his room.
She totally digs that danso. Totally.
After our village visit, we decided to head over to the Seoul Namsan Traditional Theater to inquire about ticket availability for a show we saw a poster for earlier that morning, Bukcheong Lion Dance. As it turns out, today was the last day of the show's run and there were some tickets available. But they told us that youth had to be at least seven years old. We toyed around with having Nedy say, "I'm seven, I turn eight in November", but ultimately decided to respect the rules and Dan, Lisa and Josiah got tickets for the 3:00 show. Nedy was disappointed that she and I would miss out. Heck, so was I. So I went down to the box office and explained that I have a three year old who is going on 17 (I don't think my joke translated well...) and would they be willing to allow her in? And they said yes! Yay! Theater for all of us!
They even brought Ned a cushy booster seat! This is Ned's anticipation before the show:
Her reaction after the show:
The kid just loves theater. This show was in Korean and I could barely follow the plot, but the masked characters and random lion dancer appearances kept her on the edge of her seat. In the middle of the show she whispered, "I love dis show! I'm so glad you and me could come, too!"
After the show, they announced that the actors would be putting on a brief performance outside to celebrate the closing of the show. We rushed to the elevator only to have the door open and be met by members of the company! Nedy looked star-struck as they made room and invited us in. And then the drummer guy gave Nedy his stick and told her to pound on his drum!
Outside, the drum and dance performance was magnificently electric. It was really neat. And really loud. :)
Our day ended with a climb up the skirt of Mt. Namsan to the station from which the cable cars climb up the line to Seoul Tower. But it was a Sunday night, and a smog-free one at that, and the line was insanely long. Looks like Tuesday will be our day for that! So much to see, so little time! :)

Seoul Day 2: Gyengbokgung Palace, Bukchon Hanok Village, Changdeokgung Palace, Dinner in Insadong

2011-04-16T23:18:00.002-05:00

Ned woke up bright and early Saturday morning...at 4:00 a.m. What can I say, we got an early start on the day. :) We decided to make use of the beautiful day by seeing some of the palaces. We made more use of our hotel's shuttle ('tram', as Nedy calls it) and rode to Insadong at 8:00, a good starting point for our walking tour. Nedy has a special seat right up front on the 'tram'--and she is obsessed with the fact that there are no seat belts. "But Mama, dis is sooooo dangawous!" Yep, we're livin' on the edge here in Korea.
Our first destination was Gyeonbokgung Palace, considered the most prominent of Seoul's places because of its downtown location. (It is always an interesting/juxtapositional (is that a word?) experience to visit these old palaces and see the skyscrapers surrounding the preserved history.) Anyway, like most palaces in Korea, this one has gorgeous architectural details, but the buildings are mostly empty because the furnishings and artwork were stripped during the Japanese colonial era. I am always amazed by the detail work of these palaces; mostly that they can maintain them so beautifully.
Josiah is my budding photographer buddy. He's been watching me and asking questions...and burning up Lisa's only memory card. I love seeing him curl up on the ground to get just the right angle. Boy after my own heart.So, as is the case with every single trip we've taken to Asia to date, Dan got stopped on our way out of the palace by a group of students doing a school project aimed at practicing English. They asked all the usual questions: Where are you from? Why did you come to Korea? What do you like about Korea?
One of the girls was dressed in her Taekwondo uniform. When she found out Josiah also practiced Taekwondo, she showed him her form. Not to be outdone, Josiah put on his bravery suit and got right in the mix to perform his own form for the group. They all clapped and cheered. And Josiah was just beaming. Awesome. It was one of those experiences that I'll never forget--a moment of real connection for him.
From the palace, we walked to an area called Bukchon. This neighborhood is just fantastic. It's a collection of tight, winding alleyways lined with traditional Korean tile-roof homes built in the early 20th century. The homes are packed so closely together that when you look at them from above, it's just a sea of black tile. Gorgeous.
The organization of materials in traditional Korean building is magnificent. Dan was all ga-ga over this and somehow I can see it incorporated into our addition plans...
Dan is smitten with this area. Can you tell? :)
How cool are the manhole covers? Love it.
Next stop on our walking tour was Changdeokgung Palace. While Gyeongbokgung is the largest palace in Seoul, but many think Changdeokgung is the most beautiful. I agree. This place is a photographer's dream. For real.
I really could spend an entire day photographing the details here. Amazing.

By this time, we were getting a bit hungry and decided to walk back to Insadong for dinner at one of the alley restaurants before Nedy filled up on chocolate filled cookies.
We chose a restaurant called Salt. Dan has no idea what he ordered, but he sure enjoyed it.
The thing about eating at alley restaurants is that there aren't any forks. Josiah and Ned had a great time trying to teach Aunt Lisa how to be proficient with chopsticks. Notice Ned's chopsticks in the air in demonstration form. I can still hear Ned in my head, "No Aunt Yisa, yike dis! YIKE DIS!!!"
Good food, good times.
And then after a brief dip in the pool, it was off to bed for us. Just one more day until we meet Kamron!

