Hi! This is Laura, Heather's sister! I got this email from Heather tonight and thought I would post it on here. Isn't God Awesome? Please remember to Pray for the Nothnagel's as they travel home. Heather, I will add my own prayer on here for you all. Thanks for letting me blog for you! I enjoyed it. After my prayer, I'll turn your blog back over to you and your password is now erased from my mind! LOL!
Laura,
It's 8:27 a.m. and just thought I'd tell some family member that we're leaving our hotel and going to get Emalee now!
Love you! Heather
Heavenly Father, I lift my sister and her family up to you as they start their journey home. Thank you God for giving them Emalee and for weaving this family together like only You could do. Thank you Father that You call them Yours. I thank You for giving Emalee a foster mother that loves her so much. Please be with her and fill her heart with Your love as Emalee leaves her to be with the family that you have chosen for her. I also pray Father that you fill the emptiness in Emalee's birth mother's heart and that somehow she would know God that Emalee is loved so very much. Thank You for this birth mother and the gift that she has given us. Thank you God for giving all of us a new joy and this wonderful new life to share with Heather and Brian. Please, God, just wrap your loving arms around this family as they begin bonding with eachother and growing in Your love. I ask that You just gently carry them in your hands as you bring them back to us. I also ask Lord, that you be with David and Jacob and help them to grow close to Emalee. Father, please be with Emalee as she travels and adjusts to her new life and family.
In Jesus name I pray, Amen
Monday, March 26, 2007
We Met Emalee!!!!!!
Emalee and her foster mother
Brian giving Emalee her first daddy kiss
Heather giving Emalee her first mommy kiss
Heather finally getting to gaze in Emalee's face and wiping up some baby drool!Hello Everyone! What a wonderful day today has been! We went to Eastern at 9:45 this morning and met with the intake worker, Mrs. Park and received Emalee's passport and visa.
At 10:00 we met with the two Dr. Kim's (Jr. and Sr.) Our meeting with them was very nice. The meeting with Dr. Kim Sr. was very touching. He kept telling us thank you. He was pleased that we came to Korea to experience some of the culture here. We could tell that it was very important to him that we did that. He got teary during our meeting and we could tell that he truly has a heart for the orphan. He's a wonderful man of God. He told us that 45,000 orphans have found homes through Eastern since it was founded.
After our meeting with the Dr. Kims we walked down the hall to another room to meet Emalee. As we walked down the hall we spotted her! Our social worker lead us into the meeting room and then Emalee and her foster mother came in. Emalee was in a carrier on her foster mother's back. She was wearing the sweater that I sent her in January and a knitted white hat that her foster mother had made for her.
After we were introduced the foster mother handed her to me (Heather). I cried and kissed and hugged and told her how pretty she was and how much we all love her. I couldn't be happier! She is so cute and such a sweet and easy going baby. She never fussed the whole time we were with her. I held her up in the air and she smiled at me. Such a sweet smile! She seems very happy and content. Her foster mother said that she really only cries when she's hungry and said she thought she'd do well on the flight home.
Brian held her next. Emalee seems to really like Brian a lot. She smiled and laughed with him quite a bit. Her foster mother said that she seems to take to men better. Brian said that she's won his heart forever. She sucks on her hand a lot...she even chewed on Heather's finger a bit. She's a drooler! The foster mother said that Emalee will probably like David and Jacob a lot too!
After Brian held her I took her again and Emalee's foster mother, Mrs. Kim, started crying. She loves Emalee so much and it really showed. She's had seven foster babies, but Emalee is the first girl that she's ever had, so Emalee was very special to her. We're just amazed at the love she's shown Emalee and so grateful for it. We could never thank her enough. She will be in our hearts always!
We gave gifts to Mrs. Kim and then she gave us a hanbok for Emalee and a photo album of pictures that have been taken since she's had her. The photos are priceless since they are all we have of Emalee since she's been born other than the 3 we got from our agency. We also got a necklace for Emalee. It has the Korean flag on one side and on the other side Emalee's birthdate and her Korean name inscribed in hangul. This will be something to always treasure!
