Happy Birthday Nyah!

Today is Nyah's 1st birthday!  It is pretty cool that we are celebrating it with her!

 If you remember when we started our adoption process for our 2nd we were told the wait time for a referral would be 1 year (we only waited 3 months) which would bring us to June... so we weren't even suppose to have a referral yet, let alone bring the child home!  So that is Miracle #1.  We were also told that travel times were a 11 months wait so that would make the child closer to 16 -18 months when we brought them home (not the 9 week wait we had for Nyah) so, we were not supposed to even celebrate our child 1st birthday with them... Miracle #2 (and many more I am sure)!  God is so good! 

So- Of course we had to celebrate it big!  We had almost 40 people over to our house and we party-ed!  We had Korean food catered from Mirror of Korea (Our favorite Korea restaurant) and have lots of cupcakes.

Here are a BUNCH of pictures!

Here we are in our Hanboks... traditional Korean Wear.

Nyah's came from her Foster mom.

Kyan's also came from his foster mom... it is the same one he wore on his 1st birthday!

We did the Table Ceremony. A tradition in Korea.  Many object are placed in front of the child and the objects that they touch predict the future for them. 

Here are the objects we had:

Pencil- You will be a writer

Thread- You will have a long life

Money- you will be rich

Paint brush- You will be artistic

Rice- You will never want for anything

Thermometer- You will become a Doctor

Knife- You will be a good cook

Computer Mouse- You will be good with technology

Calculator- you will work with numbers

Book- you will be a Scholar

Tambourine- you will be a musician

Ruler- You will be good with your hands

oops! Who turned out the lights?

Nyah picked the Calculator (be still my math teacher heart!) and the pencil and the brush.

So, she will be good with numbers, a writer and an artist! 

That makes a pretty well rounded girl, I think 

I ask Kyan to choose again... and he pick the SAME 3 item he picked when he was 1!

The Computer mouse, the calculator and the pencil. 

The hanbok came with a purse.

It is so beautiful!  

Kyan looking good in his hanbok... I think he will need a bigger size next year! 

Happy Birthday to YOU! 

Cake!!  

Started out with Mama feeding her... 

But she quickly took the fork away and got busy herself! 

Happy Birthday Sweet Girl!!

Como Conservatory

We took an outing to the Como Conservatory!  It was so nice to be around living plants and flowers!  The winter is LONG here in Minnesota and we forget sometimes that spring is coming!

It also provided us with some fun photo opps! 

#1 Crawling through a fake log

#2 Hear no evil

# Little girl by bench

#4 Day Dreaming

{I actually like how this really looks dreamy... it was totally on accident... my lense was all steamy from the green house.}

#5 Smiles

#6 Climbing the steps... to get away from Momma!

#7 Climbing the steps ...to follow big brother!

#8 We're off to see the wizard!

#9 Hey Big Bro... look at all the flowers!

#10 Ky-Guy peeking though the gate

#11 Nyah Peek through the gate

#12 Come on Mom, I am waiting.

I had fun taking pics of the kids!  It was fun to try some new shots!  Some times they cooperated and others not-so-much! 

Which ones are your favorites?

3!

Ky-guy turned 3 yesterday!  I cannot believe how much he has grown!  He is a little boy now and not a baby!

Jason was able to spend the day with us too!  We went to the MOA and visited Underwater World, Lego Land, and Nickelodeon Universe.  We had a great time!

Both kids enjoyed the mall and all the activities!   Here are some pictures of our day!

"Mommy- I cannot believe it!  It is so exciting!"

They had a play park at the end of the fishy tour at Underwater World... I think that it was Kyan's favorite part!

Nyah had some fun too!

A Birdseye view of the play area at Lego Land

My Little builder!

9 months and 1 month

Lanyah turned 9 months on Friday (1/21) and on Saturday (1/22) she had been home for 1 month!

I cannot believe how fast time has gone!  But, at the same time she feels like she has been part of our family forever!

Here are some fun pictures that I took of her in her bedroom:

This one shows a bit of her spunk! 

And can you see her 2 top teeth that she is getting?!

Fun in the Crib

I got some cute pictures of the kids playing in Nyah's Crib the other day!

Oh Poop...It's Croup!