Seoul Day 1: early arrival, Dongdaemun Market, Insadong, Insabed by 6:00 (ha!)

2011-04-16T17:58:00.002-05:00

Hello from Seoul!
Our flight left Chicago at 1:00 a.m. Thursday (overnight Wednesday for practical purposes) and arrived in Seoul 14 hours later at 5:00 a.m. Friday Seoul time. Before we left, so many people commented on what a pain they suspected it would be to make such a flight with a 3 year old in tow. Needless worry. Ned is a better traveler than me. She slept on the way to the airport and then woke up when we got there at 11:oo p.m....and stayed awake until 3:00 a.m. (I guess she heard me when I told people how Asiana serves steak on red eye flights at around 2:00 a.m. and she didn't want to miss it...) Anyway, she did eventually fall asleep and slept a good 7 hours. When she woke up, we were only 5 hours away. Enter I-pad. What did people do before such technology? :)
We arrived in Seoul a bit earlier than scheduled at a few minutes before 5:00 a.m. We piled our luggage into a cab and made the 45 minute drive to our hotel, the Grand Ambassador Seoul. When we arrived, they told us our rooms would be ready at about 11:00 a.m. Enter longest freakin' day of our lives.

Our crumpled and stinky selves (Ned still in her pajamas from the night before) walked down the street our hotel is on and began what seemed an endless morning of wandering in Dongdaemun Market. The markets are all organized by type of goods. One mall had nothing but hat vendors. Another had all sorts of commercial rubber mats. Another was stall after stall of bath towels. And they go on and on and on...and on. As in, towels as far as the eye can see. In a state of delirium from lacking sleep, funny is an understatement. Sadly, because of the lack of sleep, there aren't many photos from the day. We'll have to go back and capture some endless towel photos. :)

After a while of wandering, we found Lisa's version of heaven: the hanbok market. Stall after stall after stall of hanboks, the traditional formal dress of Korea.
Josiah needed a new hanbok, so the hunt was on for just the right one. Some helpful ladies tried to get Josiah's approval of a lovely pink option. It looked great on him, but Josiah's not much into pink these days.
After the markets, we wandered back to our hotel to check in and get washed up. It is cherry blossom season here, so everywhere you look there are beautiful signs of spring.
After an hour or so at the hotel, we caught our hotel's shuttle to Insadong, a fantastically artsy neighborhood of winding alleys lined with shops, galleries, coffee shops, street food vendors and restaurants.
If the hanbok market was Lisa's heaven, this place is mine. We were there on a Friday at 2:00 p.m. and the place was packed. We stayed a couple hours wandering around and then returned to the hotel to crash...at 6:00 p.m. Amazingly, Nedy made it through the entire day awake and in good spirits. The kid is an amazing traveler. (Thus far. Ahem. Knock on wood.)

Nedyism for the day: "It weird dat I can't undostand anysing anyone is saying. I guess dat because dey speak Kweean and I don't. Because I'm Chinese. But I yive in United States Amewica, so I speak Engish."

TRAVEL CALL!

2011-04-05T17:29:00.003-05:00

I got back from lunch today to an e-mail from Dan at work. Subject line? "Travel Approval!" Guess who's goin' to Korea NEXT WEEK?!

We (as in me, Dan, Ned, my sister Lisa and her son Josiah) leave for Seoul on 4/14 at 1:00am, so essentially Wednesday night for practical purposes. Holy macaroni! That's a week from tomorrow! We'll be there through 4/22, arriving home with Kamron that same night because of the time change.

That was FAST! Ohmygoodness, ohmygoodness. Someone hand me a paper bag! :)

I600 (Immigration) Approval and 3 WEEKS?!?!

2011-03-24T22:01:00.001-05:00

Today I made a phone call to our assigned immigration officer to inquire about our file status. Guess what? Our I600 was approved on March 21! And guess what? Our 171 (the official approval notice) came in the mail today!

Now for the real news. I e-mailed our agency with this update, as they need to communicate our approval date to the Korean agency to continue our processing. I got this e-mail back from the Korea program manager:

I've been looking at my files and it seems that the families who have been notified they can travel had their acceptance paperwork sent to Korea right around the same time as you and received I-600 approval about 2 weeks before you did. If travel keeps up like this you may be traveling closer to mid April.

Did you catch that last line? Mid-April. MID-APRIL. As in, 3 weeks from now. So if things continue as they have been in our agency's recent experience, we should get our travel call in about two weeks. And then we'll need to be in Korea within two weeks of that call.

Heads are spinning here tonight! (In a good sort of panic-induced way, of course.)

the non-update update

2011-03-15T20:37:00.000-05:00

I know, I know. Bad, bad blogger.

