Trip to the DMZ

JR's Grandma Graham is visiting and, yes, we've been taking some pictures of JR -- they'll be up on the blog soon. But here's an interesting picture of a different sort: Mom standing next to a South Korean Army guard at the Joint Security Area in the DMZ. She's standing in the United Nations' Military Armistace Commission building that sits directly atop the demarcation line that divides North and South Korea. The guard is making sure she doesn't make a run for the door, which opens up into North Korea. I don't think he had much to worry about.

JR gets his passport and consular report of birth

So, I don't know if we'll keep up this pace of big events for little JR, but last week he received his passport and consular report of birth (ie, citizenship document) from the U.S. Ambassador to South Korea, Kathleen Stephens, and the Eighth Army Commander, Lieutenant General Joseph Fil. The picture above is from the ceremony that officially opened the U.S. Embassy's "satellite office" at the Yongsan Army base in Seoul -- that's the reason they wanted a military family there. Oh, and there's apparently a short news clip playing on the Armed Forces television network showing pictures from this ceremony also.. How 'bout that! This kid is a star.

Happy Mother's Day!

We celebrated a very special Mother's Day this weekend -- the very first one for JR's Mom (how does that sound?)! And we had Grandma Parker here. Grandma Graham will be here soon too. All three are so proud of this little dude.

JR's invitation

JR's getting his passport on Wednesday. (He'll be a world traveler at a young age.) And the little guy will receive his passport and birth certificate from no less than the U.S. Ambassador to Korea and the 3-star 8th Army Commander. What can I say -- the kid's a pretty big deal. (And the Embassy was looking for a family to be involved in an event publicizing the services they provide for military members in Korea.. ergo, the invitation below.)

Two truly awesome pictures

Our first and most recent pictures of JR. Pretty hard to imagine how something so tiny develops into a new person.

A blog by any other name..

Well, here we are. We have a baby, we have an exciting assignment in our future, and we have family and friends clamoring for more pictures. And therefore... we now have a blog.

The first hurdle was choosing a name for our family blog. Among the finalists were thetomandjillshow (too suggestive), thegrahamupdate (too literal), and greatgobsofgrahams (too messy). I was lobbying hard for operationkielbasa, but Jill didn't like the way it would sound in a report to the foundation. So, thosegroovygrahams won out. Now we'll just have to live up to that title!

Standby for pictures and videos of the little one.

Cheers,
Tom