7 month anniversary...and counting

So, Sunday will be 7 months since we saw this picture for the first time, the cutest little boy in the world, literally (at least in our opinion!).

We can't believe it's been 7 months already and yet, we are still waiting for that final call to tell us to hop on a plane and go to Korea to finally unite our family!  If someone would have told us back in October that we would not be celebrating Mother's Day 2010 with our child at home, I would have laughed at them...now it's our reality.  I want to scream at someone, hit something, and cry all at once, but what good will that do?   It won't get our baby home any sooner; no one we know has any control over what still needs to happen in Korea to get our son paper-ready to travel.   It is also frustrating in that, if we decide we want to adopt again, we have to wait until this adoption is final before getting back on any adoption list.  With Korea, we foster our son for 6 months after he comes home, until we can make the adoption official in the US.  Only then will an adoption agency place us back on their list.  With the slow down in the adoption process over the last year, we are going to be cutting it close with the age limit issue that many countries have, if adopting a second child is what we decide to do.  WE want to be the ones to decide if we will adopt again, not have the decision taken away from us because we aged out of the process!

We are also hoping to hear some news from the director of our adoption agency, who just got back from Korea this past weekend.  She is supposed to send out a general email this week to let us know any news that she found out when she went over.  Nothing yet, but the week's not over yet.  We're also hoping that maybe she brought a whole bunch of pictures back with her for all the waiting families and we'll be getting something in the mail soon!   I am hoping for some pictures from Baby J's first birthday, maybe even some video of him?!  Wouldn't that be awesome?!?!  We are getting closer to that coveted travel call, as a friend of mine just left on Monday to pick up her son whose referral was only one month before ours!!   Let's keep those TCs rolling so we don't miss any more "firsts."

On to some happier news now, my wish book for the quilt is finally complete!!!  Chris surprised me by doing his wish sometime over the last week.   He asked me when was the last time I had looked in the album, which was actually towards the end of last week.  When I rushed upstairs to peek at it again, he had placed his wish on the first page, which I had been saving for him.  I read it and could not keep the (happy) tears contained.  This little boy is loved so much already and we're going to pour it on him when we finally get him in our arms...we can't wait!!!!!  It's so nice to have that project completed, especially since the quilt has been done for a couple of months now!

Just reading it again brings tears to my eyes.  I look forward to the days I see my guys together doing father-son activities, or when our son is imitating his dad, looking up to him to teach him how to do "guy stuff."  My heart rejoices that I will finally be able to give my wonderful husband that gift...maybe not the way we were expecting it to happen in the beginning, but the way it was meant to be.

Now for a few pictures of my new nephew, E.:

"the ND kid"

Big brother C (he looks thrilled, doesn't he?), and baby E

those of the family who could make it to the hospital, welcoming E to the world!!

I tried uploading some video of the dogs again, but it's not working.  I'll have to figure out either what I did last time to get it to upload, or what I did wrong this time that it didn't.  Hmmmmm...any suggestions?