You'd think that if I am too busy to update the blog that I'd have lots of exciting things to report on the blog. Ummmmm, yeah...not so much.

On the Kamron front: no news. Nothing but a few pieces of paper from immigration saying they received our paperwork and are "processing" it. Hmmmmm, processing, eh? So I called them. Turns out we've been assigned an immigration officer as of today. I will say this for the non-Hague adoption processing unit, they do answer the phone. So my call gets transferred to our assigned officer who tells me, based on our case number, "Oh, you're part of this huge pile I got assigned today. Ugh. This stack is huge. Like 40 families. I'm sooooo behind."

Reassuring, right?

So I turn on my Jen charm. (Incidentally, if you've never before witnessed said charm, it is...how do I say this humbly...powerful. Think Jedi mind tricks. Yeah, like that.)

It goes something like this: "Ohhhhhh, bummer. I know you probably don't hear 'thank you' enough, but there is not much better than getting that approval in the mail. Seriously, I know the paperwork end of your job must be so frustrating, but it's so cool that you are directly involved in so many families coming together. Not many people can say that at the end of a day. So, for what it's worth, 'thanks!' I'm just so excited to go get our little guy."

And she says: "Wow, that's so nice of you to say. Well, I think I can get to you this week or early next. Why don't you call me mid-week next week and I'll give you an update on where I'm at. Hopefully you'll be all done. You can just call me directly."

So we'll see how long it takes to get that immigration approval...fingers crossed.

Besides that, we're waiting on a photo and narrative update and will hopefully have that within the next week or two. We sent a letter, photos and a Nedy original to our agency for forwarding to Kamron's foster mother. Nedy was so cute--when she found out I was writing a letter she said, "Ooooh, I have a GWEAT idea! I will send Kamwon's foster mudder a picture dat I draw myself!" and she returned a while later with a colorful masterpiece of random floating people holding balloons and walking floating dogs. Good stuff.

As for travel, we are still thinking early Mayish. Right now, in addition to the immigration processing here in the U.S., the Korean government is engaged in their process that will result in the issuance of Kamron's emigration permit and visa. We will only get a week or two of notice, so it will be frantic preparation time when the 'you can go now' call comes.

In the words of Nedy, "Oooooh, it's getting warmer outside! Dat means it's almost yitto brudder time!"

Two years.

2011-02-15T20:07:00.008-06:00

Two years ago today a terrified little girl of 15 months was placed into the arms of some lady she had never before met. "Mama" they told her.

They got to know each other. They fell in love. And before they knew it, a year went by.

And then another. And they couldn't remember a time when they weren't each other's sunrise.

I love you my sweet, sassy, smart, strong-willed, curious, amazing little firecracker. I am so blessed to be your Mama.

Happy Vawemtines Day!

2011-02-14T20:39:00.000-06:00

Deary me, how cute can she be?!?

xin nian kuai le---新年快乐

2011-02-03T21:31:00.003-06:00

Happy Chinese New Year!

Blizzard Block Party

2011-02-03T16:41:00.021-06:00

Late last week, the weather people starting forecasting a "blizzard" on track to arrive in our area mid-week. I, of course, responded how I usually do when watching the news: "They are such sensationalizing fools. I mean, seriously, what's up with all the Stormageddon talk all the time? As if we even get good snow anymore. I mean, really, watch. Another 4 inches at best."

But then the weather people kept showing this photo of the storm as seen from outer space. And it pretty much covered up two-thirds of the continental U.S. And then I began to wonder if this time, just this once, they weren't being but half the sensationalizing fools they usually are. Perhaps we would see half the amount they predicted, a respectable 10-12 inches?

Enter BLIZZARD. Oh blizzard, I should not have doubted your massive ways. Indeed, you were a blizzard of historic proportions. The wind, blowing the light and fluffy snow with such force it was hard to tell if it was snowing or blowing or both. The howling, 30-50 mile per hour gusts causing the water in our toilets to ripple. And lightning and thunder...with a snow storm?!?! Snow piling up at 2-3 inches per hour. Oh, blizzard, to think I ever doubted you. You were, dare I say it, sensational.

So we woke up Wednesday morning to a TV screen full of some 1700 closures and strict warnings to stay off the roads. SNOW DAY! (As an FYI, snow days are just as exciting to me now as they were in 3rd grade.) So, we got 18-20 inches. And Dan spent the good part of Wednesday, a good 6 hours, snow-blowing us and several neighbors out. Small city lots and tremendous amounts of snow make for some enormously tall mountains.

So as Dan and the other neighbors worked to clear us out, they got to talking. And our neighbor Rob, an enthusiastic and fun fellow to say the least, thought since we were all stuck at home we should have a block party. Outside. In the snow. With a bonfire. In the city. (Needless to say, Nedy was all for it and charged out of the house like...well, like a bolt of snow thunder.)

