This Little Piggy Take 2

My mom had her piggy bank personalized with Benjamin & Seung Joon on either side.  What a nice addition to this little piggy!  He's been super busy the last 5 months collecting coins.  This was also a great time to count it all up and make a deposit in Benjamin's savings account.....thanks Grandma & Grandpa Schubert.

Care Package #2

Okay so I am obsessed with care packages and hunting down traveling families to take them over for us.  Do not try and hide...I will find you!!  I have even reached out to our US agency to ask if they would consider assisting our waiting families to coordinate a monthly delivery.  In the past wait times had not been so long so 1 or 2 care packages may have been great.  However, now with the 12+ month wait sending these seems to help with the lost time and supports the Foster Families.  Our Korean agency has said they would like to see care packages more often as it helps to provide Foster Families with simple supplies as well provides a connection between child and parent. So let's get these packages over there or get our kiddos home!


I just want our little man to get lots of love through our gifts and pictures while also showing our Foster Family that we care enough about him to send them when possible.  Plus it's a super fun challenge to buy all of this stuff to cram into a gallon Ziploc bag!


A special thank you goes out to Benjamin's Grandparents as they helped to make this care package possible.  My parents provided the cute little clothing, fireman plush toys, and Boo Boo Bunny while Fred's parents made a contribution that helped us to purchase a few of the other items.  Much love is coming your way little man!!! 


Another thank you goes out to a traveling family I met through Facebook that is anxiously awaiting their little girl's Travel Call.  Then they'll be on the next plane to S. Korea!  Hope to hear something any day now : )   

Care Package Items

• Recordable book “Guess How Much I Miss You”
• CD “Nature’s Lullabies & More”
• Boo Boo Bunny
• Baby Einstein roller activity balls
• Ocean Wonders dumbbell rattle
• Musical teething toy
• Fireman and hydrant plush toys
• Shirt, shorts, onsie
• Magnetic picture
• Starbucks VIA ready brew coffee singles
• TAZO tea
• Got Milk? chocolate straws
• Strawberry fruit strips

July Care Package - 10 mos old

Poor bag is stretched to the limit!

8 Month Update

Benjamin's 8 month medical check up was sent at the same time as our referral packet, but I decided I would split it out into it's own post with picture.

Monday, May 7, 2012
weight: 18.9 lbs
height: 27.5 inches
1 tooth on top & 2 teeth on bottom

Care Package #1

So we were fortunate enough to catch a family that just received their travel call and send them Benjamin's first care package.  I had gone out at the start of the year to purchase all of our items but still needed to write a letter to the Foster Mother.  So while on vacation, we crafted this letter which included many thanks for her support and love in caring for Benjamin during this time we could not be with him. We explained to her what was in the care package, and that we would send more as additional families travelled over the year.  We also introduced to her that we had given him the name "Benjamin," and asked that she use this with him if possible so he would begin to recognize it. Finally, I asked her to read the book we made him so he would learn about all of his wonderful family waiting for him here in the States.

One of the first things I did once we got home was send the letter off to be translated by an online service.  I of course paid for the rush delivery since I needed to mail the package up to Wisconsin ASAP.  The letter was turned around in less that 12 hours, let alone on a Sunday!!  So I bundled it all up into my 1 gallon Ziploc bag, headed off to the USPS on Monday, and Benjamin's first care package was en route on it's first leg of the journey.

Today, the care package boards a plane and travels with one of our wonderful families to South Korea.  When they go in to meet their little girl for the first time (tears of joy), they will drop off ours as well as about a dozen other family's packages to our agency.  These packages will then wait until the kiddos come on for their next check up, and there waiting for them will be all of these wonderful packages of love, hugs, and kisses!  I can 't wait for Benjamin to revive our package and hopefully we will receive pictures of him getting into his stuff : )

Care Package Items

• Small blanket square with English letters and numbers
• Family board book
• Magnet picture of us
• J & J lavender baby wash & lotion
• Burt's Bees diaper cream
• 12 mo long sleeve shirt 
• 12 mo shorts romper
• 18 mo sweet pants and long sleeve shirt
• Socks
• Bib
• Flash drive (ask the family to save pics for us)
• Bath toys 
• Beautiful little bird necklace (small gift for foster mom)
• Korean & English version letter

June Care Package - 9 mos old

So excite to send our next care package as I better start collecting items!!  We only hope we can squeeze in 3-4 more over the wait time as other families travel.

