Forever Family Day

Our second meeting with Joshua and his foster mother wasn't until 3pm on Friday so we decided to go to Seoul Tower that morning before the meeting. There is a tradition of couples going up to Seoul Tower and placing a lock together to symbolize their endless love. Among adoptive families it has now become somewhat of a tradition to place a lock at Seoul Tower as a symbol of their endless love for their child. I was so happy that John and I were able to do this on our actual Family Day.

The time finally came and we had our meeting with Joshua's foster mom. She and I were both crying almost the entire time. She left for a bit to see how Joshua would do without her. We ended up rocking him to sleep with John singing and me holding him on my shoulder.

Then the time came. We all gathered around and Dr. Kim prayed over both the children (there was one other family with us) and their foster families. Here is the English translation of the prayer:

Precious life, one of our many country’s saviors, we send away this life to a foreign country with scarred memories of his homeland.

Please forgive our sins and allow Korea to be a better country so that we will adopt children [someday] from other countries instead of us always sending ours away.

We send this child for care, so please protect his life.
And make it so that he can lead a happy life in his new home.

Please always provide him with grace and intelligence and lead him to live by the rules of Jesus Christ, To have all good fortunes, to help benefit others, and to return the glory to our Lord.

It is our sincere wish that this life will not forget his home country and the love of the people who took care of him.

Father, please remember all the foster families who work hard, whether in favorable or unfavorable conditions, to protect these lives. And bless them for the benefits they are provided with.

By Your blessings, this adoptive family will be full of love and under Your protection.

Now this child leaves. Please make his way as easy as possible and lead him to the most pleasant of lives.

In Jesus’ name, Amen.

After the ceremony, his foster mother took a few more moments with JoonSeo and then placed him in John's arms. I hugged her and gave her the flowers we bought for her. She then hid in the office while we walked upstairs to our room in the guest house.

Here are a first pictures with our boy:

Later that night we joined some of the other families in the kitchen and let the kids play together. This is when we got to see a bit of JoonSeo's personality, what one of the other families called "hurricane Joshua."

I still can't believe he is finally in my arms. I really never thought we would ever get to bring him home. I was sure something would happen to cause the whole thing to fall apart. For those of you waiting, know that those feelings are not real. Our children really do come home!

I can't get over how blessed I am to be a mom to such an amazing little boy.

We are Home!!!

We are home and doing well. Joshua did amazing his first night with us and on the plane ride home. I was actually shocked at how well he did, I never would have imagined it would go so well. Thank you all for your prayers. Last night was a bit rougher, I think it finally hit him that he is no longer with his umma and ahpa (foster mother and father in Korea). He fell asleep around 8pm after we got home, but woke up about an hour and half later crying inconsolable. He cried so hard he threw up all over me. I just rocked him and also cried. I wish I could fix it, but I can't, all I can do is comfort him the best I can. Eventually, he fell back to sleep, but woke up around 2am (gotta love the jet lag!) and decided it was play time. So mommy and Joshua played and cuddled until 4am and then it was daddy's turn. Daddy and Joshua played for a little while and then John put him in the carry and he fell back to sleep around 6am and we all slept until 11am. I think Joshua is definitely handling his grief by wanting to sleep a lot right now. Plus he is sick with a cold. And now mommy and daddy are also sick with colds. Talk about a quick initiation into parenthood!

We are both just enjoying playing and cuddling with Joshua so much. He is a very happy and easy going kid. He loves to smile, giggle, clap his hands, and do manseh (raising your hands over your head, similar to hooray in English). I am seriously blown away that I get to be mom to such an amazing kid. Another family at the guest house nicknamed him "hurricane Joshua" and it is fitting. He is a force of nature. He was playing at the guest house with some of the other kids and hugged/tackled another little boy. He would bat the ball across the floor and take off crawling as fast as he could after it. Then he would put the ball in his mouth and crawl back as fast as he could. I will try to post pictures and write more about him very soon.

We are so very blessed!

Finally a Family of 3!!!!!

We are overjoyed to finally be a family of 3!!!! No time to upload pictures right now, we are busy playing with our boy and having fun. Things are going really well so far, but please keep us in your prayers. Please also pray for Joshua's foster mother as today was a very hard day for her.

John, Becky, and Joshua JoonSeo

Together Forever 9-2-2011

To God be the Glory, Great things He hath done!!!!