It was very hard to give her back when our visit ended. I had to give her more kisses and more hugs! Emalee was strapped to Mrs. Kim's back and then they left the building. It was a beautiful day and a wonderful meeting with our precious baby!
After our meeting with Emalee we had a traditional Korean lunch with Dr. Kim Sr. and other staff at Eastern. We sat at a table with Tricia and Charlie Morgan who are from TX. to adopt their daughter. There was a couple from Australia adopting a baby that we sat with too. There was an adult adoptee who was back visiting and a Dad with his 2 adopted children from Massachusetts here doing a home land tour. It was nice to sit and visit with all these other families and share in eachothers joy.
We will go to Eastern again at 8:40 in the morning. Dr. Kim Sr. will pray over Emalee and us and then we'll get her and go to the airport! Our flight leaves Korea at noon, we land in Chicago and have a layover there for awhile and should be home around 4:45 Tuesday evening.
We ask that you please keep Emalee's foster mother in your prayers. She's going to have a very difficult time tomorrow! She's a very sweet and wonderful woman. Also, please pray that our flights are not cancelled! And of course please pray that Emalee does well on the flight.
We love you all and will see you Tuesday!
Love,
Brian and Heather
At 10:00 we met with the two Dr. Kim's (Jr. and Sr.) Our meeting with them was very nice. The meeting with Dr. Kim Sr. was very touching. He kept telling us thank you. He was pleased that we came to Korea to experience some of the culture here. We could tell that it was very important to him that we did that. He got teary during our meeting and we could tell that he truly has a heart for the orphan. He's a wonderful man of God. He told us that 45,000 orphans have found homes through Eastern since it was founded.
After our meeting with the Dr. Kims we walked down the hall to another room to meet Emalee. As we walked down the hall we spotted her! Our social worker lead us into the meeting room and then Emalee and her foster mother came in. Emalee was in a carrier on her foster mother's back. She was wearing the sweater that I sent her in January and a knitted white hat that her foster mother had made for her.
After we were introduced the foster mother handed her to me (Heather). I cried and kissed and hugged and told her how pretty she was and how much we all love her. I couldn't be happier! She is so cute and such a sweet and easy going baby. She never fussed the whole time we were with her. I held her up in the air and she smiled at me. Such a sweet smile! She seems very happy and content. Her foster mother said that she really only cries when she's hungry and said she thought she'd do well on the flight home.
Brian held her next. Emalee seems to really like Brian a lot. She smiled and laughed with him quite a bit. Her foster mother said that she seems to take to men better. Brian said that she's won his heart forever. She sucks on her hand a lot...she even chewed on Heather's finger a bit. She's a drooler! The foster mother said that Emalee will probably like David and Jacob a lot too!
After Brian held her I took her again and Emalee's foster mother, Mrs. Kim, started crying. She loves Emalee so much and it really showed. She's had seven foster babies, but Emalee is the first girl that she's ever had, so Emalee was very special to her. We're just amazed at the love she's shown Emalee and so grateful for it. We could never thank her enough. She will be in our hearts always!
We gave gifts to Mrs. Kim and then she gave us a hanbok for Emalee and a photo album of pictures that have been taken since she's had her. The photos are priceless since they are all we have of Emalee since she's been born other than the 3 we got from our agency. We also got a necklace for Emalee. It has the Korean flag on one side and on the other side Emalee's birthdate and her Korean name inscribed in hangul. This will be something to always treasure!
It was very hard to give her back when our visit ended. I had to give her more kisses and more hugs! Emalee was strapped to Mrs. Kim's back and then they left the building. It was a beautiful day and a wonderful meeting with our precious baby!
After our meeting with Emalee we had a traditional Korean lunch with Dr. Kim Sr. and other staff at Eastern. We sat at a table with Tricia and Charlie Morgan who are from TX. to adopt their daughter. There was a couple from Australia adopting a baby that we sat with too. There was an adult adoptee who was back visiting and a Dad with his 2 adopted children from Massachusetts here doing a home land tour. It was nice to sit and visit with all these other families and share in eachothers joy.