And so it was. All day long. From 11:00am until 5:00pm, the bonfire burned, the neighbors chatted and caught up, drank hot cider (among other things...), ate chili (plugged in outside, mind you) and generally played the 20 degree day away.

Nedy and the other kids decided blizzards make for good sledding, and the dads were quick to work together forming fast runs off the huge piles.

Good times. Seriously good times.

backyard sledding at Uncle Johnny's

2011-01-31T21:05:00.016-06:00

I had forgotten how much fun sledding is.

Oh yeah, now I remember. :)

Scandalous.

2011-01-26T20:14:00.000-06:00

Nedy's vocabulary is hilarious.

When she hears a new word she's always quick to ask, "What dat word mean?", followed by intently listening to the response, a brief pause and eyes rolled up to the ceiling, as though she is literally moving it into a particular Rubbermaid bin in her brain for recollection at a later time. As a result, her three year old vocabulary includes such “big words” as: ingredients, exaggeration, immediately, and scandalous, to name a few.

What is amazing to us is that she not only holds words she has heard once in her bean, but manages to, almost without fail, use them in context correctly. It is hilariously enjoyable. For instance. A couple weeks ago Nedy was sitting at Nana’s kitchen table with her 7 year old cousin, John John. Nana was also at the table, holding John John’s baby sister, Vivian, a darling gal of 7 months. Nana and Papa’s place is always really warm and Vivian’s face was flushed, prompting the removal of her tights.

Nedy: “Oooooh, dis is soooo scandawous!”

John John: “What’s that mean?”

Nedy: “It means…yike…twouble!”

John John: (looking at me) “Is she speaking Chinese?”

Nedy: “Noooooo, John John, it’s ENGISH."

legals!

2011-01-18T17:25:00.003-06:00

Our international agency reported that Kamron's "legals" arrived today and were overnighted to our local agency. "Legals" are the legal documents proving a child's availability for adoption. Receipt of this paperwork allows us to file the formal request with USCIS (immigration) to bring him home. Moving right along...

paperwork headed over the ocean

2011-01-13T20:15:00.001-06:00

Got word from our agency today that our stack of referral acceptance paperwork was "perfect" and is already Korea-bound.

"Perfect" paperwork. Bliss. :)

I know, I know...where are his pics?

2011-01-10T19:57:00.000-06:00

Sadly, I cannot post pics of Kamron (his first name...but you'll have to wait to learn the rest!) on the blog because the agency requires password protection, which is not a particularly functional part of Blogger. Sigh. He's soooooo adorable. Really, you should see him.

Soooooo...if you know us and haven't seen his pics yet and would like to, shoot me an e-mail or leave a comment here and I'll e-mail some of his scrumptiousness your way.

All of our referral acceptance paperwork is done, double-checked and ready to be overnighted to our agency. They will prepare our bundle of documents and forward it to Korea yet this week, and then the wait for travel begins. As of now, our agency reports that they are continuing to experience their longtime travel norm of 3-4 months following referral acceptance, so April or May in our case. C'moooooooon Spring!

BIG news! :)

2011-01-05T19:33:00.003-06:00

And I do mean BIG news!

In March we began the process of adopting a baby boy from South Korea. We have three, soon to be four, nephews from Korea and were excited about giving our son a "built in" network of Korean guys! At the time our paperwork made its way to Korea in June, we were told to expect a 4-6 month wait for referral. Being veterans of the long and winding road to China, we weren't quite ready to believe that a referral could come so fast...but they proved us wrong! Today, home with a sick Ned (more on that in a later post), I checked my phone at lunch time to see a missed call from our adoption agency. Trust me when I say that a missed call from an adoption agency is the source of immediate excitement/angst. So I tried calling back, as I had just missed their call by minutes. But turns out they were on the phone with Dan...telling him all about...OUR SON!

We have a baby boy, 6 months old and--are you ready for this?--a whopping 23 pounds! When I spoke with our agency, they were giggling about what a "Buddha Baby" he is. Ooooooh, I couldn't wait to see him! But Dan was at work and sick Ned needed a nap, so I put her in bed, took a shower (hey, I was home with a sick kid--who cares that it was 1:00pm?) and waited for Dan to come home. Last time when we got Ned's referral, I was at work and saw Nedy before Dan did. This time, I wanted all of us to see him together.

