First Day of School

As is tradition, here is my picture on the first day of school!  I also had to get a picture of me and the little man, since he got to come to school with us. 

Everett had a full day of being at the ELC (daycare) and he did great.  I got to check on him a few times and he was either sleeping or sitting peacefully with the other babies.  The ELC provides a daily report on how he did--it's so cute!  His report said, "Today I was happy and quiet.  Today I enjoyed sitting on the bouncer and looking around." 

 I don't think I'll put his daily report on the fridge every day, but this first one is a keeper!  I'm so proud of our little guy.  I, personally, had a great day too.  It was super fun to see my students and be in the classroom again.  Honestly, today exceeded my expectations all around.  Here's to a new year!

PS--Although I'm more positive now, yesterday was rough! I definitely had a mommy breakdown about taking him to daycare.  I hear that's normal. :-)

Everett's first day of "school"

It's tradition in our family to take pictures on your first day of school.  Yesterday was Everett's first day at the Early Learning Center, otherwise known as the ELC.  The ELC is located in the dorm of our school and it will be Everett's daycare while we teach.  Here's the big guy right before we left the apartment:

 He looks super excited in this picture...haha! He's rocking that double chin! That's my boy!

I actually start work tomorrow but yesterday and today I dropped Everett off at the ELC for two hour chunks so we could have some trial runs before our big day tomorrow.  I think he did really well and I've only had one small breakdown about the whole transition, so I think all in all we're doing okay. 

smiling baby

This is one of those shameless mom videos.  I love seeing this little guy smile.  Sorry if the video is a bit hard to see; it was taken with my iPhone. Enjoy!

how to fly with an infant

When Tom and I were preparing to fly with Everett I tried to chat with anyone I could to get tips for flying with an infant.  We are FOR SURE not experts on this topic, but we did fly with Everett over two flights with a total air time of 15 or 16 hours so we're hoping our experience can help others.   From other's advice and our own experience, I present to you a list of tips for how to fly with a baby.

1. Get your baby to suck something.  A common problem with flying is that on take off and landing your ears can pop and be bothersome (ask Tom, his are especially bad).  Adults solve this by chewing on gum, however, this is a luxury an infant can't experience.  One solution to try is to get your baby to suck on something, whether it be a pacifier or a bottle.  We actually fed Everett on take off and landing on our long flight and he didn't even flinch.

2. Ask the customer service reps for infant friendly seats. Unless you buy a seat for your baby, they will be considered an "infant in arms," which means you will need to hold them during the flight.  On international flights if you ask they will try to sit you in the bulkhead of the plane so that they can attach a bassinet for your baby to sleep in as long as the seat belt sign is off.  It's much better than having to hold your baby for hours!  Another option, which is what we ended up doing, is to ask the customer service reps if there is an empty seat by you.  If the flight is not full they can block out the seat(s) by you and you can strap in your car seat.  Words can't even express how awesome it was to have Everett riding in the comfort of his car seat during the flight.

3.  Most airlines let you check a stroller at the gate for free.  We decided to bring our car seat that snaps into our stroller so we could bring our car seat along for no extra cost.  The other perk to this is that, like I mentioned earlier, if there's an empty seat available you can use your car seat on the plane or if the flight is full they'll just check your car seat at the gate, again for no cost.

4. Get a stroller travel bag.  If you fly a lot or if you have an expensive stroller you may want to invest in a stroller travel bag that will protect your stroller when it gets checked at the gate.   I don't think this is necessary but things can get really beat up on the flights and we found that the travel bag did a great job of protecting our stroller (unfortunately, the stroller bag did suffer a puncture wound on the first flight...like I said, flights can be rough on bags!).

5. Bring a cozy blanket.  If you do get to use a bassinet, like I mentioned in point 2, they are often a rough, canvas material and you'll want something softer for your baby.  Or even if you're just using your car seat it's nice to make the space a bit more comfy for the baby during the flight.

6. Bring extra clothes and a variety of clothing layers.  Planes can get super hot and then frigidly cold.  We put Everett in a simple onesie but we brought along pants, a hat, and a little jacket in case he got cold.  Additionally, you never know when your baby will have a giant poopy mess or spit up explosion, which of course happened to us.  Back up clothes are essential.

7. If you use cloth diapers, consider using disposables for the flight.  We have been loving our cloth diapers, but when you're traveling for about 24 hours you really don't want to carry around with you a day's worth of used cloth diapers.  We used disposables for our travels and it made diapering simple and easy.  (If you want to use cloth the whole time, more power to you! You're better people than us.)

