A Few Vacae Pics

Kora excited on the plane to go to Jamaica:

This was just the 'start' of the immigration line:

 A very Merry Welcome to our hotel:

The other part of the lobby:

Todd and Erika excited and relieved that we were staying at such a nice hotel.  Waiting to check in:

Kora sitting on the very tall bench:

I thought this was like our ice cream, it wasn't.  What a disappointment:

BIG knife and fork on the wall of the restaurant:

About stepped on these guys last night in the atrium:

'This' is where your butt goes on the bench in the lobby:

Skip testing the seat out, wasn't a good fit:

They were on one side of me on the beach:

And these two were on the other side of me:

We found Erika's dopleganger.  Before the trip, Erika twisted her ankle and has been hobbling all over the place.  I call her Peggy, so we found another 'Peggy' at the hotel!:

Of course I had to include the rest of the kiddos:

This is how the guys watch Sunday football in Jamaica.  And yes, that's my bed too:

Football continues:

Christmas in Jamaica Man!

After a blizzard at home and two and half days of no power before leaving, we are now in beautiful Jamaica for Christmas!  What a time with the blizzard, it was beautiful until the power went out and we had to endure the cold and no electricity.  Amazing how one takes having electricity for granted until you don't have it.

We sent the kids off to grandma and grandpa's for a night hoping the power would be restored the next day.  The next morning came and it was freezing in the house!  44 degrees upstairs, 54 degrees on the main floor.  As we started getting ready, the power came on!!  How excited we were to have this luxury back.  Time to pack and get things ready for the trip!

We did make it without any hitches to Jamaica.  The immigration line was horrendous, think everyone had the same idea we did.  Once we got thru immigration, we had to find our bus to the hotel.  The bus was full and role was taken to see what hotel everyone was going to.  We would be the last ones to be dropped off.

The first hotel, yeah...I knew looking at it the kids were scared of where the heck we were going to be staying.  I knew they were NOT impressed.  The second and even possibly the third hotel, the kids weren't impressed either.  So then came ours...YES!  Jackpot!  Very nice, very beautiful and everyone was excited including the kids!  And they did admit they were scared of where we were staying, as like me, they have very high standards for vacations and hotels.  We were not disappointed.

Once we got settled into our rooms, we went to dinner.  Wonderful buffet!  Of course, with the long day of travel, the girls showered and relaxed while the boys went to the game room for pool and beer.  It was a very good night but even better waking up knowing we are in Jamaica!

My last full day in Korea is over. I love coming home. Yes, it's emotional and draining, but for me, that's what I love about coming here. I am home, but yet there are so many emotions I feel when I am here. Happy, sad, grateful, bless

ed, touched, loved...but this is why I live the mission for Holt. I want for these kids what I have and was given in life. So know when I post about being sad, it's not about being sad for myself, I'm sad for the children I see here that still deserve a family of their very own. You all know me as being happy and grateful and forever indebted to the Holts and David Kim for their work on our kids' behalf. And thank you to everyone for your support and taking time to read my posts. I hope that I have touched your lives in some way as you have all touched mine. Blessings to all.

I'm back in my hotel room. Alone. Tired. Sick. Emotionally drained. Happy. Sad. Disappointed. Grateful. Blessed. Before I came on this trip, at the last minute I decided to make an arrangement with a long time Holt staff member in Korea to go with me to the City Baby Hospital hoping she could help me find out anymore information regarding my beginnings. The adoption journey is like a roller coas

ter ride, with ups and downs, twists and turns, blind spots and all the while your heart is in your throat. I've shared my story with everyone but my story continues as I search for my first year of life in Korea. I didn't find out much today, as the roller coaster has now taken me to yet another facility in another city, so I decided not to go today. I did find out that I was probably abandoned when I was five months old and in three different facilities prior to being in my orphanage at 15 months of age. My story isn't done, but I have to be patient. I hope to continue this summer with my search so once again, stay tuned.

It Never Gets Easier

This is my sixth Gift Team trip and tenth time visiting an unwed mother's shelter.  Why do I even try to fool myself into thinking this time around it will be different and I won't get h.  I'll take the low road and blame the other people that are with me, they are the ones that start to cry so of course, I cry!