We got to our agency around 4:00 and sat down together to open the file and see his face for the first time. It is such a surreal moment, opening that folder. Like, "Hello, rest of my life." And when we opened that folder, I couldn't believe how sweet, adorable and BIG our baby is! He has such a gentle, calm look about him. Ooooh, he's just scrumptious. But you'll have to take my word for it for now, as our international agency does not allow photo posting on blogs. But I'll be calling them tomorrow to see just what I can get away with in that regard... ;)

What did Ned say about him? "He's a wiwwy big baby. Yike, I not sure how I fit him in my Ewgo to cawwy him awound." (Ergo is our baby carrier. Apparently Nedy's had delusions of grandeur about hauling "yitto brudder" around in it...kid cracks me up.) Dan made the mistake of making a joke at dinner about how "yitto brudder" is bigger than Nedy to which she promptly and indignantly replied, "He not dat big, Baba. He just a yitto bit big. Fow a baby."

Our agency confirmed that we are on track for travel to bring him home in 3-4 months, so looks like this family will be Seoul-bound in April or so! I told Nedy that we'd go to Korea to bring home baby when it gets warmer outside and winter is gone away, to which she replied, "Yitto brudder prolly be even bigger by den." Probably so, kiddo. Mama's arms better start working out. :)

More to come...stay tuned!

a visit with friends

2011-01-03T14:45:00.030-06:00

In 2005, when starting the process of adopting from China, our agency told us we would be part of a "travel group", depending on what other families had paperwork ready for submission to China at the same time as us. Shortly after our paperwork was sent, we were given the information about other families in our group. We started e-mailing right away, and over the years of waiting, the closer we got, the more we e-mailed. By the time we were ready to travel, we had already personally met two of the three other families in our group and felt like we "knew" them.

And then we went to China and met our daughter while these other families met theirs. All at the same time. All in the same room. This isn't an experience many can relate to, but trust me when I say a unique--and strong--bond is formed under such a circumstance.

We're lucky in that two of the three families live in Minnesota; a relatively short (6 hours) drive. We've been up to see them twice since coming home from China. Since two families live close to each other, it makes sense that we would travel to see them. But a couple weeks ago I got an e-mail from one of the families that they wanted to come see us! In the words of Ned, "Dyno-miiiiiiiiite!"

Jill, Thomas, Li An and Kaitelin joined us for a couple days of fun Thursday until Saturday. We packed a lot of fun into those couple days, but I think we'd all agree that seeing the girls goof around and play together was tops on the list.

Thursday night, we went for a carriage ride downtown...only afterward did I find out Jill isn't particularly fond of horses. She's a good sport, this much I already knew. ;)
After the ride we came back home and had some take-out...
followed by what would be the first of many musical performances of the weekend.
After a late bedtime Thursday night, Ned woke me up Friday morning at her usual 6:45 and said, "Hey, Mama? You sink guests awake yet? I sink dey want to pway wit me and I should get up." And then she waited by the door for them for a bit, letting me know occasionally that "Dey moving awound down der!" until she was overjoyed by the opening of the door. "Dey up! My guests! My fwiends!" (Built in play buddies is a seriously cool thing, we decided. I'm not sure that Jill and Thomas are interested in taking up living in our playroom permanently, but the offer is there just in case.) :)
After breakfast and some play time, we stuck our head out the back door to see if my phone's report of 50 degree weather was actually right. It was. 50 and misty. (Much better than 35 and misty, right?) So we decided to head out to the zoo. The weather held pretty well and the zoo was sparsely attended, so getting up close to see the creatures behind the glass was a piece of cake.
The Peacock Whisperer at work...
Funny, Ned's been afraid of the lions for the longest...enter a couple buddies and the "well, if they can do it, I can, too" kicks in. Both the lion and lioness came right up to them and brushed against the glass while walking past.
After a stop at the grocery store, we headed back home. The gals got out the Play-doh...
and Thomas joined in. Thomas makes pigs in a variety of colors. Even when you ask him to make a panda, you get a panda-themed pig. It's really something.
Dan started cooking--fruit stuffed pork tenderloin--and we played while waiting for Holly, Pat and Zhi for our little New Year's dinner.
And the band is up one member with the arrival of Zhi. Do kids get any cuter? I don't think so.
Somehow we all managed to fit around the table for dinner. Pat made this fantastic potato dish--YUM. Good stuff.
Nothing revs up the band quite like a full tummy, apparently.

Happy 2011!

Saturday morning involved doctor visits...
and a reunion of the band, down one member, though this time with a distinctly Chinese twist...
You can't beat Milwaukee's Domes for energy depletion prior to a long car ride, so our visit ended there. And I finally got a family shot for my wall:
Face-making...
Jumping...
Chasing...
Mask-making out of fallen leaves...you can't beat the Domes for entertainment value. :)
Self-portrait:
The CUTEST picture in the entire world. (Not biased or anything, but seriously, look at these cutie pies. Be still my beating heart.)
And this is what you get when you ask a random person to take a shot of all of you with "limited background--just us." Sigh. I guess we can't all have an eye, can we, Thomas? ;)
Thanks so much for coming, guys! We absolutely loved having you here. Come back soon!

