Blood, tears and chocolate

Why would I possibly title a blog that way? If you lived in our house, you would understand. My pictures got a little out of order so I'll just revisit our week in the order of the pictures, which is....backwards. On Sunday (yes, I know...we were supposed to be in church, but we all COMPLETELY overslept). To our credit, Henry asked at about 11 if we were going to church and we said we weren't going today. He and Charles were both very disappointed. Instead, we unloaded and stacked wood. The boys would load up their wheelbarrow and wagon and then we would go stack it by the fence. It looks like we worked them to the bone, but it was only our second trip. They weren't able to fit many logs in their wheelbarrow and wagon so we hadn't worked very hard. We were having fun though. The weather was gorgeous and the boys were helping each other by carrying each log together. Now, only if they could be like that all the time...wishful thinking.
We went to the park in the afternoon. Henry and I are at the top of the rock climbing wall. That's Min at the bottom. It helps put the height in perspective. It wasn't terribly tall...at least looking up at it. But, when we got to the top it looked a lot higher than it really was.

Actually, the 'blood' part of the title comes in at the park. I was going to go down this long tunnel slide, and as I was taking off, I said to Charles, 'Here I go!!" He jumped on me from the back and held on around my neck. At the bottom, it got a little steeper with a bump. When we bumped, he whacked his nose on the clip I had in my hair. Of course, he screamed bloody murder and got a bloody nose. This was shortly after we had watched another boy cough so hard that he threw up in a garbage bag.
The park we were at was right next to Soldiers Field Memorial Park. We walked over there and this is the boys playing on an Iraqi cannon. Doesn't that sound like a nice, safe way to spend a Sunday afternoon, playing on an Iraqi cannon?
This is Charles from today. His preschool went to a local nursing home to sing for the residents. They were all dressed up for Halloween and did a really great job. The residents handed out bags of candy afterwards and treated the kids (and parents) to juice and giant pumpkin cookies. No, I didn't start my diet today.

Here comes the tears part of the title. Last Sunday, we finally did Mins' toljabee, which is part of the first birthday celebration. It is where the child gets to pick from a variety of objects. The items he picks are said to predict his future. Mins' first choice was the pencil, predicting him to be a scholar. His second choice was rice which predicts prosperity. His third choice was jujubee's which, in Korea, are dried dates. We used raisins. This indicates many children. So, I guess our son is going to be a prosperous scholar with many children. Hmmmm....maybe he gets it from his smart, rich parents....Ha Ha Ha!!!!
Here he is a little happier and eating the raisins.
Our own Elton John. Charles found these somewhere and loves to wear them.

Now, for the chocolate part of the title. On Saturday, we went up to Minneapolis for an anniversary celebration and fundraiser for a magazine we subscribe to and love that targets the Korean-American community. First, we stopped at a Korean market in St. Paul to get some groceries. Of course, we had to buy some candy and a favorite of the boys is a long, thin cookie stick covered in chocolate. We left the market and drove to where the celebration was. When we were parking, Charles said, 'Who's going to help Min?' We said, 'Help him with what?' Charles, ' He has chocolate on his hands.' 'Oh. We can just wipe them off.' Well, little did we know what he would ACTUALLY look like. I guess it is our fault for putting him between his two older brothers who are both eating chocolate covered cookies.

This was what we found when opened the back door, and yes, his hands were covered in chocolate. Thankfully, his clothes were pretty good and I was able to wipe the chocolate off of them. We had a great time at the celebration but didn't get to stay as long as we had hoped. We DID get to eat a great lunch of Korean food and take in some of the traditional Korean drumming which the boys had been so excited for. We also ran into the lady who started the Korean adoption program at our agency. She even remembered us!! I couldn't believe it! We had seen her as we walked in the door, and when she turned around and saw us she came right over to visit. She waited at the airport with us when we were waiting for Henry. She was so excited to see the boys. She's retired now.
We were outside playing before we left the celebration and Min thought the leaves were so funny. Charles would throw them up in the air and he would laugh and laugh!!

