Merry Christmas

This Christmas will be the best for us! Our first one finally as a family
of four. I'm so glad to have received the best gift of all, a wonderful, sweet, cute
baby girl that we love so much!!
Thank you God, this was the Christmas we were waiting for too many years.
Dear little J, I hope that you'll enjoy the first Christmas with your family!
Mummy

For my American friends

We don't celebrate it in Italy, but we're busy for my son birthday.
He just turned 5 and he'll have a big party next Saturday with his preschool friends.

Happy Birthday, J!

HAPPY FIRST BIRTHDAY!!
My sweet little Halloween baby is one!

Seoul Tower

The Seoul Tower is famous for its locks. So we also put
a lock with our names on it to remember our adoption
and our forever family.

Halloween in Korea

I want to share one thing of our trip in Korea. In Seoul
there were everywhere Halloween signs and decorations,
already one month before.
That was very nice because our little J was born at Halloween!

First day together!

Our J seems happy, she fussed only a little.

Let's hope for the best!

Great big brother!

Our son was great, he played with J all the time and now they are already long time friends!

That was really moving!!!

Tomorrow is the big day!

Finally we'll meet our daughter at her foster family's house!!!

Today we made for her a lot of Pororo shopping, so we'll have

some toys for home with her favourite character.

We're in Seoul!!

Being in our daughter's hometown in so exciting and moving...

The fly went well and also the big brother was very good during the loooong trip

to Korea.

Tonight we tried a typical Korean dinner, but too much pepper-onion-garlic for us!

Tomorrow we'll visit the city and we'll buy some gifts, waiting for Monday to meet

our little girl!

Korea, here we come!

Packing is finished. Gifts are done. All is ready.
J: Mum, Dad and Brother are coming!

Things to see in Seoul

Thanks to a nice coworker that borrowed me the Lonely Planet Korea guide,
I've found what I would like to see while in Seoul.
(we have the weekend of 24-25 September as tourists because we'll meet J
only on Monday 26).

1. Namdaemun-market
2. Lotte-world
3. Coex-mall with its aquarium
4. Cheondogyo-temple
5. Children-grand-park with zoo
6. Gyeongbokgung
7. Seoul-tower
8. Changdeokgung
9. Bongeunsa Buddhist temple

Maybe too many? We'll have a son of almost 5 with us... I've chosen
something historical and something funny for our boy.
But it's difficult to choose when there is so many things to see!

Let the countdown start!

The Pororo toy was really a sign...
WE'LL FLY TO KOREA ON THE 22nd of SEPTEMBER!!!

It's a sign!

Today in a Chinese big shop near work
I've found a Pororo little toy! It's the first one
I see here so I immediately bought it for our little J.
Now let's hope to meet her soon so we'll be able
to play together...

Happy 10 months, J!

Dear J,
today you're 10 months.
We're still here, I know, but I really hope to be with you before
your 11 months.
Let's hope September will be the right month for our travel call.
A big kiss
We love you and we miss you so much!
Mum

My fisrt decorated cake for J

Today I made some cupcakes to celebrate
the birth of the third little boy of a friend.
Then I decided to bake also some of them to celebrate
our little J. They are the first decorated cakes
that I make for her.
They will start a long list of pink decorated cakes
that I'm going to bake for her in the next years.
After so many blue cakes it was time to change!!

Dedicated to my little J

"...Venivano dai più lontani estremi della vita, questo è stupefacente,
da pensare che mai si sarebbero sfiorati, se non attraversando da capo a piedi l'universo,
e invece neanche si erano dovuti cercare, questo è incredibile,
e tutto il difficile era stato solo riconoscersi, riconoscersi, una cosa di un attimo,
il primo sguardo e già lo sapevano, questo è il meraviglioso
- questo continuerebbero a raccontare, per sempre, nelle terre di Carewall,
perché nessuno possa dimenticare che non si è mai lontani abbastanza per trovarsi,
mai - lontani abbastanza - per trovarsi"

Alessandro Baricco, Oceano Mare

A thought for my baby

Hi, little J!

Today you're 9 months old and I'm really sad. I would like to be

there with you to celebrate. Let's hope for your 10 months...

And we're also worried for the landslides that occurred in the last days in Seoul.

I hope you're ok.

I missy you.

Mum

Sorry, this will be in Italian!

Questo post è per ricordarmi sempre della lettera che oggi ho scritto alla mia piccola.
E' per una buona causa, il progetto Diecilune che finanzia una scuola in Camerun.