The same questions are asked over and over on each trip so you would think I would be used to the drill.  Yesterday, when we went to the shelter, we started off with the tour and then created our own pottery out of clay.  That was a lot of fun and everyone seemed to have a great time with it.  So with this type of atmosphere, things should be pretty mellow.  Wrong.  Once the Q & A begins, the tears begin.

I am a very strong advocate for adoption, but I will not tell any other woman what her decision should be.  This is a life long decision that this mother has to live with.  I'm only grateful that my birth mother made the decision that she did, whether she gave me up willingly or not so willingly.  I am here today because of her and I love her for giving me life.  I feel the same way about my daughter's birth mother.  I hope I can do her proud raising this beautiful girl and give her every opportunity I possibly can.

These types of visits tend to drain me emotionally, which then leads to me being tired physically.  After getting back to the hotel, we went shopping then I had a late dinner of Korean fried chicken.  Yes, I am addicted to this chicken!!  But being so tired and worn out, I was physically getting sick.  I could feel my sinuses hurting and then my top molars began to hurt...a clear sign that I was or have a sinus infection.  I told hubby that during our video chat...not something he wanted to hear, but I needed him to call my doctor to have a Rx ready for me for when I get home on Saturday.

But today, I wasn't in pain anymore!  My sinus finally unplugged and wasn't hurting and my teeth weren't hurting either.  I took it easy in the morning tho and stayed in bed til the very last minute before getting ready for the day.  I didn't eat breakfast which I broke the cardinal rule of eat every meal this trip for energy!!  But I did fine today.  So onto what happened today...

Today was our trip to Ilsan to tour and host a Christmas party for the 300 residents living there.  I just love Ilsan, it has this atmosphere for me of 'coming home' and I wasn't even at Ilsan as a child.  But there's just something about the family atmosphere and everyone working together to help each resident become a better version of who they are.  I feel so blessed every time I see the staff and caregivers, without them, Ilsan would not be possible.

The Christmas party was held in the chapel rather than in the gym because of the snowy conditions makes it more difficult to get some of the residents to the gym.  It was different but our team members were scattered amongst the residents rather than all of us at a head table.  It was nice being right with them and share in festivities.  It's amazing that all the faults I see in myself, I can push aside and tell myself how blessed I am and just be me.  Maybe that's why I was able to sing my part of the song without hesitation.  No judging goes on at Ilsan, we are all family there.  Ilsan is home for everyone.

Mini Me's

Yesterday was the day we went to the orphanage to bring Christmas joy to all the kids living there.  This is the reason why I do this trip.  I want these kids to have a Christmas like they deserve and they look forward to us coming every year.

I see familiar faces as the kids start performing.  It breaks my heart to see them still there and not with their own families or other forever families.  But I do know they are taken care of loved by all the staff. There were currently 45 children there, infants to age 7.

After Santa and the Mrs. passed out presents, we were able to give them candy and the rest of the presents we bought from the toy store.  How fun it was to see the excitement in the eyes of the kids.  I went to the little girls' room and started helping with the presents and giving out gummy worms.  Man, could some of these little ones eat!

Little by little, the girls warmed up to us being in the room and would soon sit on our laps or next to us. I just adored all these little girls, as I always see myself in their eyes, I was one of them many years ago, in an orphanage, not understanding what was going on, but just trying to survive.  These little girls also had haircuts that I had at their age.  Each had their own distinct personalities and each were so eager to play with the new toys.

I stayed in this room the majority of the time we were there, it's hard for me to break away from little girls because I want for them what I have.  My heart truly cries out for them.  For those faces I no longer see, I wonder where they are now.  Are they with their families, in another orphanage, or did they go live another forever family?  Wherever they are, they are continuously in my prayers and my wish for them is that they are happy and live their lives to the fullest no matter what.

Back in the Saddle

As in, I'm back in Korea!  What can I say, but I love Korea and I love coming back as much as I can.  I'm traveling with the Holt Gift Team again.  This wasn't planned until I was in Portland and my good friend Debbie stated she was going this year and that I should go too.  Well...I first had to wait and see if I had to serve on a jury and I wouldn't know until after 5:00pm November 5th.  I made the call on Nov. 5th and nope, I didn't have to serve so the decision was made that I was headed to Korea in three weeks!

