Preston David, My Angel in Heaven

October 18, 2003 should have been the best day of my life but ended up being the worst. Today is my first born son's 8th birthday in Heaven.  This year I have been surprisingly really emotional.  I just expected this to get easier and easier every year that goes by but this one has been really hard on me.  I think it's because I just don't feel whole right now.  My best friend in the world (my husband) has been away for the past 3 1/2 months and will be gone another 2 1/2 months and my son is half a world away in Korea.  I miss ALL of my boys.  The difference is that I know I will be with Dave and Liam soon and get to hold and kiss them.  My meeting with Preston will have to wait until the Lord calls me home.  As painful as it was to lose Preston, I wouldn't change having him for the world.  He brought Dave and I closer together.  I don't know where we would be if it wasn't for him.  I can still feel his soft cheeks, tiny feet, and precious little hands.  I miss my son but am comforted by the fact that he is being held by our Lord.

When I was pregnant with him I listened to Dixie Chicks "Godspeed" over and over again.  It would sing it to him while I held my belly.  I couldn't wait to sing it to him while he was looking at me.  The song has a whole new meaning now.  "Godspeed little man, sweet dreams little man, my love will fly to you each night on angels wings". 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VqaBof47pmY

Photo shoot

My handsom boy is getting so big!

 Liam at 10 1/2 months old!

 Here he is at 11 1/2 months with some of his birthday goodies.  We sent him a birthday letter, truck, baby football, All the ways I love you book (recorded by Dave and I), fridge farm, a few teething toys, and a fun farm small electronic toy.  Lots of baby snacks like puffs and mum mums! 

This is my favorite picture of his pouty lips! 
So at 11 1/2 months old he is walking along furniture and has 6 teeth (4 on top and 2 on bottom).  He is 31 inches, tall boy!! And weighs 23.4 pounds! 
We are so blessed to have pictures of him every month.

"When do you get to bring him home?"

Is the million dollar question that no one seems to know the answer to.  There is a lot of paperwork involved in bringing him home and one big piece of the paperwork puzzle is the EP (emmigration/exit permit).  The ministry grants these and they have cut back on the number that they will be submitting and approving.   The great news is that just yesterday they FINALLY started submitting babies for these permits and today the last EP batch submitted (may 2011) were approved!!!  We still don't know what this means for us but it is movement which is fantastic!  We are prepared to have to wait until next year to bring him home but my heart hurts.  I miss my son!  I have never met him but I can't imagine life without him.  We just have to wait on the Lord to get us to our son, and I know he will.  I have strong faith in God that he will take care of Liam and take care of us while we wait for our family to be reunited.  So please say a prayer for us as we continue to wait.  Please ask God to prepare Liam for a difficult transition and prepare his Foster family's heart to say goodbye after raising him from baby to toddler.  It's going to be difficult but I am so ready to be his mommy and I know my husband is ready to hold his son.  2012 is going to be the best year yet for our family!

New picture!

So I have put this picture on everything but my blog.  I am horrible about remembering my blog.
Anyway, here is the lastest greatest picutre!! 

Isn't he beautiful?!!!  I just can't get over how handsom our son is. 

Here he is with all of his goodies and his beautiful foster mother.  I had to put sunglasses on her to keep her identity private. 
At his 10 month appointment (he was really 9 1/2 months) he weighed in at 22 pounds!!!  He is in the 75% for height and weight.  He has 2 teeth on the bottom! It says that he creeps, sits up well, perfers his foster mother, responds to his name, plays peek-a-boo and patty cake, says single syllables, and imitates speach sound!!  He has really grown just in the couple of months that we have been recieving updates on him. 

What we are doing while we wait for Liam

Dance Recital (she called it dance recycle hehe)

Myrtle Beach, SC.!

Looks like Snapple is waiting for a treat :)

Went to a rodeo!