8.  Even if you're nursing, consider bringing a bottle to feed your baby for the flight.  I've been nursing Everett but I decided to bring with me a couple of bottles of milk that I previously pumped just in case I needed them.  I knew I wanted to feed Everett during take off (see point number 1) and I didn't know how he would respond to flying, so I decided giving him a bottle may be easier than trying to nurse a screaming baby (luckily, that didn't happen).  Also, a lactation consultant I talked with said that traveling/stress can lower a woman's milk supply so it was nice to have some milk on hand just in case we needed it.  Just make sure you tell the TSA you have milk before they scan your bag.  Baby formula/milk is one of the few exceptions to the rules on liquids and flying.   You may also want to think about bringing on a hand held pump for the long international traveling if you regularly pump.

9.  During the flight keep your baby's head pointed toward the middle or even better, keep you baby in the middle seat.  Think about how many times you've walked down the asile of a plane and accidentally bumped into someone. You don't want that accidental bump from others to be on your baby's head.  Be especially careful as people are getting on/off the plane with their bags.  This was a great tip from one of the flight attendants.

10. Don't be intimidated.  There were people out there that tried to freak us out about flying with Everett.  People would constantly ask us if we were worried about flying with him and some of the baby books out there even discouraged taking your baby on trips.  Tom and I weren't too intimidated or worried because we knew that we didn't have a choice.  Everett had to fly because we had to return to Korea, and we knew that no matter what we'd survive.  Take a risk...the adventure is worth it.  

And lastly, don't forget to ask a flight attendant for some wings!

cereal obsession

"I Love Cookie" is the name of the new store that opened in our area that sells imported products.  You can find a random assortment of goods like Reeses Peanut Butter cups, A&W Root Beer, and....Froot Loops (I've never noticed until now that it's spelled "froot" not "fruit").  How much would you pay for this big box of FROOT Loops in Korea?  Try about 14,000 Won or $13 US Dollars!!!!

However, we weren't tempted by this purchase because luckily for us we have 13 boxes of cereal at our apartment.  Okay...maybe it's down to 11 now.  But seriously, when we first got back to Korea we had 13 BOXES of cereal.  Six of those came from America on our latest trip back here (this does not count the four Tom brought back on his own when he was here for 4 weeks while Everett and I were in the States).  

So what is more ridiculous...paying about $13 bucks for Froot Loops or having 13 boxes of cereal at your apartment???  

Everett meets GSIS

Since Tom has been back at work this week and I'm still enjoying my maternity leave with Everett, I decided to take Everett up to school a few times to meet our friends and our students.  It has been such a blast to introduce him to our community here! 

These first two pictures are Everett at lunch:

 

Everett with Ms. Becki: 

Tom showing off Everett to his classes (that is one proud daddy!):

 If you look closely you can see the students busted out their phones to take pictures of him.  How funny is that?!

Everett's New Room

Tom did a good job of prepping Everett's room prior to our arrival, as seen here.  It was so nice to walk in the door and immediately have a crib for Everett to sleep in that first night.  We've been back in Korea for three days now and the first two days were dedicated to getting our apartment in order.  We have very limited storage space so anytime we bring in new stuff we have to reorganize our place. With the addition of Everett and all of his things it took us a decent chunk of time to get things in order, but I think, aside from hanging some pictures on the walls, we're basically done!  Here is Everett's new and improved room:

 That's a traditional, handmade paper lamp next to the rocking chair.  It has a dimmer so it's a great lamp for feeding Everett at night.  It's a really unique, Korean piece for his room.

 New pictures need to put in the frames still but at least the frames are ready to go.

His room has become my new favorite room in the house.

traveling with Everett

As I mentioned earlier, we had a great journey to Korea.  It may have been our smoothest adventure across the ocean to date!  Our travels started around 3am on Thursday morning.  I woke up, fed Everett, did some last minute packing, and then we headed for the Kansas City airport around 4am.  We were able to check our bags in quickly and then we said a lot of tearful "see you later's" to my parents.  

Our first flight was to Detroit.  We were able to bump up to first class, so Everett could ride in style for his first flight!  Everyone was super nice/helpful to us with Everett and the flight attendant gave him his first set of airplane wings (sorry Gramps, they're Delta not Southwest).  Everett flew with us as "infant in arms" so he didn't get his own seat on the first leg of the journey.  He was a champ though! 

We had a nice long layover in Detroit and we were excited when we found out that the plane wasn't full so they were going to give Everett his own seat, so we were able to strap in his car seat between us!  Looking back, I can't imagine us having to hold Everett in our laps for the entire 13+ hour journey in the plane.  

 Everett's cozy little set up.  Tom and I were jealous because he looked super comfortable on the flight.

 During the long flight over Everett had a record breaking HUGE poopy explosion (hence the new outfit in the next picture).   We quickly became accustomed to maneuvering the diaper changing station in the small airplane bathrooms.  Here's little man in his new outfit and his wings doing what he did most of the flight--sleep peacefully.