Christmas Day

2011-01-01T11:14:00.000-06:00

Nedy woke up Christmas morning, tapped me, and said in her loud whisper, "Mama, you sink Santa Cwaus come yast night?" After protesting a brief stop at the bathroom, she was on her way to the family room..."HE CAME! Mama, HE CAME!" Seriously, just look at her face. (And try not to look at mine. Note for next year: make-up application first.)
I quickly figured out that, for Nedy, it wasn't about what Santa brought for her but whether or not he actually came. Once she saw that he had indeed deemed her a "good girl", she said she "didn't wiwwy feew yike opening pwesents" and would rather "just pway." My guess is this is the last year that she won't care much about the stuff. :)

But I managed to convince her to open a few things. I mostly directed her opening to the things I wanted to play with. I'd been waiting a month to get my hands on that vintage View Master...
And check out these Lego letter tiles! Building words! Love it. (I know. I'm pathetic.)
And who doesn't need a child-sized accordion?
Lego hospital anyone?"Hey, Mama and Baba? Maybe I take your pick-chur? Yike, wit da wiwwy big camwa? I be wiwwy caweful and not dwop it? Okaaaaaaay?" (I think she might be developing a nice eye for composition--you think?)
Then Nana and Papa came over for lunch and afternoon fun. Our long-standing Christmas Day tradition is lunch followed by the Domes. (It's pretty fun being among the twelve people who are lame enough to go to the Domes on Christmas Day.)
"Bye-bye, puppy from Santa. You not go to da Domes because dey don't yet dogs in da Domes, okay?" (Nedy wanted a puppy for Christmas. She never told him exactly what kind of puppy she wanted. Santa is a thoughtful guy.)
THE DOMES! No matter how many times we go, Ned never grows tired of the Domes.
We unexpectedly ran into our friends Barb and Paul and their son, ZhengZheng in the Show Dome. Who knew that they were also among the twelve? Small world. :)
Awwwwww. Seriously, what else can I say?
Our annual Domes waterfall self-portrait.
After the Domes we headed over to the downtown M & I Bank lobby for a visit to their Enchanted Forest. The security guard had actually just closed the lobby and turned out the lights, but I guess we looked pathetic enough (perhaps he sensed we were among the twelve?) that he let us in and turned it back on. It is a bizarre collection of Steiff animals, some animated, placed in a woodland scene. Lions, penguins, giraffes, rabbits and squirrels all side by side in seeming harmony. It's...odd. And oddly enjoyable. But don't take my word for it:
MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Christmas Eve

2010-12-29T23:31:00.000-06:00

Christmas Eve Day. Always a good time.

How could it not be?

There's Uncle-Cousin Nick...
and the rest of the amazing cousin crew of Syd, Kaitlin, and Nicolle. Ned loooooooves her cousins.
There's card games...
and airplanes!

A short drive north to the other side for dinner and church. Ned is a bit of an evangelist these days; what with all of her "God made me" talk with random Starbuck's patrons. Church was high on her list of Christmas Eve excitement...elevated even higher when the pastor requested some "help" telling the Christmas story. She sat up there on stage and turned around to wave at us a good 10-15 times, sometimes "loud whispering" commentary. ("You see me? I up here hewping!")
And then there were games back at my sister's. (You know, after church on Christmas Eve you always come back and play dreidel games, right?)
And rigged Christmas bingo.
Nedy insisted on making a birthday cake for Jesus at Nana's the day before. She advised that we had to all help blow out Jesus' candles because he couldn't do it. She said, "It's like TEAMWORK for JESUS!" So Nana and Nedy made this crazy raspberry, mint chip, walnut brownie concoction and spelled out the big guy's name in white chocolate chips. Raspberry, mint chip, walnut brownies for Jesus? Really, Nana? Really?! And yes, much to Nedy's delight, we all sang a spirited 'Happy Birthday' to Jesus. (Get it? Spirited? I crack myself up.)
Nedy and her prized "fancy microphone."
Wow, this partying all day stuff is hard work.

keeping watch

2010-12-16T22:17:00.002-06:00

It warms my heart when Hank naps with Ned or sits on the bed keeping watch. Hard to believe this cranky, 15 year-old, long-time-only-child would decide that he actually likes her little self. That's my buddy.

"Poopy on da potty"

2010-12-16T21:22:00.004-06:00

A while ago--like a year or so--we decided to potty train Nedy. Seemed an easy proposition. She's a scary smart, generally easy-to-reason-with rational kid. And, from a Mama's perspective, going potty on the potty just makes sense. So, I had this plan to just explain that going potty on the potty just makes sense. And then, like *viola!* she'd go potty on the potty and we'd shed our diaper ties forever (well, not forever) in the blink of an eye. Because it just makes sense.

Ahem.

So, that plan lasted about 45 minutes. And then I gave up. (And ate all of the reward-intended Jelly Bellies myself.)