Referral Day: May 9, 2012

As I shared in an earlier post, we took a little vacation to Cozumel the second week in May.  We were still without a referral, but had high hopes it would happen sometime soon.

After 4 days of vacation which entailed diving, eating, drinking, and of course checking my email every night, it finally happened.  As we went to dinner each night, we stopped off in the lobby to meet up with other divers, chit chat a bit, and log-in to check emails. Saturday... nothing.  Sunday...nothing. Monday...nothing.  Tuesday...nothing.  To say the least I was a bit disappointed at this point and figured this just wasn't going to be our week.  But then it happened.  On Wednesday night as I downloaded my email I saw a reply from our Social Worker to a message I sent her prior to vacation.  I figured it was just a quick question on her part or a reply to a question I had asked.  To my surprise when I opened it the first thing I read was "I am happy to attach the referral of..."  I stopped in mid sentence and looked over to Fred with my hand up in high 5 mode.

That's all he needed to know our time had come and our referral was here.  I walked over with the iPad and sat with Fred as we continued to read the short email which contained his name and the most current (8 mo) measurements per his doctor's visit on Monday, May 7. The actual referral document was attached with more detail and a additional pictures.  I told Fred I did not want to see the pictures until we read the details, but we caved and scrolled down to the bottom of the email and there he was, the cutest 8 month old little boy ever!!!

After a few screams, "oh my goshes," squeezes, giggles, and a little welling up...we opened the attachment to find all kinds of detail about medical and physical status, development, history of birth and admission as well as the a few more pictures.  These pictures were from his original intake after birth and I can only guess at his 5 or 6 month check up in Feb/Mar.  

That night, we had reservations for dinner with others so we had to wander off to the restaurant and planned to read all of the details later.  That lasted about 10 minutes.  Once dinner was ordered I was back on the iPad soaking in every word.  I think I was in such a daze the rest of the night as we reread the details again and again in the room and continued to look at that cute little face.  Can you ever look at a picture too much??


Some of his developmental status @ 5-6 months old which was included on the referral:

• Places both hands around the bottle.
• Goes to sleep around 11 pm and wakes at 7 am.
• Naps 2-3 times per day for 2 hours each.
• Sleeps with his foster mother on the futon laid out on the floor.
• Takes a bath every day, he does not like bathing much.
• Turns his head to direction of sound.
• Babbles a lot and is able to say eomma (mom).
• Turns from front to back
• Raises the top half of his body and turns head both directions.
• Holds up his butts and tries to crawl.
• Bears weight on feet and bounces when placed in standing position.
• Uses his hands and fingers to pick up objects.
• Is able to pull down objects put on high.
• Finds his reflection in the mirror interesting.

To say the least, vacation was great and I am so glad we were able to enjoy our little guy for a few moments just the two of us.

Referral!! Meet Benjamin Cho Westhoff

It has been an amazing week with both a vacation and a referral.  Now I finally get to post this announcement to my blog after filling out all of the paperwork to make it official! Actually, after 485 days of waiting, I can finally share that we are the proud parents of a son!!  We'd like to introduce you to Benjamin Cho Westhoff.  This is a picture from his 6 month check up which was part of our referral packet.  Isn't he just a cutie pie!!!

DOB: September 9, 2011

Birth weight: 6.9 lbs

Born: Cho, Seung Joon

Cho = mothers last name; Seung = triumphant; Joon = hero

Referral Date: May 9, 2012

Oh happy days, but now on to our second wait to bring Benjamin home!  For those of you wondering, this wait may be 12-15 months depending on how this year's exit permits go and what next year's quota will be.  In the meantime, we look forward to the care packages we'll be able to send and to the opportunity to receive updates as he visits the doctor over this time with his foster family.  

P.S. I have split out the referral day story into a separate post for your reading pleasure.