Goodbye Zona

This week we were shocked and saddened to lose Zona after a short 4 1/2 years of life. As I was looking through old pictures of Zona, I was surprised to see that almost all of the pictures we have show Sushi and Zona lying side by side. However, ever since Jordan came home the cats had not been so cuddly with each other. Zona never took to Jordan and was rarely seen while he was awake. But the moment he was down in his crib she would make an appearance.
We rescued Sushi and Zona from the wild when they were only 3 weeks old. Here they are lying in our bathroom during the first week we had them.

Here I am feeding Zona a bottle. The cats were so little when they were found that we had to feed them from a bottle for the first couple of weeks.

This is a picture of the cats in the windowsill of our first apartment. They loved to sit here and watch the birds.

Luke and I have both been surprised at how sad we have been about losing Zona. She brought us so much joy (and got rid of a lot of mice in our backyard!) in the last 4 years.

New Pictures!

We were excited to receive new pictures of Hyeon Seo yesterday! Staff from our agency recently traveled to Korea and took pictures and a video of him. We will be receiving the video sometime in the next few days. He looks very well fed and cared for just like Jordan did when he was his age. However, he has much less hair than Jordan did! When we received Jordan's pictures from this age he had so much hair they had to put it in a little ponytail!

We also received a written update on Hyeon Seo. He is currently 7 months old and has started to crawl. He is also trying to pull himself up to stand. It sounds like he is going to be just as busy and active as Jordan! I was surprised how late he goes to bed. He sleeps from 11 p.m. until 9 or 10 a.m. He stays up later than I do! Besides the late bedtime he seems to be a good little sleeper. Although we would love to hug and kiss him right now, we are still in for a long wait. We hope the next several months pass by quickly!

It was fun to see little Hyeon Seo wearing one of the outfits we sent him for Christmas!

Introducing...

Hyeon Seo! On December 10 we received a phone call from our social worker about this precious boy and eagerly accepted the referral. The referral came earlier than expected as our home study was not even completed yet. Last week the home study was finally done, and we received the acceptance paperwork this afternoon. Once that paperwork has made its way to Korea, we are in for a long 8-12 month wait until we can bring our son home. In the meantime we will have to be content to stare at his picture and look forward to any updates we receive from Korea during the next several months. We are so excited to be adding this little sweetheart to our family!

Christmas Activities

The Christmas season has been so much fun with Jordan this year! The past few days have been busy as we've been celebrating the season in many different ways. When we first put up the Christmas tree, Jordan pulled up his little chair and just sat down in front of it and admired it. It was very cute!

This past weekend Grandpa and Grandma Scherkenbach came to visit. Jordan calls them Grandma Deena and Grandpa Tim and sure has been talking about them a lot since their visit! Here he is opening one of the presents they brought for him.

Jordan loved playing with the little matchbox cars and the ramp that he received! He opened them up in the hotel room and had to be carried out while throwing a little fit because he did NOT want to stop playing with his new toys!

Once we brought him to the pool area he calmed down. He had so much fun swimming with Daddy!

A couple days ago my mom came over and helped Jordan and me bake Christmas cookies. Jordan participated in every step. Here he is pouring in the flour.

After watching me roll the dough for awhile he couldn't stand it any longer and had to try it himself!

He loved squeezing the frosting on to the cookies and even tried to eat the frosting right out of the tube! That boy sure does have a sweet tooth!

He was so excited when it was finally time to eat the cookie. "Yum!"

Today my parents and I brought Jordan to the Critter Barn to see the live nativity. He loved the animals and had no fear of them! (very unlike his Mommy!)

Here he is patiently waiting for a turn to hold a duckling.

Although his facial expression doesn't show it, he was so excited to be holding this duckling!

Finalization Day (Finally!!)

After 15 months home, we finally finalized Jordan's adoption. Although we have been a family in every sense, it feels good to have it be official! Thats Daddy on the right collecting Jordans legal documents, No he's not a lawyer!

It's official! Here's the judge signing the document naming us as Jordan's parents.

The judge invited Jordan to hit the gavel and gave him this teddy bear as a gift.

Jordan was way too interested in his new teddy bear to look at the camera!