I flew into San Francisco November 30th so I wouldn't have to be rushed December 1st to catch the international flight to Seoul.  Good move so I didn't feel anxiety or panic having to worry about connections and good thing since San Francisco had been having rain since Thursday so flights were already delayed in and out of SFO.

December 1st and it was time to head to the airport to catch the 10:40am flight to Seoul.  Everyone met up and ate breakfast together then headed back to the gate to wait to board.  All went smoothly until take off.  We departed  late, but was at least on the runway...for 3 hours!  I couldn't believe we were still on the runway!  I took out my phone to text home to let hubby know what was going, he couldn't believe it either, I should have been in the air three hours already!  

I had hubby look online to see what was being said.  Stated something to do with cargo load, but that didn't make sense.  The announcement came on saying something about getting the numbers correct...what?  Then we started to head back to the gate...not looking good!  Guess we needed a mechanic to come look at the plane.

Guess the problem had been fixed and we were off again, yeah!  Back to the runway...not so fast, we began turning around again!  So we sat for a bit until the announcement came on saying the paperwork wasn't coming thru the database and we had to wait for the final paperwork for the FAA.  We were approaching 3 1/2 hours of delay now.  I wasn't feeling very confident we would actually take off because the crew would have to be rotated to a whole new crew but then again, there wouldn't be another plane available for an international flight, right?

Just when I was giving up hope, we were taking off this time....but I wasn't going to really be happy until I saw us really take off...and we did!  There was a lot more turbulence this time around than I remember with the other flights and with all that had happened prior to take off, i really did some heavy praying that all was ok.

I watched one movie on the plane as we did not have the individual screens on this flight so after the one movie, I listened to my music and tried to sleep.  I was in the window seat so I was pretty much stuck there for almost the entire time, but I did manage to get to the restroom two times.  

We landed in Seoul around 7:00pm Korea time, three hours late, but at least we were finally here!!

So onto the week of busy activities.  Today was the Holt office visit, toured the brand new office building which was very nice.  While we were at the Post Adoption Services building, I got some great news that I was going to be able to do something Friday afternoon that I had been wanting to do for a long time...I'll save that for later when it happens so stay tuned!!

In honor of national #adoptionmonth. With adoption comes many unknowns. For many of us that were adopted, we don’t have a history, family and/or medical. It’s always fun filling out the kids’ forms for school or for my own records. At least it saves on writing a whole lot. I have to be proactive when it comes to my health history as it all starts with me for my two oldest kids. The unknown can be scary tho. Who would have thought me asking for a CT scan would lead to a seven hour brain surgery. But I was one of the lucky ones, I caught it before it got me. Everyday I look in the mirror and see my scar. It goes from the middle of my head, down the right side to below my right earlobe. Seven hours and 30 staples later, it’s just a distant memory. #grateful

In honor of national #adoptionmonth. As an adoptee, I am so thankful for all that my life has brought, the good and the bad for it has made me the person I am today. As a full circle moment in my life, I was able to go thru the adoption journey and fulfill my dream of adopting a baby girl from Korea. What a true miracle life is and to complete my family with this little girl has been incredible. She adds sunshine to my everyday and brings joy to my grateful heart. She. Is. My. World. #blessed

In honor of national #adoptionmonth. Because of adoption, I had a Forever Family. Because of adoption, I was then able to create a family of my own. I’ve been blessed to be a mother to my two oldest kids. From the time I knew I was pregnant with them to today, I’ve been so proud to be their mom. They are beautiful ScandinAsians! They. Are. My. World. #blessed

• In honor of national #adoptionmonth. I had a wonderful and memorable childhood. But I did become a child of divorced parents before I entered high school and my father passed away when I was 18. But prior to all that, I met my soul mate at the age of 14. I’ve posted about this before so I won’t bore you again, but how blessed I am that I met and married a person that loved me for who I was, not someone he could change to fit him. We’ve had our ups and downs as most marriages do, but thru it all, we worked together to get to where we are today. Name changes: Kim Mi Sung; Kimberly Sue Hansen; Kimberly Sue Anderson; Kimberly Sue Hanson. Guess I was meant to be ScandinAsian. #overlyblessed

