By our crude estimates, it came about two months ahead of schedule. So we didn't get to paint what we wanted to paint, and we didn't get to build what we wanted to build. Instead, we got a phone call. And by the end of the day, we had plane tickets: two going out and three coming back.

Thirteen months ago, we were still going to stores and restaurants as we always did, wondering what it would be like to be in these very same places with a child. We couldn't even imagine it, despite it being our fondest wish. We couldn't visualize us with a kid... sitting in that booth or walking in that mall or pushing that shopping cart. And worst of all, we had no idea when it would finally happen.

And then it did. We brought Clark to the United States on the day he turned four months old.

And now we're a year later.

Clark can communicate to us now. He points and says "cat!" "bubble!" "clock!" "ball!" He can tell us when he wants his "cup" for a drink. He does sign language for "more," which, as we've found, can apply to so many additional situations than just meal time. He does the spidery fingers portion of Itsy Bitsy Spider, and he knows when to fall in Ring Around the Rosie (even if sometimes he'd rather watch you do it.) He says "aah!" when he is done drinking and "aww!" when he touches one of the cats. When he sees something that catches his interest, he says "oooooooooo!" Everything is done with exclamation points.

He is determined to master the proper use of forks and spoons, although he hasn't yet decided if he intends to be right- or left-handed. He loves spicy foods (like those seasoned soy steak strips and Szechuan tofu.) Wax beans, grilled cheese, bananas, papaya, noodles, animal crackers and broccoli are all favorites.

He is a thrill-seeker, a dancer, an explorer. He gives great big open-mouthed kisses. He loves to go outside, where he can spot flags and trees. He loves to go shopping, where he can see new people and places. He always has to be holding something, the bigger the better... currently, he prefers his butterfly net.

He knows that balls are tossed, keys go in doors, and that he's more likely to get food if he heads for one particular chair. We still need to work on the right way to go down steps and up slides.

He doesn't know that our family is a little different. He doesn't notice how we get checked out by the people walking past. He doesn't understand the extra smiles he gets when we go to a Chinese restaurant for supper. He doesn't know why we work to keep in touch with other families like ours, or why it is important that we go to special adoptive family meetings and outings and parties. Someday, he will.

One year ago, we were hustling through a nervous weekend buying baby essentials and memorizing Korean phrases.

This weekend, Rhonda packed up most of his smallest outfits.

I could say that our family started with that phone call. But I could also say that it started one month before that, we we first saw his picture. Or two months before that, when he was born (although we had no idea at the time.) Or five months before that, when we sent in our formal application to adopt a child. Or six months before that, when we went to our first adoption information meeting.

Or even two and a half years before that, when we decided we were ready.

Because the journey that brought Clark to us was both wonderful and random. We experienced months of excitement and endured years of pain. We made decisions; agencies made decisions. Notarized letters, official meetings, phone call tag, bank withdrawls, the postal service... every possible step of the way where a million other things could have happened, ended up bringing our family together. One letter gets stuck on a desk somewhere, and it all could have been different. Another letter gets mailed a week earlier, and it all could have been different.

But when the three of us spent the night in a modest room on the eighth floor of a hotel in Seoul... regardless of how it was different and exciting and painful and random, that was when we knew it was perfect.

Eleven months and three weeks ago.