Little Samuel

I had the privilege of taking photos for a beautiful family last weekend.  It was a very momentous time in their life.  Read their story below.

“We started trying to have a baby six years ago. After three unsuccessful years, and many doctor appointments, we decided to start the process for adoption. We started in March of 2008 and our agency told us we needed to wait a year to be old enough. In March of 2009 we began our wait to adopt from Ethiopia. While we had waited to be old enough to adopt, the amount of families trying to adopt from Ethiopia grew by quite a bit. In January of 2011 we thought we were within three months of adopting a child from Ethiopia when we got a call from our social worker saying that they had boys in Korea that needed homes, but that it would be an 11 month process. So, we turned them down. The next day our social worker called again and said that she had a little boy from Korea in mind for us and that the process would move a lot faster. So, we took that as a sign from God that this was what we were supposed to do. In March or so of 2011 Ethiopia has essentially almost closed their process. We would not have made it. On April 28, 2011 we got the call from our agency that Korea was ready for us to come and pick up our son! On May 1, we flew out of Minneapolis to Korea. We got to see Samuel (born Shin, Jiyong) on the first day we were in Korea for one hour. We picked him up six days later which was a Monday in Korea, but technically it was still Sunday night in the states (Mother’s Day). 🙂 On May 10, we arrived home with our little boy. We have been so blessed during this process; seeing God’s hand in it all and having the love and support of so many friends and family. Samuel was definitely worth every hardship, every tear, and every heartache it took to bring him home.”   Jessica Monson

It was such an honor to take their family photos.  Little Samuel was SUPER precious.  When I first met him I could hardly take my eyes off of him.  His big brown eyes and thick black hair were gorgeous.  He was so good for us considering the circumstances – he was hungry, he was tired, it was raining outside, and he was still on Korean time!  Congratulations, Jessica and Clark, on your beautiful son!  Congratulations to the the new grandparents too!  This is the first grandbaby on both sides!  May God bless the beautiful new addition to your family!