  

  
  

   

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In honor of national #adoptionmonth. 12.1.72, after 15 months of abuse and neglect, I am saved. I go to kindergarten, but taken to the principle’s office. My social worker is waiting for me. She shows me a picture of a family and asks me if I would like to go live with this family. I look at the picture and know this is my way out. I shake my head yes. I am 5 ½ yrs old, but the size of a 2yr old. With just this little jacket on, I am taken to this family. I become Kimberly Sue Anderson. I am finally shown unconditional love. I am hugged rather than beaten. I can eat whatever I want rather than go hungry. My parents are patient with me and I bond with my sister. I can finally be a kid. This is my true Forever Family. #blessed

In honor of national #adoptionmonth. Most of you recognize this pic if me. This is my referral pic. I was 4 1/2 yrs old. I flew to the United States to be adopted. I became Kimberly Sue Hansen. However, I became a victim of child abuse. I was whipped, kicked, held by my ankles and whipped against the wall on a daily basis. I was locked in my bedroom for hours with no toys. Back then, I didn't know it but God was with me, comforting me, healing my wounds, and making sure I wasn't hardening my heart. He gave me strength and the will to live. Don't feel sorry for me. My story continues. Stay tuned. #grateful

My Story

In honor of #national #adoptionmonth Right side pic of me when I was a year old and admitted into my orphanage. Left side pic of me a year later.

Continuing National Adoption Month

In honor of national #adoptionmonth I want to thank Dr. David Kim for his unwavering commitment and dedication to serving Holt for all these years. Once an orphan, I am truly honored to be serving alongside him for those children that still need a family of their own. And thank you to Nancy Kim for being such a wonderful example of love and support for David and his passion for Holt.

National Adoption Month

In honor of #adoptionmonth I want to thank Harry and Bertha Holt for answering the call of service from God to do the great work for all of us who didn't have a Forever Family. #grateful

September is Quite the Month

September is full of some special anniversaries:

September 4, 1971: I came to the United States from Korea to be adopted in the state of Minnesota. This was with my first adoptive family. I endured 15 months of brutal physical abuse.

September 10, 1999: I survived 7 hours of brain surgery to remove an AVM.

September 29, 2001: I survived having a grand mal seizure while driving out of a parking lot.

These may not be positive anniversaries, but they are ones to celebrate because I survived all three events and came out even better each time. I am forever grateful for each event.

The Official End of Summer

This day is the official last day of summer as tomorrow, my youngest starts her first day of high school.  I can't believe how fast the summer has gone by, tho to others, the summer may have dragged on.  I'm not sure why it went by so fast for me, maybe because three weeks out of the summer I was in Korea and the rest of the summer, my other two kids were just as busy traveling.

Yesterday was spent cleaning and rearranging the house.  We cleaned out the cupboards in the office because believe it or not, we still had boxes packed inside from when we moved into this house three years ago.  I knew what was in the boxes, I just never went thru them and sorted them out.  Now the cupboards are organized and stuff that wasn't needed was actually thrown out or put into the give away pile.

Then it was onto changing the kids' rooms, as in completely switching rooms.  Since my youngest will be the only one living here out of the three kids, she now gets the biggest room.  I felt like we were moving all over again since cleaning out Taylor's room in order to move Kora into it was exactly like moving out and into a house again.  It was nice being able to thoroughly clean out the rooms, but boy was that a lot of work!  Thank  goodness I had decided to move the two rooms while Taylor was still home so he could do all the heavy lifting with hubby.  I did the cleaning out while everyone had to move their things in and arrange how they wanted their 'new' rooms to be.

The transition went smoothly as we had plenty of room to move furniture to the theater room to Erika's room to the designated final rooms.  Thursday, we move Taylor to Lincoln into his fraternity so once again, we will feel like we are moving!  Not sure exactly what all will be needed for his room since he's not as organized as Erika was when she moved to college.  We will just wing it and buy things in Lincoln that will be needed tho we do have the majority of furniture already.

