Wordless Wednesday....Katie edition

See ya cast #6

On Tuesday we cut off cast #6. It has become second nature now. Out come the tin snips, or red scissors as Kiya calls them and in about 5-10 minutes she is cast free. It is so nice to do it at home without the dreaded cast saw. Immediately we headed to the big tub for a bubble bath and lots of splashing.

 Post bath picture of her back. In some photos she looked really straight, others not so much. I have a love/hate relationship with cast off week. I love being able to hug my daughter without the barrier of the cast. I hate the worry. I hate that we both lost our security blanket in away.

Kiya, being the amazing kid that she is, asked for her cast to be put back on. She has never done that. She said "Mommy, I want my cast back on. Pink one please. My back needs it." I hate that at almost 3 and a half she has such an understanding of her reality. She is super excited about getting her new cast. We shall see how that goes on Monday when we get to the hospital.

Besides getting a pink cast, Kiya and I are super duper excited for a hotel pool party. We are staying at the same hotel as some of our cast friends and the hotel has a pool. Some other local Chicago cast friends are popping in for some fun in the pool also. It will be so great to see my friends and for Kiya to play with her cast friends outside of the hospital. It is going to be amazing and my guess loud. Hope the hotel doesn't mind :)

unexpected

About one week after my last blog post, we got an update on Katie :) I was beyond thrilled. I wish we had gotten photos. The report made reference to photos but still haven't seen them.

Here is what we learned about our sweet now one year old:
-She has 7 teeth
-She is cruising on furniture and will stand for about 5 seconds unassisted.
-She is eating yogurt, rice, apples and more
-She sleeps through the night
-She naps twice per day
-She is starting to scribble
-She LOVES music and apparently loves to dance

We also learned about the grabbing ceremony that is tradition for 1st birthdays in Korea. There is also a traditional “tohl jahbee” via which the child grabs an object from a collection of objects and the chosen object, per tradition, represents what the child will be when he/she grows up. Miss Katie grabbed a pencil which means that she will be an academic or scholar.

I love that we got this update. I also have a feeling if Miss Katie's love of music and dance continue she and Kiya will get along great. I am not close with my sister and it stinks so I really want my two girls to be friends.

Kiya is so ready to be a big sister and talks about Katie a lot. Kiya recognizes the letter K and will see a capital K and say this "K is for Kiya" and then point to a small k and say "this k is for Katie. I am bigger so I get the big K."

Love both my girls so much and can't wait to see them together.

Bummed

Well, Katie's first birthday has come and gone. I was really really hoping we would get an update this month. Like I refreshed my email 50 + times an hour hoping. Such was not to be I suppose. I guess it is still possible but unlikely given the timing of our other updates.

Therefore I am officially bummed. My baby girl turned 1 and it was bad enough that we couldn't witness it in person but to not get any kind of update really hurt. In reality I shouldn't complain. Since we accepted our referral there has only been one month that we haven't gotten an update, this would be the second month.

The upside is that the 1st batch of emigration permissions for our agency have all been approved. Those families should travel to Korea in the next 2-4 weeks to finally be united with their children. Now we wait on the next batch to be submitted for approval. Given what we know of the numbers which is little, I admit, we if all stays on course would likely be in batch 5, 6 or 7 that would be submitted for approval.

On a completely random note, we decided on a middle name for our sweet Katherine. It is tradition in my husbands family that the oldest son share their father's name. So my father in law is Robert Norman (his father's first name) and my husband is David Robert. Well we have two girls so this presented us with a little bit of a challenge. Kiya shares my middle name and it is also my mother's middle name. We really wanted Katie to also have a name that meant a lot to the family. So we selected Emma. Dave's grandmother's name. Katherine Yeon Emma. And both of our daughter's will have two middle names and they both start with Y and then E. Annakiya Yewibdar Eileen.


So there you have it. It didn't take a month and it may not be a long update but it is an update indeed. Hoping this week or next brings lots of good news to waiting families.

Vacation, illness and funk

I can't believe it has been a month since I last posted. So much has been going on. I will start with with the good stuff.