That's the end of the saga about blood, tears, and chocolate.

Futility

We learned the meaning of the word futility on Sunday as we tried to get one decent picture of the boys to use for a Christmas picture. We've decided that maybe we've set our expectations too high. These were a few of our favorites. Charles getting ready to hit Henry with a stick.
Charles after he hit Henry with the stick and now listening to Dad say that he's going to take the stick away. Henry is pretending to be mad because Charles didn't really hit him that hard. Notice Min who seems to think its a little bit funny.
And, Dad taking the stick away.
Charles trying to feed his baby brother a pine needle.
And, Andrew crying because he didn't really want to eat a pine needle.

No other news here. We've been leading very boring lives the past few weeks, but have been so busy with daily things that it's been hard to blog. People really just want to see the pictures, so I'll try to be better about posting those ; )

Finally...blogger is letting me upload pictures

I've been trying to upload these photos for a couple days, but something was wrong with Blogger and I haven't been able to post any until today. This was us last Thursday at Andrew's finalization court hearing. Yes, the poor boy is stuck with our family forever and ever. Little does he know that he's become a member of the family who hopes to post a sign at the door that says...nope, not 'The Paul Family,' but 'Where the Wild THings Are.' It is a family joke, and when we go down to our unfinished basement in the winter so the boys can ride bike, inline skate, etc....we say, 'Let the wild rumpus start!!' Now, everyone is going to have to go out and read the book, 'Where the Wild Things Are.' Anyway, the court hearing was pretty short and sweet. We answered questions from the judge, and Henry would whisper, 'Ugh,' every time we answered 'I do,' because it made him think of people getting married.

This is Min at our traditional finalization supper. I'm not sure why we ended up at this particular restaurant after Henry's finalization, but the 'Hunan Garden' is where we have celebrated all finalizations. This is Min with a spoon in his mouth.
On Friday, I drove the Paul Bus to their preschool so I could transport 3 other kids to Tweite's Pumpkin Patch. Their preschool tries to do this every year or two. We had a really great time. We had never been there before, and it was like a kids paradise. There were so many things to do that we didn't get time to do them all before having to go home. This is Charles peeking out of a little door on a castle tower.
Henry pumping water on an old pump. Both boys loved this, and I told Travis we should have one at home. Charles absolutely adores any running water and would happily water the trees, grass, and sidewalk all day.
And, this is our very curious, just 1 year old who thinks climbing into the refrigerator is a lot of fun. I hesitated putting this one up because then everyone can see the inside of my fridge, but I couldn't pass up on showing you what a little monkey he is. He also loves it if I hold him up so he can stand on the window ledge to look outside. Thankfully, he hasn't tried the stairs yet.

The boys and their (borrowed) Hawg

Just a few photos to post tonight but not much news. Min in his new winter cap. Who can resist a cap that looks like that? It was pretty chilly today and I realized that I don't have a winter coat for him. Though he came home in the winter, he was younger and smaller than the other two. Their first snowsuit will fit him this winter, but I didn't want him to start wearing a snowsuit now and sweatshirts aren't quite warm enough. I ordered him a coat that, hopefully, will be here in a couple days. A good friend let Travis borrow his Harley for a few days while he was out of town. The boys have been begging for a ride so Travis took them around the neighborhood this evening.
Charles was pretty excited to go. He loved it when Travis revved up the motor. Andrew was not so impressed. He cried.
Travis and Henry riding around the neighborhood. Henry has been wearing Darin's helmet all week when he rides his bike. He pretends its his motorcycle.

Henry was all prepared. Note the welding gloves he's wearing on his hands : ) He's also wearing a black, Jolly Roger adorned dew rag that he got from his friends' pirate birthday party.

These boots (I mean slippers) are made for walking...