My house is going to feel like a new house after Thursday.  We will now have three bedrooms available to have guests stay, how weird is that!  I will need to buy some more sheets for Taylor's bed to have ready for guests.  I get excited about shopping for new bedding, heck shopping for anything new is exciting!

I think I'm ready for this new year of change.  Two kids in college, one a freshman and one a senior and youngest one in high school.  Ready or not, it's upon us!

Only One Kid?

Lately, I have found myself shaking my head as I set the table for dinner.  I've been used to having two kids at home rather than three kids, but lately, I've only had one kid at home.  I've caught myself grabbing silverware for four of us.  Such a minor thing, but I will need to get used to only having three of us around since my son will be off to college in the fall.  Two kids in college...wow, makes me feel so old!  Yet, I don't feel old, is 45 really considered 'old'?

We've had this discussion with my kids at the dinner table actually.  And according to my youngest, who's 14 years old, 45 is old...really...??  We came to the conclusion that when our youngest was 14, we were considered young parents, but now that she is 21, almost 22, and our son is 18 and going off to college too, We. Are. Old.  Guess that's final.

Karaoke Anyone?

Forgot to mention that our last night in Busan, we actually did some karaoke!  I've never done karaoke in my life so this was a new adventure for me.  I don't like to be in front of people, I like being invisible...I know, hard to believe but it's true.  I don't like to be center of attention, I like being a wallflower.

Anyway, in Korea, you can rent a little room for your group.  There was a u-shaped booth and table, two microphones, screen and disco light.  It took awhile for everyone to get warmed up and brave enough to sing in front of the group, but once we got started, we had a blast!

Good laughs, great memories and we all sang.  I even sang a few songs with someone else and each time, our voices didn't record for some reason and we didn't get rated...must have meant we scored a perfect score, right?  We sang Whitney Houston's, I'll Always Love You, Disney's, A Whole New World, and Grease's, Summer Loving.

This was a great way to have some good laughs, I think my cheeks were sore from smiling and laughing so much!  I know some of the songs were video taped by a few people, let's just hope they don't end up on youtube...scary!  Will I have a new career in singing?  No, but it was fun to let our hair down and sing like we didn't have a care in the world!  And I didn't even have to drink any alcohol to get brave to sing in front of everyone...who knew!  But then again, I don't want to even think how I would be drinking in public...we'll save that for another time!

What Day is It?

This jet lag is killing me.  I can't sleep thru the night, I'm tired after being awake 3 or 4 hours and end up snoozing.  Then I wake up feeling groggy.  I've been meaning to finish my posting of the final days in Korea, but my mind is so foggy, I can't remember what I even did on the last few days.

I'll talk about the final night and morning in Korea.  Our final night in Korea, we had a wonderful dinner at the 63 Building.  All the adoptees were in the traditional hanboks, beautiful colors and always a special night seeing all of them together.  Was nice sharing the night with Nikki and Kelsey too, as they have been at Ilsan volunteering.

As parents and adoptees shared their experiences with everyone, of course I needed my sunglasses but no, it was night time so I didn't have them with me.  Though two weeks in Korea seems like a long time, when it comes to the final night, I never want the trip to end.  I love everyone I meet and I know I will miss everyone and go thru group withdrawals.  Such a special trip and I feel so blessed to have shared in this journey with so many great people.

The morning we were to depart, I slept in, felt nice to relax and not hurry.  I did manage to do some power shopping and made a couple of major purchases.  One will be delivered to my house in about a month, can't wait to see it!

We then went to get some mandu for lunch, so yummy!  As I was eating my mandu in the hotel lobby, those that went to the Korean War Museum had come back and everyone else had started bringing down their luggage.

About 45 minutes before we were to load onto the bus, one of the dads came up to me looking for the tour leader...didn't sound good, he looked a little panicked...uh yeah, come to find out, he had lost his passport!!  He was with the group that went touring so it could have been anywhere...at the museum or somewhere in Itaewon...a needle in a haystack...