We had a very exciting, very scary night on Tuesday night.  Nyah woke up coughing and crying and unable to catch her breath.  She just kept grasping for breath.  Jason and I tried to calm her down.  We brought down stairs to call either 911 or the nurse line.  By the time we got her down stairs so had stopped crying and was smiling at Jason... but still breathing a very wheezy.  Since she was responding with smiles and giggles to Jason we decided to call the nurse line. 

She told us to bring her to the ER if she was having trouble breathing... so we woke up Kyan and bundled them up and drove to the ER.

There was no one in front of us at the clinic we went to, and we were the only ones there so we got EXCELLENT care! 

It ended up being Croup!  They gave her a steroid to help open her airway and nebulizer-ed her to help as well. 

We were told that if she could not catch her breath again, we should make a steam room in our bathroom with a hot shower and sit in there, and if that doesn’t work to take her outside in the cold air (the cold air helps reduce the swelling) – at least we live in a start that has cold air! 

We were told it would take 2-3 days for her to feel better… and it could take up to a week to get fully over it. I am glad that we went to the ER, because they told us that we caught fast and she has a better chance of healing fasting now.

Kyan was a champ and tickled that he got to go on the adventure to the Dr to “Help baby Sister Banyah”. Nyah did great at the Dr as well, cooperating with all of the exam and taking the meds.

We are all OK... A bit tired, but OK! 

The kids and I are still in our Jammies. and will probably stay this way for a couple of days!

Introducing...

Lanyah EunHei~ 

Born April 21, 2010

Placed in our arms Dec. 22, 2010

Lanyah (Pronounced La-Nigh-Ah) means Sunshine and Happiness, a person who is bright and joyous.

Eun (Pronounced like the first sound in "uno") means Mercy

Hei (Pronounced "hey") means Wisdom

{EunHei is her given Korean name}

We will call her Nyah for short.

Nyah is a very social, cheerful little girl.  She has lots of smiles and giggles for her daddy and her big brother.  She is constantly moving.  She is crawling and almost walking at 8 months.  She is going to keep us all on our toes! 

She loves to eat... she has not met a food that she does not like.  She is never more excited then when there is food in front of her!  

Lanyah adores her big brother and often cries when he leaves the room.  Kyan is taking the big bro role seriously and enjoys being a big helper to mommy and daddy.  However, he does not want her to touch any of his tractors!

All in all we are settling in nicely in the Norman home!   Our house is full and so are our hearts!

We're home!

We are home!  We are Happy!  We are TIRED!!  But mostly happy! 

We had a WONDERFUL Christmas morning together just the 4 of us!  We will update soon with pictures! 

We're going to Korea!!

We got our travel call yesterday!  We get to bring Baby Girl home before Christmas!  AMAZING!  God is so good!  It truly is a CHRISTmas miracle! 

We get to celebrate Christmas as a family this year!  What a Blessing!  Praise the Lord! 

We have lots to do to get ready!  Kyan is staying with Mima and Peepa so, he will be a happy camper. 

We are staying at the guest house at the agency in Korea and we get to meet our little girl on Monday at 1:00 (Korean Time)

We will be Cocooning like we did when Kyan came home for a week.... and also having Jason and I hold her for the 1st month or so, depending on how the bonding is going.   Here is the post I wrote about that last time - we are going to do the same thing.

Update on Baby Girl!

We got an update on Baby Girl last week!  It totally unexpected and wonderful.  We got pictures and video of our daughter.  It was so fun  to see her moving and hear her little voice and laugh.  Kyan LOVES to watch the "Baby Sister movies"  He asks often "When is Baby Sister coming to Ky-Guy's house?"  Soon- I hope!  We still do not have a date or a real time line of when we are traveling.

I called the USCIS officer that is in charge of our paper work for Jason and I to get cleared to bring Baby Girl home.  She said she already processed our paper work and we should get our notice in about a week!  This is a HUGE answer to prayer.  We did not want our paper work holding us up from bringing her home.  Now, we wait for her paper work to be cleared. 

Also with all the goings-on in North and South Korea we are more anxious then ever to bring her home before it gets really ugly over there.  Our agency has been in contact with the Korean agency the all is well with our Baby and our process... at this point it is not effecting it.  But if it gets worse it could!  Just another thing to add to our prayer list:  Bring our Baby home soon, and help North Korea keep it cool!