Celebrated Independence day and watched some fireworks

 (our last day together before hubby left)

I can't wait to be able to do these things as a family of FIVE!!  Next year will be amazing :)

Surrounded by Love

God has surrounded our family with AMAZING people.  This process of adoption has been a really difficult one.  We've had emotional highs and lows.  I have gone to family and friends in tears because of disappointment and I have gone to them in celebration of a new step toward bringing our son home.  And now we are facing a new challenge of being away from my husband, my kids away from their daddy.  It has only been 6 days and we have 6 months to go.  But we are doing alright, we are getting through it because of the people we are surrounded by.  I am amazed by the true, genuine nature that some people have.  I have witnessed some truly selfless acts of kindness and am so overwhelmed by the love.

We recieved an annonymous note about a month ago with a donation towards our adoption.  I am still in awe of the selflessness and kindness that it took to give that gift to our family.  If you are reading this, thank you for this gift of helping us bring our son home. Big hugs to you and your family.  We will never forget it. 

Thank you to everyone who has been there for us emotionally.  Your kind and understanding words and prayers have gotten us this far!  Thank you all who have taken care of our family, fed us, watched our dogs, and babysat our kids (you know who you all are).  From the bottom of my heart, Thank you!!  Love and Blessings to you all.

Our Beautiful Boy!

Here he is!  The most beautiful little boy!  He will be 9 months at the end of this month!  This is his 8 month picture.  Hopefully there will be more to come :)

These are his newborn pictures!  He was a beautiful 6 lbs 5 oz., 19 1/2 inches.

I praise God for this amazing little guy.  We are so blessed to be his mommy and daddy.  I just can't wait to hold him in my arms. 

It's a BOY!!!

I am so happy to announce that we have a son!!! I was in walmart shopping with my two baby girls when I got the call.  I almost didn't answer it not recognizing the phone number but I am so very glad that I did. Here is a little of how it went:
Social Worker:  Are you driving?
Me: No, just shopping in walmart.
SW: well, you may want to sit down because you have a baby!
Me: (something like) Oh my goodness.  Are you serious?!  Praise the Lord.  Thank you Jesus!
I was definately turning some heads because I immidiately started crying.  I was so overwhelmed with joy, I was shaking.  After I got off the phone with our SW I told the girls that they had a baby brother!  They were excited of course!  I tried to call my husband but wasn't able to get a hold of him for THREE HOURS!!  Finally he called and I told him that it wasn't an emergency but I needed to go pick him up from work.  When he got in the car Brooklyn said "Addison is going to be a big sister!".  He was so surprised and so happy.  And then she told him that the baby was a baby brother!  I am so happy for my husband that he has a son!  And the really great part is that they already share a special day, their birthday September 28!  Our son is 8 months old and the cutest little guy in the world.  He actually looks a lot like our girls, the button nose and big round cheeks that you just want to kiss all day long.  He has beautiful pouty lips too.  We sent off  the acceptance paperwork to Holt (our agency in Oregon) Thursday but it's not going to get there until Monday morning.  Hopefully everything will be filled out right and it will be sent onto Korea in the next few days. Once it's on its way to Korea, we can post his picture!!! 

Fingerprints and Korean Food = great day!

We drove to San Antonio to get our fingerprints done to finish up the I-600a.  They said our prints looked good so now we just wait for approval!  I'm a little nervous that this government shutdown is going to affect the processing of our paperwork :-/  GOD'S TIMING, GOD'S TIMING.  I have to keep reminding myself and it makes me feel calmer.  So now we just wait, no more paperwork until we get our referral! 

While we were in SA we went to a great Korean restaurant!  It was the first we as a family has sat down for a Korean meal.  I cannot wait to learn to cook some of this great food.  So here is the spread that we had.  Kimchi, Yaki Mandu, Edamame, Bi Bim Bap, and lots of other yumminess!  The girls weren't sure what to think of some of it but they will get used to it :) 

 Yaki Mandu, two different kinds of kimchi, edamame, potatoes, broccoli, and cucumbers.

