Tuesday, December 15, 2009

Best Day Ever!

We finally met Gus today. We started our day with a 6:30 wake-up call. We anxiously got ready, ate some breakfast, and rode the subway over to Holt. We met DJ the overseas social worker at Holt. We then traveled about an hour to Ilsan. The drive was very pretty, mountains surround the city. When we got to Ilsan we met the superviser and Molly Holt. Then we took a short walk across campus to where Gus lives. As soon as we entered the door, there he was in the arms of his house mother. She instantly handed him to me. He smiled and cuddled into my arms. Holding him and kissing was indescribable. I handed him to Jason and Jason lifted him high in the air and we saw an even bigger smile. His face just lights up when he smiles. After Jason hugged him he reached back out for me and I took him back in my arms and we embraced in a family hug, our new family felt complete. We then took him into the play room and showed him all of the fun toys we had brought him. He loved the bear puppet, elephant puppet and the touchy feel book. Whenever he gets a new toy he looks at it and then pulls it up over his head, its very cute. We were able to play and interact with him. He sat in both of our laps, cuddled with us and then started getting very tired. He sleeps on the floor so we started getting into his sleep position. Then he flipped onto his back and started crying, his whole face scrunched up. I quickly scooped him up. I held him to me kissed his face and patted his back. He was asleep in my arms within about five minutes. He was so comfortable he started snoring! What a sweetie. We layed him down on his blanket and said good bye it was so hard to leave him but at least we know that come Friday at 10:00 am we will be able to take him with us.

We got a chance to talk with his house mother for a while and get a lot of our questions answered. He eats three times a day a rice porridge. He also eats smashed bananas and yogurt. He has a sweet tooth and his favorite food is Strawberry yoplait yogurt. He is not feeding himself yet. He drinks soy milk and rice powder mixed in water, both out of a straw sippy cup during the day and out of bottle at night before bed and then around 2:00 am. He sleeps from 9:00pm-7:00am with the feeding at 2:00am. He is still taking two naps one from 9:00-10:30 and one from 2:00-4:00pm. He likes to sleep and would sleep more if they let him but they keep him on a strict schedule. He gets hot while he sleeps and will crawl around on the floor trying to find the coolest place. When he is tired he gets fussy and will hit head on the floor, the same when he gets hungry. We are assuming that is how he gets his bumps on his head. His favorite things are the taggy balnket I made for him, a toy drum, thomas the train dvd's and cars that you can pull back and watch go. He can manuever a little slide all by himself including crawling up the wrong way. He is an absolute joy everyone just adores him.

The rest of our day was full of meeting people and seeing places. We enjoyed a wonderful lunch with Molly Holt at a traditional Korean barbeque wow the food was fabulous. We sat on the floor, ate with chopsticks, and left our shoes in the entry way. Molly's parents were the original founders of Holt and now she lives on Ilsan's campus and helps run the ministry. She is very passionate about what she does and cares very much about Gus. After lunch we said good bye to Ilsan and headed to the Holt orphanage where Gus used to live. The entire staff was elated to see us, they miss Gus and just adore him. They gave us some pictures from when he was younger including one from his first birthday party. Everyone was so friendly. DJ was able to translate our conversations.

Later we went to bookstore to get a couple of kids books in Korean for Gus. We bought a Thomas the Train book for the airplane and then we bought the giving tree in Korean. The bookstore was a lot like a barnes and noble just filled with Korean books.

This evening DJ picked us up at our hotel and took us out to dinner. We had a wonderful time getting to know her better. She is a wonderful woman. She speaks wonderful English. She lived in Ada for a little while so it was fun to name places that she remembered from Michigan and tell her about where we live because she recognized so much of it. She then gave us a little car tour of Seoul.

We are now back at the Hotel, trying to wind down from our amazing day. Jason is in the living room watching Korean soccer and I am planning on trying to get some pictures up on facebook.

Tomorrow we will be going on city tour, then we have Thursday to ourselves and pick up Gus at Holt on Friday morning at 10:00 am. Things are going wonderful! Check out facebook for the pictures that is where I will hopefully be able to post them.

6 comments:

  1. i cried when i read this post-- God is soo good! I'm so glad you have finally been able to hold Gus in your arms :)

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  2. Wow. What an awesome awesome day! Thanks for your post.

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  3. Awesome! Oh my--the best thing in the whole world--when a child comes into his forever family.

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  4. How great friends! What a blessing...what a good looking family! Peace Like a River...david

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  5. Oh I am so tempted to join facebook just to see those pictures! Gus sounds SO sweet. It must feel amazing to be mama to such a sweet boy! Your journey has boosted my faith in God's sovereign plan. Continued prayers! Love, Juli

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  6. Jason and Emily, we have had our prayers answered. We prayed for wonderful immediate bonding. Praise God.
    Phil and Nancy Pleune

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