One of the biggest challenges was figuring out how to get all of our bags home from the airport.  We had SO much stuff (kind of an embarrassing amount).  We tried to comfort ourselves by reminding each other that we were moving an infant over to Korea and since we may not come home for Christmas we had to bring over about a year's worth of Everett clothing/needs.  

Tom, in his master packing/spacial reasoning skills, was able to figure out a way to get all of our stuff on the airport shuttle that would take us to Suwon, where we live.  The shuttle staff actually made us buy a third ticket because we had so many bags.  We were feeling pretty proud of ourselves and then we realized....we forgot a bag at the airport.  *Sigh*  We had one small 20 lbs bag that was "Everett's bag" and we completely forgot about it.  We'll have to teach Everett to collect all his belongings in the future.  This was his first flight so we cut him some slack.

Everett and Tom on the shuttle to Suwon.  Everett is saying hi to Korea!

 We arrived at our apartment around 6pm Friday night after about 24+ hours of travel.  Everett seems to be adjusting well to his new home!

PS--We got Everett's lost bag.  Tom had to drive to the airport to collect it.  

we moved our infant to Korea

We are back in Korea!  Everett did awesome.  He didn't cry at all on the flight, his ears did not seem to bother him, and he was such a fun little traveling companion.  All the traveling went smoothly and after 24 hours of being on the go we made it back to our apartment.   More to come on our traveling adventures....

Here's a picture of Everett smiling before we left (thanks to my brother's girlfriend, Jennifer, for the pic).  It is so so so fun to see Everett smile.  Hopefully this is the first of many pics of our grinning little man.

We have had such a great time in America this summer/early fall.  We have especially enjoyed time with our families.  Here are a few more pictures of Everett with those we love. 

Granny Jerre and Everett on the patio swing.  The fall weather has made swinging outside so great.

 Great Uncle Lloyd and little man.

 My parents each gave Everett a book where they recorded themselves reading each of the pages to him (these are really cool books made by Hallmark).  It was such a sweet gift! This way Everett can hear Granny and Gramps as often as he wants.

 Great Granny Luebbert and Everett:

 Family photo (maybe the Christmas photo?) taken tonight.

 We (mostly Tom) spent the day packing.  I think we may be taking more bags over this time than we ever have! I'm proud to say that Tom was able to get everything packed; my husband has amazing spacial reasoning skills. (This is just a small portion of the stuff we packed)

We're leaving for Korea tomorrow at 6am.  We will be enroute for about 24 hours.  Please pray for us if you get a chance.  We could use prayers for safe travels and a smooth transition back to Korea, especially with our little guy.

"smile and the whole world smiles with you"

Here are a couple of videos of our little man.  The first one is with his Great-Granny Luebbert.  I love hearing her talk to Everett.  She's such a sweet woman.  The second video is Granny Jerre chatting with Everett and you can see him smile a bit.   It's been so fun to see this little guy start to smile more!  It melts a mommy's heart, that's for sure.  

the summer uniform x2

If you're one of our faithful blog followers you may remember this post about my Dad's summer uniform where we described how he tends to wear the same type of clothes everyday in the summer: white t-shirt, khakis, and a hat.  Guess who decided he wanted to look like Gramps???  (Disclaimer: there is no hat because my Dad doesn't wear hats inside.)

apple picking

One of my favorite times of year is the fall, especially a Missouri fall.  Unfortunately it has been 3 years since I've gotten to experience a Missouri fall, so I had to make this one count while we're still here! We decided to take Everett to a local farm for apple picking.  Granny and Gramps joined us and we headed to the Weston Red Barn for our adventure. 

Tom decided to try out our baby carrier, which we hope to get a lot of use out of in Korea. 

 It doesn't get more classic Missouri than this scene right here:

 I think this scene is slighty creepy, but I thought it was cool:

 Gramps with our apple loot!

 Fall family picture:

 Granny and Gramps with Everett:

 I love this picture of Everett and the pumpkin.

Not only did we have a great time, but this adventure has been the gift that keeps on giving--an apple crisp just came out of the oven.

Tom is Back!

This is a few days after the fact but Tom is back! Here we are awaiting his arrival: 

Family reunion:

Tom is back in full dad mode:

daddy time

As you all know, Tom has been in Korea for the past 3.5 weeks while Everett and I have been hanging out in Missouri.  We are happy to report that tomorrow night this season of being apart will come to an end! Tom will arrive in Kansas City around 9pm!!! We're excited for our little family to be reunited.

Although we've been thousands of miles away, we still found ways for us to connect.  About twice a day we would skype chat, as you can see here.

 It's not as good as being together in person, but it sure is the next best thing!

Here's a family picture (early in the morning) that exemplifies this time in our life.

 Even Granny Jerre gets in on the calls every now and then!

If you get a chance please pray for Tom's safe travels home.  He'll be flying most of the day Wednesday (Central Time).  If you could pray for protection, safety, and that the flights would be on time.  Thanks!