1) VACATION :)  We took a family trip to Arizona for Spring Training to cheer on our Brewers. We made it to three games and Kiya had a blast. We also went to the botanical gardens, the zoo and Sedona. It was a busy trip but nice to enjoy the sunshine and the time together. Our adventures continued on our flight home. Apparently you need to get to the Phoenix airport 3 hours ahead of a domestic flight especially at the start of Spring Break. We gave ourselves half that and missed our flight. We spent most of the day in the airport, then on to a flight to Chicago where we had to rent a car and drive ourselves back to Milwaukee where our car was parked. Then we had to drive from Milwaukee back to our house. Instead of being home by 4pm on Saturday we got home around 1am Sunday morning. Fun. Kiya did great and made lots of new friends in the airport.

Here is the bad part.

2)  Kiya has a mild case of pneumonia. Sunday morning after just a few hours of sleep from our long travel day, we took Kiya to urgent care. We left with a prescription for antibiotics. She has this horrible cough. Her cast doesn't help. She wasn't eating really much of anything. We are a couple of days into her medication and she actually asked me for food yesterday. She loves to take her medicine and seems to be getting the spring back in her step. The issue I am struggling with is her cast. She is due to get cast #7 on April 10th and I am hoping this illness won't delay that. I am so glad she is getting better though.

Here is the funk.

3) Sweet Katie turns one on Saturday and we won't be there. It is hard to know that our daughter is half a world away and hitting a milestone and we won't be there to celebrate. I try not to focus on it as there isn't much we can do but celebrate Katie here even if we aren't all together. This adoption is approaching the 3 year mark. 3 years to add to our family. It has been a long almost 3 years. I am ready to complete my family. We are getting closer. The process is moving again in Korea and we are thinking we could be in batch 6 or 7 this year so hopefully Sept/Oct to travel. Reality is this is international adoption so things could change. The phone could ring next month or it could be November. We are just praying it is this year.

So there you have it. Here's to hoping it isn't a month before I post again.

Busy busy

I know that I have been MIA for awhile. Things are busy. Life is busy. So what have I been up to

1) I registered Kiya for preschool. Yup my baby girl is eligible for actual preschool in the fall. We sent in the form and should find out soon if she will be going there. We did select a private school for Miss Kiya. I am nervous about changing schools but she will still go to daycare at her current school and then 2 days a week preschool at her new school if she gets in. Kiya doesn't always do well with change but this is the school we really want her to go to and hoped that change at a younger age would be easier.

2) I shockingly accepted a promotion at work. This definitely changes what I had thought the rest of the year would look like but it was a good opportunity. It is a lot of responsibility and pressure but I am excited and ready for the challenge.

3) I don't have an adoption update other than I am super frustrated and sad about the whole thing. There has been zero children given emigration permission from Korea so far this year. 0. So not right and so not okay but alas there is nothing we can do about it. We have our provisional I600 approval and all necessary paperwork is on its way to the US Embassy in Seoul. In theory you would think this would mean we were closer to Katie joining our family and in a way yes she is but we need the Korean government to give her emigration permission. There are lots of families ahead of us waiting for this as well. It could be longer than 14 months from referral to travel. In fact I would be surprised if we travel by September. Sigh....

4) Plane tickets purchased. Rental car rented. Baseball tickets ordered. We are headed to spring training in a few weeks in sunny Arizona. Go Brewers!

So there you have it. Not very exciting but an update nonetheless.

10 months old :)

We got pictures :) We had gotten an update about sweet Katie and it was said to have pictures but they weren't there. Here is my lovely girl at 10 months old. Those eyes are just drawing me in and that look. Man oh many we are in trouble. It looks like I will have two strong willed, sassy girls on my hands.

In the update we also learned that Katie, has 2 teeth. She is eating porridge and rice. She takes 2 naps per day and sleeps through the night from about 11pm to 7:30am.

We also learned that she is crawling and pulling herself up to a stand. She walks if you hold both hands and is a very content and happy child. She weighs 18lbs and is over 28 inches long.

I can't wait to hold her. We did just get our provisional I600 approval from USCIS. We are still waiting on the Korean government to grant Katie her emigration permission and thus granting us travel approval. We are hoping it won't take until September but it could. Some time this year I get to hold my daughter and I carry that hope with me. I know she is doing well and that helps.