We will go to Eastern again at 8:40 in the morning. Dr. Kim Sr. will pray over Emalee and us and then we'll get her and go to the airport! Our flight leaves Korea at noon, we land in Chicago and have a layover there for awhile and should be home around 4:45 Tuesday evening.
We ask that you please keep Emalee's foster mother in your prayers. She's going to have a very difficult time tomorrow! She's a very sweet and wonderful woman. Also, please pray that our flights are not cancelled! And of course please pray that Emalee does well on the flight.
We love you all and will see you Tuesday!
Love,
Brian and Heather
Sunday, March 25, 2007
Sunday In Seoul
Hello Everyone!
It's Sunday evening at 8 p.m. right now. We've had a busy day being tourists. This morning we went to Seoul Station and Lotte Mart and Pizza Hut and a palace (can't remember the name right now.)
Seoul Station is comparable to Grand Central Station. There are a lot of people there coming and going. We saw quite few S. Korean military men there.
Lotte Mart is like a Target/Walmart Super Center. We got to observe Koreans in their every day lives. It's 2 stories tall and has an escalator w/o stairs, more like a ramp so shopping carts can go up and down. It was pretty neat.
At the palace we witnessed the changing of the guards ceremony. We really are not sure about much of this, but enjoyed the sightseeing of it.
This evening we went to Seoul Tower. It is a major tourist attraction in Seoul. We went to the top of it and could see the whole city. Unfortunately, it's very over cast here but it was neat too! The tower is the 3rd tallest tower in the world.
Have you every tried Bulgogi Pizza at Pizza Hut? We didn't risk it, but it looked good. We're trying not to eat too much of the ethnic foods here. Some of them look really yummy, but we're afraid of getting sick and don't want to be sick when we bring a new baby home. We did try Bipbimbap on the airplane. It's okay, but we're not crazy about eating seaweed.
We're calling it a day now! Our legs are sore from walking so much today.
Anyway, we'll meet Dr. Kim Sr. and Jr. at 10 a.m. tomorrow. They are the founders of Eastern. Then at 11 a.m. we'll meet Emalee and her foster parents. We can't wait! After meeting Emalee we think we'll be having lunch at Eastern. We hear that there are several other staff members that we'll meet during lunch. If there's enough time after that we may rock the babies again.
We both thank you so much for all the prayers. Tomorrow will be another emotional day for us. It's been such a blessing to experience the people and culture of our daughter's birth country. We're so glad that we'll be able to answer some of the many questions that she may be asking some day. This is a beautiful country with a rich culture.
We love you all!
Brian and Heather
It's Sunday evening at 8 p.m. right now. We've had a busy day being tourists. This morning we went to Seoul Station and Lotte Mart and Pizza Hut and a palace (can't remember the name right now.)
Seoul Station is comparable to Grand Central Station. There are a lot of people there coming and going. We saw quite few S. Korean military men there.
Lotte Mart is like a Target/Walmart Super Center. We got to observe Koreans in their every day lives. It's 2 stories tall and has an escalator w/o stairs, more like a ramp so shopping carts can go up and down. It was pretty neat.
At the palace we witnessed the changing of the guards ceremony. We really are not sure about much of this, but enjoyed the sightseeing of it.
This evening we went to Seoul Tower. It is a major tourist attraction in Seoul. We went to the top of it and could see the whole city. Unfortunately, it's very over cast here but it was neat too! The tower is the 3rd tallest tower in the world.
Have you every tried Bulgogi Pizza at Pizza Hut? We didn't risk it, but it looked good. We're trying not to eat too much of the ethnic foods here. Some of them look really yummy, but we're afraid of getting sick and don't want to be sick when we bring a new baby home. We did try Bipbimbap on the airplane. It's okay, but we're not crazy about eating seaweed.
We're calling it a day now! Our legs are sore from walking so much today.
Anyway, we'll meet Dr. Kim Sr. and Jr. at 10 a.m. tomorrow. They are the founders of Eastern. Then at 11 a.m. we'll meet Emalee and her foster parents. We can't wait! After meeting Emalee we think we'll be having lunch at Eastern. We hear that there are several other staff members that we'll meet during lunch. If there's enough time after that we may rock the babies again.