See, I know how Ned works. On minor issues, there's no point pushing this gal to do something she's not interested in doing. And, putting it mildly, she wasn't interested. So we moved on to Plan B. Plan B pretty much revolves around the concept that very few seventeen year olds are in diapers. We went all zen on potty training. As in, "When she wants to, she'll do it. In her own time, when she's ready."

Fast forward to September. Ned decided peeing in the potty seemed interesting enough to try. And pretty much from that first time forward, "pee-pees in da potty" was an every time thing. Accidents? Not so much. And Ned reported when she had to go without reminders. None of this 'take the kid to the potty chair every half hour', 'sit on the potty chair for crazy lengths of time', etc. Nope, not with Ned. She'd say, "Hey, I have to go pee-pees" followed by a beeline to the bathroom where she'd open the toilet lid, slap down her self-selected Elmo seat, and make the magic happen. It was great.

Except. Except that pee-pees and poop are not the same. And Ned fell victim to what I understand to be a common toddlerhood fear: If I let my poop fall into the toilet, who knows what else might fall out of me. Or something like that.

So. While she was "pee-pee trained", she required a diaper to poop. It went something like this: "Hey Mama, I have to poop. Can you take dis puw-up off me and put on my diapo?" Attempts to bribe her, incent her, etc.? Useless. Plan B continued for poop. All zen about poop. It'll happen when she's ready to do it... Yeah, right. Really? "Oh my gosh, this is CRAZY!!! Why won't she just poop in the damn toilet?!?!?!" But, I hid my inner poop angst from her and rode it out, obliging her diaper requests at 7:something every morning for her predictable deposit.

But that all changed Tuesday. (Yeah, this Tuesday. Am I jinxing this?) Dan and Ned were home when she said, "Baba, I have to poop. Can you put on my diapo?" And Dan said, "I want you to try. Just try on the toilet. And if it doesn't work, I'll put your diaper on." (Mind you, we've done this song and dance 50 times before.) As usual, she agreed to try. But this time was different. This time Baba had a stroke of genius. He left Ned sitting on the potty for "pwivacy" and grabbed his Iphone. And pulled up the Team Umizoomi theme song on YouTube. Now, Nedy digs her some Umizoomi. But she can only watch it at Grandma's once a week. No cable here at home. Well, Ned hears the song and starts yelling, "Umizoomi!!! Baba, you have Team Umizoomi on your phone?!? Can I watch it?!?" And Baba says, "This is just the song on YouTube. But, I'll make you a deal. You go poop on the potty and every time you do it, I'll download a new episode of Umizoomi." Her response? "Ooooooh, dis is GWEAT! I make poop on potty and get Umizoomi! DEAL!" And she proceeds to poop on the potty. (Followed by Baba and Nedy screaming, doing the "crazy shake" (it's an Umizoomi thing), and sending me a photo at work of her... ummm... creation...in celebration.

So she's pooped three times since that first time Tuesday. (She's a regular sort of kid. Wow, this is way too much information. I'm sorry.) And she's racked up four episodes of Umizoomi. And she's finally wearing her Hello Kitty underpants. (With tremendous pride, I might add. And tremendous cuteness. There is nothing cuter than a little butt in little undies.)

So, there you have it. I guess what I'm saying is, Ned potty-trained herself. She'd have it no other way.

message received.

2010-12-05T22:49:00.001-06:00

There are some bits of language that get repeated a lot at our house. You know, the important stuff. The stuff we want absolutely ingrained in the very fiber of Ned’s being.

One of those things we say again and again is, “Nedy, I love you humongous love always and forever, no matter what. Even when you’re crabby, even when you’re not listening. Always and forever. No matter what.”

So Nedy has 3 dolls: Bubbles, Baby, and (are you ready for this?) Soumakowea. Yesterday as she cradled Soumakowea in her arms she looked intently at her little plastic face and said, “Soumakowea, I yuv you hooooomungus yuv always, fowevuh, no matto what. Even when you cwabby or not yistening or make mess I yuv you always, fowevuh. No matto what. No maaaaaaato what.”

Can you sense my heart swelling?

Nedy with a D

2010-12-04T09:45:00.003-06:00

Oh, the things she says. Take this for instance:

"Hey Mama. Some people call me Net-t-t-t-y. Like, with a T in it. But my name is Ned-d-d-d-y, with a D. There is no T in Nedy."

