LONG....Update

I've just been too busy and tired over the holidays to even try to get on here.  The less computer time the better and this blog sometimes is just too much.  Though I know I want to keep my journal up, so I always come back.

My brother FINALLY made it back for Christmas. They were only able to stay a few days due to the occurrences and Jaemin already misses E.  He thinks he should be at grandma and papas all the time.

We also finally heard back from Make a Wish on Cole's wish to go to Korea.  They told us Korea said no.  I found that a little hard to believe as she got more into the story of it, but what can you say?  She said Korea said there were political things going on though both her and I didn't know of anything.  She then said she told Korea Make a Wish that they would just the assist for us to go to Korea and Korea would only serve as an emergency contact if we had anything happen medically.  She said Korea said no to that as well.  That's where I wondered if it was true or just a reason to say no without saying it was just too big of a wish.  Their saying is no wish is too big, but that's really not true.  Not logically and realistically, but it would have been great if they would have told us and Cole last March when he wished it.  Then, she proceeded to tell me he could either rewish totally since no one knows what happened to his wish granters or he could go with his 2nd choice of a Cabela's shopping spree.  Here's the kicker.  She explained to me how it would work and we'd end up responsible for some of the costs.  They're web site says theses wishes are granted without families having to pay for anything so there would be no worries.  I'm NOT okay with this.  We are emptying our savings to go to Korea....yep, that's right we're going anyways....after 7 full years of saving for it, we can't afford to pay for meals, etc. so he can go there.  He's tried to think of a different wish but hasn't been able to.  It's been so stressful we're thinking of telling them to forget it.

Onto Korea.  We scaled our plans back A LOT.  There will be no birth city trip and it will be a little shorter, but we should be able to squeeze in everything we want to do and see and especially the foster mothers.  We have our tickets on hold.  I just have to call this week after I move things off my credit card so it doesn't max out (pay it down is what I mean), and I can get our airfare.  We are barely getting tickets anyways.  I was told in the fall to wait until January or February by every agent I called and suddenly by December all of the fares were gone or almost gone and only expensive ones left.  We found another Korean agent in Chicago who was able to get a pretty decent rate on Korean Air, so we stayed in my budget thanks to her.  We'll nail down the hotel and fare details this week.  I already have reservations at Fraser Place Central like last time, but I want to see if we can get a little better rate before things are final.  Every dollar counts on this huge trip and most of the dollars are in the $15000 hotel and airfare portion of the budget.

But, we have an itinerary made, emails sent to the agencies so they can contact the foster mothers.  Gift list started.  Baggage figured out.  Maps and directions to everywhere!  Reminders on my calendar for what we can't do yet.  Passport application for Jaemin ready to go.  And a growing list of things we will still need to have before we go.