We both thank you so much for all the prayers. Tomorrow will be another emotional day for us. It's been such a blessing to experience the people and culture of our daughter's birth country. We're so glad that we'll be able to answer some of the many questions that she may be asking some day. This is a beautiful country with a rich culture.
We love you all!
Brian and Heather
Saturday, March 24, 2007
This Is Not Heather, but as close to her as you can get right now!
Hi everyone! This is Laura, Heathers sister. She is unable to post to this blog so she is emailing her posts to me and I am maintaining her blog while she is away. I will try to check my mail as much as possible and get her next blog up quickly. She is unable to reply to your comments right now, but if you wish to leave her comments please do so as I have set this up for her to receive them via email. I know she would love to hear from you all! As you can tell, they are doing well and having a good time. The best time will be when they get to hold Emalee and take her home!
More News From Korea!
Good morning everybody! It's 9:25 p.m. here and we're getting ready to call it a day! We're really upset about the calling card. We've tried everything and just can't seem to get a call to go through. (Laura, you can put this on the blog if you want)
We managed to conquer Seoul's subway system today! What an adventure! We went to Namdaemun market today. This place was huge! It's a place that has a lot of shops on the street and vendors in the middle of the street. Brian and I are guessing that the market covers about 8-10 square city blocks like we have in Spfd. It's packed with people walking shoulder to shoulder. We got some souveneirs there and got Emalee a hanbok (traditional korean outfit) to wear for her 1 year old pics.
The people here are very, very nice to us. They all dress very nice too. We actually feel kind of scummy in our jeans and t-shirts. They all wear suits, dresses, slacks. Almost all the women wear heels...even with all the walking that they do here! We were on the subway when high schoolers got out of school. We noticed that they are very "in" to their clothes, shoes and ipods...just like our american teens.
When walking on the sidewalks people are very pushy, but other than that we have no complaints. In the stores they are very helpful and eager to please. We can tell that they have a lot of pride in their work. In the dept. store that we were at early today there were so many employees ready to assist us it was amazing! They literally stood waiting to apply customer service. A quality we don't get much in the U.S. anymore.
We met 2 Canadians today. One teaches english in a university here and his father was here visiting him. It was nice to speak to someone in English today. We also met a few of our service men here. They were helpful in giving us directions.
Well, off to bed for the night!
Love you all,
Heather and Brian
We managed to conquer Seoul's subway system today! What an adventure! We went to Namdaemun market today. This place was huge! It's a place that has a lot of shops on the street and vendors in the middle of the street. Brian and I are guessing that the market covers about 8-10 square city blocks like we have in Spfd. It's packed with people walking shoulder to shoulder. We got some souveneirs there and got Emalee a hanbok (traditional korean outfit) to wear for her 1 year old pics.
The people here are very, very nice to us. They all dress very nice too. We actually feel kind of scummy in our jeans and t-shirts. They all wear suits, dresses, slacks. Almost all the women wear heels...even with all the walking that they do here! We were on the subway when high schoolers got out of school. We noticed that they are very "in" to their clothes, shoes and ipods...just like our american teens.
When walking on the sidewalks people are very pushy, but other than that we have no complaints. In the stores they are very helpful and eager to please. We can tell that they have a lot of pride in their work. In the dept. store that we were at early today there were so many employees ready to assist us it was amazing! They literally stood waiting to apply customer service. A quality we don't get much in the U.S. anymore.
We met 2 Canadians today. One teaches english in a university here and his father was here visiting him. It was nice to speak to someone in English today. We also met a few of our service men here. They were helpful in giving us directions.
Well, off to bed for the night!
Love you all,
Heather and Brian
Friday, March 23, 2007
News from Korea
We made it to Korea! Our original flight to Chicago go cancelled so we were rerouted to Dallas and flew from there to Seoul. By the time we made it to Seoul we had been awake 24 hours straight. I think we each dozed on the jet maybe 1-2 hours each. It was so hard to sleep because we were so excited!
