Thursday, October 23, 2008

171-H!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

IT'S HERE!!!!!!!!!!! For those of you just checking in, the 171-H is the "golden ticket" of the adoption world and it means that the lovely folks at US immigration have deemed us fit to be parents. That's a darn good thing considering we've been parents since late '06. Alas, we are done waiting and can now officially begin WAITING.

Tuesday, October 21, 2008

The most wonderful time of the year

Our pumpkin patch hopping has begun! We started by purchasing our house pumpkins (not to be confused with house elves) on Saturday. Typically we carve three pumpkins, but CJ decided he wanted four this year. And well, if we get four we might as well get five. And well, it was buy five get the sixth free, so we might as well get six. The last two are small and will probably not get carved, and I have to admit that the pumpkins do look cute on the front porch in two groups of three. Paul immediately tried to lift the largest pumpkin he could find and made quite the face during his effort. Unfortunately I was not quick enough to capture it on film and my little problem solver quickly figured out that A.) It was much easier to roll the desired pumpkin toward the wagon and B.) The smaller pumpkins are easier to lift. And hey mom, look at me lifting two pumpkins. So there!

On Sunday we headed out to a pumpkin patch/amusement park where we met up with Kim & her brood. The boys enjoyed jumping over hay bales and riding the ridiculously fast slides in the playground. We tried to capture them on film posing in the pumpkin teepee, but this is the best I could get. Imagine - four boys five years old and under not wanting to sit still. Hmmmm.
The festivities continue this weekend and will include a hayride at the zoo and murder mystery event for mom & dad. Hopefully it will not snow. AH!

Thursday, October 16, 2008

I (heart) Fall

The leaves are rapidly falling in our backyard, and we spent some time raking this weekend. Paul enjoyed "un-raking" and jumping into the piles. It took some convincing, but CJ agreed to make one big pile out of the smaller ones (he usually just goes around & collects the small piles onto a large tarp) so that Paul could get the most from his jump. I got some great shots & managed to capture the run & jump on video.



*** Disclaimer: Paul chose to start that far back - he would have gone even further back if I didn't tell him to turn around. Makes for a nice Monty Python reference though. (grin)

I have another video of him counting down to the big run, but I'm having trouble uploading it. Instead, here's a pic of him in the pile of leaves.




Monday, October 13, 2008

Happiness is...

...Daniel Radcliffe.... live on stage... in the flesh... all of it!!!
As an early birthday present, CJ got us tickets to see Equus on Broadway. We decided to go this past weekend so that we could have today to recover from the trip. Luckily we were able to stay with CJ's relatives in New Jersey and spent most of the day in NYC (sung like Daddy Warbucks: NNN!! YYY!!! CCCCCCCCC!!!). The weather was amazing & we spent some time walking around Ground Zero, lounging on a bench in Battery Park & shopping for Paul on 5th Ave. (He spent the weekend with Grandma van.) Then it was off to Broadway for an incredible show. Seriously. I'm not just saying that because it was Daniel Radcliffe, although that certainly helped. He without a doubt proved that he can be more than Harry Potter. I read Equus in high school and have wanted to see it performed live ever since. I was not disappointed.
As we left the theater, a large crowd quickly gathered in hopes of catching a glimpse of HARRY POTTER. We crossed the street to try and get around everyone and I remarked to CJ, "We don't need to stick around for this. We just saw him completely naked." (OK, so I used a more colorful word there, but I thought I'd keep this PG.)
Anyone out there in the blog reading world that plans to be in (sing it) NNNNYYYYYCCCCCC, I highly recommend Equus. A fantastic show.

Saturday, October 4, 2008

The struggle for independence

Besides "NO!" Paul's current favorite saying is "All by self." In the morning he insists on dressing himself, which is great except for the fact that he typically puts both feet into the same pant leg and if he manages to get the shirt on in the right direction, head and arm often come out of the same hole. The worst part is that when faced with an article of clothing that he cannot get on "all by self", he launches into complete meltdown mode. This morning we had a fifteen minute episode over a pair of socks. He couldn't get them on without me but there was no way I was going to be allowed to help. After some kicking, screaming, snatching and a loud chorus of "NOOOOOO"s , eventually he agreed that we could do it together.
I'm all for independence, but it is this struggle between what he wants to do alone and what he is developmentally capable of doing alone that is causing the problem. Hopefully soon his abilities will catch up to his desires. Until then, we celebrate each time his head and each arm all find their own way out of a shirt.