HI'm sorry!! I saved this video in the correct orientation (so he's not sideways) but it switched back when I downloaded it and I don't know how to switch it back. Oh well. Here is a video of Min walking. I guess you'll just have to tip your head to the side or imagine that he can walk on walls. There is sound too though he isn't saying much. Yes, we have a walker!! Min has reached that huge developmental milestone of walking. The one that strikes fear into the hearts of most parents as they envision their child falling down the stairs (it can happen even with gates. In our old house, Charles just climbed through the stair rails and would make his way into the entry), climbing out of their crib (Henry used to help Charles out of his crib. Actually, only once because when I asked him to show me what he did, Charles started to cry.) or finding electrical outlets. However, he is very happy and so proud of himself. So are we. I still get very surprised when I see him walk into the kitchen. Or, today when I was putting his clothes away, he walked into our spare bedroom and got a book off the bookshelf. He's quite a repeater when it comes to words. Now, whenever we're in public, he says 'Hi Da,' to everyone we pass.

Min had his 1 year well child check on Thursday and he's doing fine. We had to postpone his vaccinations (which reminds me that I need to call back and schedule them) because Henry was with me and got so sad when he found out Andrew needed shots.

Henry learned to tie his shoes...a huge milestone for him. I forget what a big deal that is. But, he needed new shoes and insisted he have the ones that tie. He's also close to losing a second tooth.

Today is my 9th transplant anniversary. Yaaay!! We were trying to explain to Henry what that meant. And I told him that I wasn't able to make any blood so Uncle Lance gave me some of his bone marrow so that I could make blood. Then I told him that now my blood is really Uncle Lance's. I think that was a little too much information because he gave me a really funny look and then said, 'That's gross!'

We go to court on Thursday to finalize Min's adoption. And, we'll have his tol on Saturday. I"m going to make bi bim bop, which our family loves. Of course, the boys insisted on mandu. Kimchi is a must-have, and we'll see about anything else besides cake. We bought a tae gukki, a Korean flag, on Friday. The boys have been wanting one for a long time. We got it onto the pole and carried it outside to hang up and Charles grabbed it and hugged it! He loves to come home and see the tae gukki.

Happy Birthday, MinSeong!!!

I am posting a day late, but we were all so tired last night that I couldn't get any pictures posted. We actually had a pretty quiet, family day. Andrew had been up coughing for about 4 hours in the night. We tag-teamed with Travis on first duty. We were so tired we didn't even make it to church. Yesterday went a little better for him, and we found out today that he does NOT have whooping cough. Apparently, just a bad cold and cough. He slept better last night and has had another good day today. We postponed Min's tol party to the 13th. The boy's had fun making cake, as you can see below. Henry was stirring and, as a 6 year old boy, was making faces as he imagined all kinds of unmentionables having to do with brown cake batter.
Andrew getting his hands messy. He wasn't very impressed with the frosting, so we gave him a piece without. Charles was the same way. Charles and Travis went to the store to buy the cake mix, and Charles chose chocolate cake with triple chocolate frosting. (Charles favorite cake is chocolate. Henry does not particularly care for chocolate so he had an orange pop float instead. )
Andrew's present was a push-toy/ride on car. He LOVED it. I tried to download the video but it was taking so long I cancelled. I'll save it for another day. He's really on the go and can cruise the furniture and walls all around the house. We put up the stair gates the other day so we should be safe.

Getting into the toy basket.
Andrew was so cranky when he woke up on Sunday, and we were talking about him being mad and sad. Henry said that he thought he was sad. I asked him why Andrew might be sad, and he said that he was probably missing his family in Korea. I asked Henry if he missed his family in Korea, and he said yes. On your birthdays? Yes. Do you get sad on your birthdays? You guessed it... yes. I was aware that this was common. Henry didn't want a birthday party last year or the year before. Isn't that interesting from kids that some people say shouldn't remember/grieve the loss of their parents?