 Fried Shrimp, mmmmm.

 My Bi Bim Bap had beef,  lettuce, rice, mushrooms, carrots, and topped with an egg.  Served really hot, it was very yummy.

 Brooklyn trying to figure out chopsticks.

 Addison eating edamame :)

Green Tea Ice Cream for Dessert.

It was a great day in SA, a little shopping and a drive thru safari were in order too!  It was such a good day, I love every moment with my family.

Biometrics appointment (fingerprinting)

So I have been stalking our mailman for a week now waiting for our fingerprinting appointments and they finally got here yesterday!  It's for April 7th (my birthday!) in San Antonio.  So we are going to make a day of it and do some fun things with the kids (possibly sea world or the wildlife safari) and hopefully some shopping and good food.  Even though this doesn't change the wait for a referal it is still progress on something.  After the fingerprinting we will just be waiting for our I-600A approval and then a referal!!!  Things are moving!  I just have to keep remebering that it is God's timing and He knows who our baby is. :)

A First

So last sunday after church we decided to try out a restaurant that we pass by all the time.  The name of the restaurant is "Seoul" so the Korean food has to be great right?

To our surprise it was a Chinese, Korean, AND Mexican buffet!  Ha ha!  The Korean food was very sparse but what I had was pretty good, pork bulgogi, korean hot wings (which honestly I'm not so sure wasn't American hot wings, but I wouldn't know the difference), and some sort of spicy soup (I can't remember the name of it).  I would love to find an authentic Korean restaurant but no such luck here in Del Rio.  It was definately an experience :)

My little loves

My girls are everything to me.  They are so very different from each other.  Brooklyn (4) is sensitive, dramatic, caring, and affectionate.  Addison (2) is  the boss.  She is outgoing, sweet, and will take a swing at her sister if provoked.  They both love to cuddle (Addison is cuddling with me right now as I type on the couch).  Motherhood is the hardest thing that I have ever done but is the most rewarding, amazing thing that I have ever done.  I wouldn't change my life for ANYTHING (except adding another child... ha ha)! 

True Love

Our kids are going to be so embarassed of us when they get older

We can never get a serious picture.  My husband is a goofball.  And yes, that is a mustache that he was growing (for mustache march, it's an Air Force thing).  Thank goodness he shaved it already.

This is my true love even if he can't take a serious picture.

HSTK (home study to korea)

I almost forgot to tell everyone that our homestudy was sent to Korea yesterday!!  This is a huge step!  The next thing we need to do is wait for a referal!  In the mean time, we have to get our appointments for fingerprinting and FBI checks from USCIS (immigration).  I just sent our I-600a in today via UPS (we need immigration to approve our homestudy and fingerprints to recieve a referal)!  It should get there on Monday so hopefully we'll get our appointments soon.  I realize that we are on God's time but it is hard not to want things to go as fast as possible.  I am so ready to be mama to #3!

a dream coming true

Hello!!  So I'm just going to jump right into this blogging stuff!  I need something to keep me busy while we wait for baby #3 to join the Kluttz family (not that I'm not busy enough with two young, beautiful, active girls).  It all started as a dream of mine.  I always wanted to adopt a child and now it's actually coming true!  Dave and I had discussed it even before we had the girls but that is all it was, discussion.  After we had baby #2 Dave actually brought up the idea of adopting.  That brought so much happiness to my heart because he wasn't 100% on board a few years ago.  I think that he knows that he is an amazing dad so he wants to keep spreading the love ;).  So here we are, waiting for a referal for an infant from Korea.  It is such a beautiful country, culture, and people.  I'm so in love with Korea and I have never even been there.  Dave was fortunate enough to go last year and brought some Korean gifts home for us.  I feel so blessed that God put this in our hearts to do this.  We have so much farther to go and so much more paperwork, and waiting.  I'm excited for ya'll to take this journey with us.  Please pray for us as we go on this rollercoaster and pray for our baby (whomever he or she may be).