Ciao piccola mia.
Questa è una lettera speciale perchè tu vivi all’altro capo del mondo, in questo momento sei con una famiglia affidataria e aspetti che la tua mamma e il tuo papà vengano a prenderti insieme al tuo fratellino. Magari stai tenendo in mano la nostra foto con le tue manine e pensi “Ma di chi sono queste tre facce buffe così diverse dalla mie? Mi dicono “umma” e “appa” ma sono strani...” Eppure siamo noi, tesoro, la tua famiglia. Ti troverai con un visino diverso, un colore della pelle differente ma sarai a casa. Non scordartelo mai. Non sarai uscita dalla mia pancia come tuo fratello ma sei stata un’idea nel mio cuore per tanto tempo, finchè non hai avuto un nome e un volto. Ora sappiamo chi sei e non vediamo l’ora di venirti a prendere. Ti vogliamo un bene immenso. Per il momento gioca, divertiti, cresci... Mamma, papà e fratellino arrivano presto.
Un bacino sulle tue guancine paffute.
La tua mamma

E chissà che un giorno questa letterina non sia pubblicata sul sito o addirittura sul libro...

Done!

The documents are ready and maybe already flying to Korea.
The care package is also on his way to our little girl.
Now we are the last ones that have to fly, I hope soon!!!

I wanted to share something cute. I was writing a story about
a little kitty because the psychologist said that we had to write a
tale about our girl's life before adoption.
I put a picture of Charmmy Kitty in the file and I discovered that
this character shares the birthday with our little J.! The 31st
of October (our little Halloween baby...)

Care package

Today we made our first shopping for the care package!
We were so happy to choose something for our little girl...
Here are the first two toys (from Ikea):
a funny book about circus

a golden retriever peluche, very very soft:

I hope she'll be happy playing with them!

How could I resist?

Going to my first pink shopping was a real pleasure...
I never got something pink before because we have a boy
so "unluckily" I'll have to buy more and more...
BTW Saturday I'll have a shopping date with my best friend
that also will be the Godmother for this little girl.
After the last great news it will
be even better going out together!!

Thinking PINK!

We've been matched to a little GIRL!!
Thursday we'll know more. For the moment we have to wait!
Today I was at school working when my mobile rang: it was my husband
that got the call from the Agency. From that moment I keep working
but it was very difficult to think at what I had to do!!
We're really happy!!

Korean Party

Today we had a party at our Agency with all the adopting
families and three important people from the Korean
Agency.
I wanted to do something special so I baked a special cake
depicting the Korean flag!


Here it is:

The white is icing while the red and blue are made
with strawberries and cranberries jam. The i-ching
are dark thanks to the coffee's powder.

By the way we hope that this party will bring soon
more referrals, the Agency was very hopeful!!

My heart was speaking!

We have still no news from Korea (the next referrals are expected in april)
but yesterday I spoke about adoption at work.
I wanted to have a referral but I was really angry with
my boss. They changed my school timetable again (and it's worse) and my boss
said "I'm sorry, I know this year you had to stand a lot, for example an ugly time table, but next year..."
Without thinking I heard myself saying "Probably next year I'll be in maternity leave!"
So my boss eyes went to my tummy and I said "I'm not pregnant, it's an adoption"
He said he was happy and I went to my class.
That means that I really want this baby!
I really would like some good news now, most of all because I'm worried for
the risk of radiations from Japan (Korea is so near Fukushima!!)

Shopping for the baby!

Even if the only news I got from our Agency is a raising
in the costs for Korean adoptions, the upcoming spring
is giving me some hope... so without thinking I purchased
two little things for our Korean baby! I know it's strange
because we don't even know his/her name but I needed
these gifts for me, to keep thinking positive...
The little clothes are two t-shirts (one with Goofy and one
with some cute animals). They are 9 months old size because
the average of the Korean babies coming here in Italy are of
8 months.

I've also written to some famous companies of baby food
asking for samples (easier to bring during the trip to Korea).
They sent me lots of samples and also a cute spoon with
a bear on it. Now all seems ready for our baby.
Let's hope that this items will bring soon some luck with
our referral!

This would be great for our baby!

I've discovered some videos of this Sanrio character,
Pankunchi.



"Pankunchi is a baby panda who was abandoned in a forest where pandas live. His favorite possession is an old mitten that was in the box with him. Pankunchi loves bread, and his tummy rumbles whenever he sees the two pieces of bread, Shokupan and Koppepan."

How cute is this story?
Obviously now I can't wait to have my baby panda to show him/her these videos...

Another new Lunar Year

The 3rd of February will begin the Korean Lunar Year,
the Year of the Rabbit.
I've started this blog last year when the Tiger Year
has just begun and already 12 months are gone.
I hope this will be the right one for our baby to come.

New Korean friends

Still no news from Korea but we should be very near. Let's hope for a quick referral.

In the meantime, we discovered that a Korean baby from our Agency was adopted by a family living in our block. Last Sunday my husband was out of city for work so I met the baby and his family with my son. It was so sweet! Seeing my son with a Korean baby was like seeing our future!
The baby was very cute, with two puffy cheeks like an hamster... The parents were very
kind and patiently answered to all my questions.
One step more to our baby!