Inside the Blue Bag: What Isaac Came Home With

Ahhhhh, the infamous blue bag! Children from Korea who are adopted through Holt Children's Services are given a blue bag to take home with them. I wanted to document everything that was in Isaac's blue bag, so I took some photos of its contents. I meant to also photograph the bag itself, but I forgot. I remembered after I'd already uploaded the other photos, and I didn't want to put this post off any longer. I did find the above photo, which is of Isaac and his wonderful escort--who, as you can see, has his blue bag on her shoulder.

Here's what was inside ...


Can of Korean formula and two bottles


Hanbok for Isaac to wear on his first birthday. It is huge--way too big, but hopefully we can make it work for his birthday, and perhaps he can wear it again next year.


Little white shoes and socks that go with the hanbok (I forgot to put the socks in the hanbok photo). It is my understanding that the hanbok is a gift from Isaac's foster family. The little white shoes were in an envelope with the following book from Holt ...


Booklet from Holt Children's Services about Korea as well as the adoption agency


Two diapers--that appears to be all that was left at the end of his long journey, as we have been using diapers from Target and Publix (had a coupon) since he arrived. (We LOVE Target diapers, by the way. The Publix ones are OK, too.)


Small padded thing--for diaper changing?


These are priceless! Photos from Isaac's 10.5 months in Korea. The plastic bag contains many photos of him with his foster family over the last several months. The bigger photos appear to be professionally done. I blurred his foster mother's face for privacy reasons. What treasures these are!


Brown envelope containing Isaac's medical records and some other background/documents/etc. I have noticed on some of his paperwork that the "KM," which I believe stands for "Korean Male," has been corrected or written over (or taped over with another piece of paper, etc.) with "KWM," which I assume stands for "Korean/White Male." But apparently the "KM" wasn't caught on the brown envelope.


Priceless--a beautiful letter written by Isaac's foster mother. My MIL has loosely translated this for us, and I plan to get a verbatim translation as well.


Beautiful necklace of the Korean flag. Isaac's Korean name and birth date are engraved on the back.


Travel certificate


Clothes. Included in this photo are the clothes Isaac was wearing when he came home. The outfit is kind of hard to see because I tucked it under another outfit that was sent as a gift.


Pillow, which was a gift from some friends of the foster family, and a Thomas book in Korean


Some of the things we sent Isaac in the two care packages that we shipped during our wait. I am touched that they sent these things home with Isaac, as I have read not to expect anything back. (In fact, I bought duplicates of some of these things for that very reason.) It was so sweet and thoughtful of his foster family to pack these things for Isaac to bring home--though I hate that they took up so much space in his blue bag. (Note for other adoptive families who may be curious: None of the clothes that we sent for Isaac were returned--which is fine with me, of course. I just wanted to note that.)

As I looked through his belongings, I thought of his sweet foster mother, lovingly (and sadly) packing up his possessions for his long journey home. I know she--and her family--must be missing him so much, and I think about her every day.