So there you have it. There is no T in Nedy. ;)

Thanksgiving weekend

2010-12-02T21:24:00.015-06:00

Turkey Day at Grandma and Grandpa's is always a good time. Of course, most important to Ned is the presence of her cousin and personal hero, Syd. Ned loves her some Syd. :)
Our Thanksgiving celebration involves the men working the kitchen. It pretty much rocks. A new tradition emerged this year in the form of flying plastic food.
That night, Baba and Nedy made a pumpkin pie--Nedy's first from scratch crust experience. (Maybe my first from scratch crust experience will be next year. Ahem.)
Awwwww, look at those cuties and that fabulous pie.
Saturday morning we had breakfast with Holly, Pat and Zhi and then headed out to a far-away tree lot that seems to have the market on adorably pathetic little trees.
And then we came home and decorated our adorably pathetic little tree. :)
"I hewp you, Baba. I wiwwy good at putting yights on dis twee."
Yeah, Norman Rockwell's got nothin' on us. :)

The return of Pum Pum

2010-11-30T22:32:00.003-06:00

Remember this?

Nedy's adoration of The Little Drummer Boy was a near daily giggle for us most of last winter. Even after Christmas came and went, Nedy would pull up "Pum Pum" on her MP3 player (yes, it was that serious) and demand we dance with her while she sang along. I don't know what it was about that song exactly--I'm sure the "pums" had something to do with it, and the fact that it talks about "Nana's Jesus" (don't ask)--but whatever her reasons, this song just tripped her trigger.

By Spring, sadly, it seemed her obsession had subsided. She was on to the ABCs and Wheels on the Bus and such. Secretly, I missed hearing Pum Pum.

Fast forward to tonight. Every night, Baba, Nedy and I read books together and then I rock her to sleep while listening to music. (Yeah, I know she's 3. Whatever. She'll always be my baby.) So a couple minutes into our rocking she was asleep...or so I thought. And what came on the radio? Well, The Little Drummer Boy, of course. And Nedy says, eyes closed, voice soft as can be, "Mama, it's Pum Pum. I soooooo happy."

Me too, baby. Me too. :)

my little artist

2010-11-28T17:44:00.002-06:00

Happy Birthday, Baby!

2010-11-09T20:32:00.023-06:00

Hello 3!

For the second year in a row, Ned's birthday defied Wisconsin weather odds and we enjoyed a 60 degree day for our now annual 5th Ward random brick wall parking lot photo shoot. I love this little tradition--heading out the morning of her birthday in search of just the right spot and spending an hour or so just capturing her (and us!) on this day.

Happy Birthday, Baby! You make my heart feel super happy.

Nedy's 3rd Birthday Party

2010-11-07T22:39:00.025-06:00

This morning I woke up to the most adorable little face leaning over me, "Mama, today my bowfday pawty at bowying ayee." Spoken like any true southeastern Wisconsin toddler. :)

Good times. :)

Halloween 2010

2010-11-05T22:05:00.000-05:00

Of skin tags and Silly Putty...

2010-11-01T21:03:00.003-05:00

Nedy is a character. She has a memory that scares me and, frankly, makes me mindful of pretty much everything I say in front of her these days.

Several weeks ago, my Mom and I were talking in her kitchen about a small growth on her arm. It didn’t look alarming or anything, but my Mom agreed—after my usual prodding and I’m sure only for the purpose of shutting me up—that she’d have her doctor check it out at her next appointment. Apparently Nedy, my resident spy, overheard this conversation.

Remember this post?

So today my Mom watched Nedy on short notice. Mom had a doctor’s appointment in the morning and took Nedy with her. Nedy sat quietly and watched as the doctor checked her over, asked all the questions doctors do, and finished by asking Mom if she had any questions about her health. If you know my Mom, you know she said, “Nope.”

Now you know Nedy was not havin’ that sort of avoidance on her watch. Pointing to the offending growth, Nedy blurts out, “Doc-or, what dis on Nana’s arm?” The doctor (after commenting on how smart my baby is, mind you) checked it out right away and informed Nedy (and Nana, I guess) that it was a harmless skin tag and was a-okay.

I love that someone else is obsessing about Nana other than me. And I’m sure Nana is just thrilled about it. Ahem.

Oh, and then it got even better--after dinner we got to relive the doctor's appointment experience as Nedy pulled a piece off her Silly Putty wad and smooshed it on her arm while assigning roles, "Dis how it goes. I be Nana. Mama da doc-or. Baba, you be me, 'kay?"

Silly Putty skin tag reenactment. I mean, really, does it get any better?

the making of a sandbox

2010-10-22T20:43:00.015-05:00

Only Nedy's Baba.

Only Nedy's Baba could design and build the most fantastic sandbox that ever was (no bias here at all) while having the patience to let his little helper think she was actually, among other things, carrying heavy beams and mounting them in place.

Without further ado, I present Baba and Nedy's first major project together--a summertime of work--the sandbox. (Which, you'll notice--for the sake of my sanity--is actually a sand table. I have successfully brainwashed Nedy into thinking sand tables are just as much fun as sandboxes. Shhhh.)

In the words of Kai-Lan, these two make my heart feel super happy.
And their plans for next summer? A tea house big enough for backyard sleeping.