First Meeting with Joshua!!!!!

Our first meeting was fantastic, thank you all so much for your prayers. Joshua let both of us hold him and didn't show any stranger anxiety at all. His foster mom gave us an album of pictures, including the ones from his Dol (1st birthday). This is something I have been praying about for a while! We found out he chose the gavel indicating we may have a future judge or lawyer on our hands!!! We also have a picture of him at his dol with a famous Korean actress. I still have to find out who she is. Those moments of holding Joshua in my arms are among the best in my life. We also learned that his personality is very easy going and he has a gentle nature, though temper tantrums were mentioned. He likes going out in the stroller, but hates the car seat. I am so glad we are flying back into Tucson and not Phoenix. He is not afraid of much. He stops his actions in response to Andae (no), but if he thinks he is being chided for misbehavior, he crawls to another place to avoid being chided. :-) If he is told that he is going to go out, he goes to the hallway and sits and waits. I love him so much already!

He also has a foster sister that is also going home next week. I can't imagine how hard this must be for his foster mother. She was crying when she arrived and I could tell she didn't even want to look at me. Who could blame her, she has taken care of JoonSeo for 14 months and now she has to say good-bye to two babies in a week's time. My heart was literally breaking for her.

And now what you have been waiting for - pictures!

 

The last 3 were taken before our meeting. We had some time to kill - we arrived 3 hours early. :-)

Tomorrow we are meeting with the head of Eastern for a luncheon. We take custody of Joshua on Friday at 3pm!!!

We Are in Seoul!!!

We made it here with no problems at all. All our flights were on time, no lost luggage, and finding transportation from the airport was very easy. The only little hiccup was the traffic getting from the  airport to our hotel. We were exhausted by that point since it was the middle of the night on AZ time. We checked in to the hotel at 8pm and were in bed by 9 pm. We managed to sleep about 5 or 6 hours before the jet lag got the best of us, so we decided to just get up at 4am.

We meet Joshua in less than 5 hours!!!

All Packed Up and Ready to Go!

We are leaving very soon!!!! I really can't believe it is finally happening. I will try to blog from Korea as much as possible. Right now I can barely put a sentence together so this is going to be short, but I do have a few prayer requests.

Please keep us in your prayers for safe and smooth travels with no lost luggage. Please also be praying for our meeting with Joshua and his foster mother on Wednesday morning (Tuesday evening in the U.S.). Please pray that I am able to get answers to my questions in order to fill in the blanks of Joshua's life for him when he is older. And lastly, please be praying for our transition, attachment, and bonding.

Thank you all for your love, support, and prayers throughout this whole process!

Flight and Meeting Time Set! Need Prayers....Updated

We have our flight booked, leaving early next week and returning next weekend. We will meet Joshua for the first time on Wednesday August 31st at 10am!!!! That is August 30th at 9pm on the east coast and 6pm here in AZ, which is exactly one year from the first time we saw his sweet face, how cool is that!!!

We have a hotel for our first 2 nights in Seoul, but are still waiting on our travel agent to find us one for our last 2. Almost everything in Seoul is booked solid right now. Please be praying he finds us a hotel room for our last 2 nights. I am not panicking yet, but I am getting close!

I also just found out that most likely my mom isn't going to be able to come and watch our dog Annie for us; her work won't give her time off. Now we need to find an alternate arrangement that will work for our highly anxious little pup. Could you also pray we find just the right place and/or person. It's also really disappointing for her and for me because now she won't get to come to the airport to at least meet Joshua. For anyone who might be curious as to why she can't come after we are home, it is because it is not recommended that you have other people around when you first bring your child home. It would be entirely too overwhelming and confusing for Joshua. He has no idea who we are or that we are his forever mommy and daddy. All he will know is that he has just lost the only family he has ever known. So until we can establish that bond with him, we won't be allowing others to visit much (if at all) and certainly we won't be allowing anyone else to hold him or meet his needs. I hope this doesn't sound harsh, but we have to do what is best for Joshua.

Thank you all for celebrating with us in your comments on my last post! I also really appreciate your prayers.

Update: A doctor at John's work has offered to watch Annie for us. Praise God!!! And we were able to get into the guest house for our last 2 nights! Prior to finding that out we were able to get a reservation at the military MWR hotel (Dragon Hill Lodge), but we are going to cancel it and stay at the guest house.