Now the teddy bear goes with Jordan everywhere and he even brings it into his crib at bedtime.

The following pictures are back from Halloween. My mom bought this pumpkin for Jordan a couple weeks before Halloween and he had so much fun watching Daddy carve it!

Jordan is always SO curious about anything we may be doing!

Didn't the jack-o-lantern turn out fantastic? Even the smile looks great. Great job, Daddy!!

Jordan dressed up as Tigger for Halloween this year. He liked to hop like Tigger when he wore his costume.
Here are Reily and Jordan holding hands before going out to trick-or-treat. Aren't they cute? Jordan didn't know what a sucker was until he saw Reily eating one here. He had his first sucker later on that night and he loved it! There's no turning back now!

Jordan's First Haircut

For the past year Luke has been giving Jordan his haircuts in the bathtub. Although this has worked out okay, Jordan has become increasingly wiggly when Luke tries to cut his hair which can make it pretty challenging! So we thought it was time for him to have a real, professional haircut.


When we arrived at the salon Jordan sat on my lap while he watched Luke get his hair cut. He was very still and attentive for awhile, but true to his personality, he was ready to move after about 10 minutes. He ran around the salon and found the broom saying, "Sweep!" while trying to push the broom and got into other mischief. Thankfully we were the only customers in the salon!


Here's a picture of Jordan getting ready to get into a lot of mischief!!



We had no idea how Jordan would do when it was his turn so I loaded my purse with snacks in case I needed to distract him. We also told him that he would get a cookie when it was all done. But surprisingly the snacks were not needed- he sat still during the entire haircut!

He looked a little scared as the apron was put on him, but he didn't whine or fuss one bit. He was very brave!

He sat on the booster without wiggling one bit! I was shocked!!

After he was finished with his haircut the salon gave us a coupon for a free tub of chocolate chip cookie dough that we could get at the pizza place next door. Jordan was so excited about the cookies and kept repeating, "chocolate chip cookie!" the whole ride home. He didn't quite understand the idea that we had to bake the cookies first, but once they were finally ready he was rewarded with a nice warm cookie!


Here's Jordan running around at home showing off his new haircut! I'm sure it won't be long before he needs another one!

Happy Birthday Jordan!

For the past couple of weeks we have been telling Jordan that his birthday was coming up and that he was going to be two. Every time we would ask him how old he was going to be, he would answer by saying, "Two!" and then give a silly smile. Jordan has been full of smiles lately and especially loves to smile for the camera. Whenever I take my camera out he will say, "pick" (picture) and give me a big smile. What a show off!! Jordan had a great birthday! We began the morning by going to the park to feed the ducks. Unfortunately it was a very cold and windy morning, so we didn't spend much time there, but Jordan had fun watching the ducks eat the bread we threw to them. We thought he would like to feed the ducks because he has a little stuffed duck that he carries around the house with him. He is always asking for his "ducky".

It didn't take long for Jordan to find the steering wheel at the park! He loves pretending to drive!

After the park we went to our public library. Jordan loves to go to the library because there is a playroom there full of toys for kids Jordan's age. Here he is playing at the lemonade stand.

When we came home from the library we had lunch and that is when Jordan really began to get excited! While playing at home he discovered the place where I hidden his presents. He started carrying them around the house and asking to open them. I told him he had to wait until after his nap. The second I went into his room after his nap he started jumping up and down in his crib and saying "ope, ope" (open). This picture of Jordan on his train was taken right after he woke up from his nap. He was SO excited all afternoon for his cake and his presents!


When the time finally arrived for Jordan to open his presents he yelled, "YEAH!" and ran right for the presents. Here he is opening a couple trucks for his new train set.

Here we are opening his bubble mower. He absolutely loves this mower. Jordan keeps repeating bubble mower over and over because he wants to go outside and play with it so badly!
Jordan's biggest gift was a train table and a beginning Thomas the Train set. He loves playing with the train at Barnes and Noble so we knew he would love this gift, and we were right!

Jordan has changed so much in the past year. He has gone from barely walking to running and jumping. A year ago he wasn't saying any English words and now he repeats almost everything we say! It is such a joy to watch him grow and change and we can't wait to see what the next year will bring. We love you Jordan!!