It's noon on Saturday here. We get to meet Emalee on Monday at 10 a.m. (Sunday at 8 p.m. Missouri time). Today we went to the adoption agency she's been cared through (Eastern Social Welfare Society). We each got to go to the baby nursery and hold and feed babies. Heather got to hold a girl and she looked a lot like Emalee's referral picture. It was a very emotional time! Brian got to hold a boy. Both babies were so sweet and couldn't have been much older than a couple weeks. There are about 25 babies in the nursery waiting for a home. Very heart breaking. The nursery workers remembered Emalee after we showed her picture to them.
We went to the Hyundai Dept. store awhile ago. It's very high dollar. We also found 7-11, Outback steak house, KFC, Pizza Hut, Dunkin' Donuts, etc. I don't think we'll starve. Everything around here smells like kimchi and isn't setting well with Heather's sense of smell.
Well, we're very tired. We'll write as much as we can. Thanks for the prayers!
Love,
Brian and Heather
It's noon on Saturday here. We get to meet Emalee on Monday at 10 a.m. (Sunday at 8 p.m. Missouri time). Today we went to the adoption agency she's been cared through (Eastern Social Welfare Society). We each got to go to the baby nursery and hold and feed babies. Heather got to hold a girl and she looked a lot like Emalee's referral picture. It was a very emotional time! Brian got to hold a boy. Both babies were so sweet and couldn't have been much older than a couple weeks. There are about 25 babies in the nursery waiting for a home. Very heart breaking. The nursery workers remembered Emalee after we showed her picture to them.
We went to the Hyundai Dept. store awhile ago. It's very high dollar. We also found 7-11, Outback steak house, KFC, Pizza Hut, Dunkin' Donuts, etc. I don't think we'll starve. Everything around here smells like kimchi and isn't setting well with Heather's sense of smell.
Well, we're very tired. We'll write as much as we can. Thanks for the prayers!
Love,
Brian and Heather
Hello from Seoul, Korea!!!
Hello Everybody! We made it here. It's 8:25 a.m. right now here in Seoul on Saturday. So, it's 6:25 p.m. on Friday for you. We had quite a long flight getting here. Our flight out of Spfd. was cancelled to Chicago so we were re-routed to Dallas. They wanted us to fly to Tokyo, then Seoul, but luckily we found a flight straight out of Dallas to Seoul. Our flight left Dallas at 1:00 p.m. and we got to Seoul at about 5:30 p.m. the following day. It was about a 14.5 hour flight.
We didn't make it to our hotel until almost 9 p.m. and just did find the computer room. Brian is trying to call the U.S. while I'm in here writing this.
There is so much to write about already. Seoul is a very, very big city. Our driver said that there are 11 million people in Seoul. It's a lot like NYC here. People drive like complete maniacs!!! We don't think there are many traffic laws/speed limits...if so, then no one follows the laws. The only thing we've observed about drivers is that they do yield to pedestrians!
We're getting ready to take the subway down to our adoption agency. We had the same flight as Tricia and Charlie M. I think I mentioned them before.
Anyway, we get to meet Emalee at 10 a.m. on Monday morning. It will probably be the only time we get to see her until we leave Tuesday. It's a neat feeling knowing that we're in the same city that she's in right now!
We miss David and Jacob! I'll email you guys very soon and as soon as we figure out our calling card we'll give you a phone call!
Take care and we'll write again soon!
Love,
Brian and Heather
We didn't make it to our hotel until almost 9 p.m. and just did find the computer room. Brian is trying to call the U.S. while I'm in here writing this.
There is so much to write about already. Seoul is a very, very big city. Our driver said that there are 11 million people in Seoul. It's a lot like NYC here. People drive like complete maniacs!!! We don't think there are many traffic laws/speed limits...if so, then no one follows the laws. The only thing we've observed about drivers is that they do yield to pedestrians!
We're getting ready to take the subway down to our adoption agency. We had the same flight as Tricia and Charlie M. I think I mentioned them before.
Anyway, we get to meet Emalee at 10 a.m. on Monday morning. It will probably be the only time we get to see her until we leave Tuesday. It's a neat feeling knowing that we're in the same city that she's in right now!
We miss David and Jacob! I'll email you guys very soon and as soon as we figure out our calling card we'll give you a phone call!
Take care and we'll write again soon!
Love,
Brian and Heather
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