We had people calling left and right to start looking for the passport.  And it was time to load the luggage onto the truck.  Plan A:  The dad and the tour leader would stay behind, drive to the museum and Itaewon to look for the passport, then meet at the airport if it was found.  Plan B:  The dad would need to stay in Korea until Monday and go to the American Embassy to get an emergency passport then get a flight out, hopefully.  Thank goodness the tour leader was scheduled to stay in Korea for a few more days anyway...

Just as we were to load the bus to the airport, a call was received saying the passport was found at the McDonald's in Itaewon...what a miracle!!  The bus would stop along the way to pick up the passport...talk about a huge relief for EVERYONE!  Not the kind of excitement we wanted, but at least it all worked out.  Thank goodness the rest of the trip home was uneventful!

Now if I could just get my sleeping in order!

Final Days in Korea

I'm not sure if I can remember all that happened during my final days in Korea.  We were very busy, needless to say and I was tired!  But I loved every minute.  

We traveled further south to Busan.  The weather was beautiful and had time to spend on the beach, tho I did not swim...not going to be in my bikini in public, tho I was seen in Myrtle Beach...why not in Korea, amongst my own peeps?  I don't know, I'm shy sometimes...I could have caught some rays as I felt like my tan was fading, but yet, everyone kept telling me how dark I was...of course I was dark compared to everyone in Korea that love to be pale.

We went to visit an orphanage while in Busan, I had forgotten I had been to this one before.  I was in charge of the group, as one of the tour members got sick in the morning, so the tour leader had to stay with her to take her to the clinic.  Once we arrived at the orphanage, I remembered being there before. The Director of the orphanage was such a neat person, I admire him dearly.  He's 70's years old, he and his wife adopted a son, who is now 17 years old, but his wife passed away five months ago.  He has such a big heart and compassion for the children.  He advocated for the children to be able to keep them in his orphanage til the age of 18 rather than have them sent to another orphanage when they turned 6.

We had a chance to play with the kids for about an hour.  One boy, he had a play cell phone so I took mine out and pretended to talk to him.  He seemed to enjoy this game.  Then he was joined by another boy and I started chasing them and they would run into the room next door.  They would come back and I would continue to chase them.  Soon the two boys grew to four boys, then girls started to join in and I would count on my fingers to three and they would all scream and run away.  This continued for quite awhile, they were wearing me out and I was so hot!  I found a room with an a/c unit and stood in front of it but the kids kept coming and I would chase them.  Some of the boys would kick me and punch me, one even head butted me in the stomach, some threw the big lego blocks and toys at me...wow, they were active!!  But it was fun playing with them, they had skipped going to kindergarten because our group was there.

After the visit and lunch, we went back to the hotel.  I spent my time sitting under an umbrella on the beach with a couple of other adoptees.  Was beautiful sitting and people watching.  Soon others from the group joined us and was fun getting to know them better.

My night was frustrating dealing with my laptop not charging due to the cord being exposed from Beaner chewing on it!  I wanted to be able to chat with family and friends and it was touch and go with the battery going down...So many things we take for granted...

Tough Decisions

This morning was the visit to the unwed mother’s shelter.  What a wonderful facility available to these mothers that are in a tough situation and will make one of the most difficult decisions of their lives.  As a mother, it breaks my heart to see the heartache these women are facing, you can see how torn they are, what should they do?

The staff at this facility are so wonderful and caring, they make the facility a home for these mothers and babies and become each other’s families.  It amazes me that still, in today’s society, that these women have to be in the facility rather than with their families, but they are too afraid to be with their families because they are not married and some have already been turned away by their families because they are not married.

There is new Director of the facility, she had been there previously so knows the program well and getting to know her more personally at dinner last night, she has a great heart for the job.  I feel so blessed to know that these mothers have a staff that love and care about them as if they were their own children.  What a blessing for the care and education these mothers receive here.  I was here in December and have heard the updates of two of the mothers, happy endings so far.  I wish them well.

And yes, I needed my sunglasses....

We are now on our way to Gyeongju.  We will be staying at a hotel rather than the traditional Korean hut on my last trip there, good thing because it is pretty hot outside.