April Medical Update

We received a medical update for James on Friday. He weighs 17.2 lbs and is 27 inches long. He also has four teeth coming in, two on top and two on the bottom. It has been 2 months and 9 days since we found out he was ours and we are hoping to hear something soon.

James medical update

We received a medical update for our son dated 3/10/2008. They send us one every month. He weighs 16.5 lbs. and is 26 inchs long and has no more cross eyes. The photo above was taken 1/26/08 when he was 6 months old. He is now 8 months old. We have no new news other than his medical update.

Anthony Alexander Gallo

Rachael and Kevin's brother Anthony passed away on Saturday, March 15 in North Carolina. He was 34 years old. Anthony was survived by his daughters Savannah and Maia, mother Anna Gallo and Perry Perno, paternal grandmother Ramona Gallo, sister Rachael Grabowski and her husband James, brother Kevin Gallo and his wife Andrea, and three nephews, Giovanni, Luciano, & James Ji-Hun, as well as many aunts, uncles, cousins, and friends.

We ask everyone to pray for Anthony and his family during this tough time.

He's a talker.

What do you think he's saying?

A BIG email from foster family

We received a nice email from James Ji-Hun's foster family today. It was in Korean and we translated it using the internet. It's amazing what you can do on the internet.

You can tell he is loved. The video's are awesome.

Paperwork complete (we think)

Wide Horizons For Children has received all of our paperwork and is working with it to complete our end of the adoption process. A very informative video about the Korea adoption process is on their website. http://www.whfc.org/media/webinars/Korea/player.html
We would love for you to watch it.

How it happened....

OK here we go. We have been praying and looking into other options to start our family for a little while now. The long wait in China is very discouraging. As of 2/1/08 they have refered children to those families logged in before 12/27/05. That means all of last year they covered three months worth of logins. Our login date is 5/31/06. China's system goes in order by date. We are 5 months away from our LID, but if they continue at the rate they have been it will be at least another year to 18 months from right now. :(

On 1/25/06 we received a call from Amy (our awsome adoption coordinator) of Catholic Charities. She was wondering if we had given any thought to a waiting child or a child with a special need. The answer was yes. We have given it a lot of thought and with Amy's help found a little girl from China who melted our hearts. We did the paperwork needed and applied for her along with four other families. A few days later we found out we were not chosen. It hurt but it just wasn't meant to be. The next day which was 1/30/08, our angel Amy, found a little boy from South Korea named Ji-Hun. Ji means wisdom, Hun means teach according to a web site I found. We fell in love instantly which scared the hell out of us. We worked on getting some paperwork together and doing some online education that was needed as Amy worked on her end with some interagency forms with Wide Horizons For Children, an adoption agency from Massachusetts, who deals with Holt International, an adoption agency in South Korea. We Fedex'd everything on Monday, Feb. 4th. On Tues. Feb. 5th. Wide Horizons approved our match with Ji-Hun and forwarded this info to Holt International for approval. We were told because of the Korean holiday (Lunar New Year) we would probaly get news on Monday or Tuesday (2/11 0r 2/12). On Monday morning I got a call from Amy saying we needed to come in to sign some paperwork (inter-agency stuff) and when we got to the office she told us she lied and congratulated us.

WE HAVE A BOY!!!!!!!

Ju Ji-Hun who will be James Ji-Hun Grabowski.

We will be sending a package to Holt with pictures and something for our son :) and some disposable cameras so they can take more pictures of him and his foster family. We also will recieve updates until we leave to get him. We will keep you all informed. Thank you all for your prayers.

James Ji- Hun Grabowski

Rachael and I would like to introduce you to our son

James Ji-Hun Grabowski

Born: 7/26/07

Time:12:49

Weight: 2.63kg (5.8 lbs)

I know we've got a lot of explaining to do. I will update you guys a little more as soon as I get a minute. Thank you for all your prayers.

Happy Birthday....

Corey, Briana, & Michael turned one last week.

First Video Post

Here is a little video of the triplets laughing. You will smile after this! The second part is a little dark, but I'm a beginner, what do you want me :)

Frequently asked dumb questions

Doing some research, I found a funny web page on questions and statements that some families adopting from China have been asked.
I don't know if there is any way to prepare for questions like these, but we are expecting them. Check it out.

http://www.woodruffs.com/dfaqpage.html

Veteran's Day

I was looking through some old pictures and found one of my favorite veteran of all time. This picture of "Crash" was taken on November 9, 1952 @ Camp Schimm (Sendai, Japan). Thank you to all our veterans and troops out there who fight for our freedom and way of life.

Blake Thomas Rampino

Blake Thomas Rampino was born on Halloween @ 8:09 am weighing 9 lbs, 1 oz. Congratulations Tom, Maria, & Jillian.

Triplets October

Since I haven't posted many pictures in a while I thought I'd post a few more of the kids. Nine months old, wow.

Halloween 2007

Hi everyone. I'm sorry I haven't updated the website at all. I'm gonna start updating everyone using this blog, so lets see how this goes. In case you haven't seen them in a while here are the triplets in their 1st Halloween costumes. Cute kids!

Nothing new on our adoption. There is a lot of speculation on why China's adoption process has slowed so much and we just don't know how much longer it will be until we get our referral. My guess at this time is October or November of 2008. We have been logged in a little over 17 months at this time.

China is up to December 8, 2005 with their referrals, so those family's who just got their referrals this month have been waiting 23 months. I wish it would stay at 23 months which means we would get ours in April, but that just isn't going to happen.

We want to thank everyone for their prayers. We have been blessed with a wonderful family and friends.