Happy Birthday Jaemin!

I CANNOT believe my sweet baby boy is 5 already!  My youngest child is actually 5!  He has been such a blessing for the past 4 years and 3 months we've known him.  We have not done any cake yet.  We will be having grandparents, etc. over next weekend and he'll get to blow out his candles then.  He did want biscuits and gravy for his birthday dinner, so that's what Brian made tonight and I made a quick stop at the store to get his orange juice.  We gave him his birthday present too.  He needed to have something to open ON his birthday.  He liked the Duck Dynasty blanket okay.  I really thought he would love it since he loves anything Ducky Dynasty, but it didn't quite strike him yet.  He LOVED the Ninja Turtle color book best.  Go figure, the $1 color book!  But he's happy and he's made happy easily.  What more could you love in a boy.

I took this picture this morning of my 2 birthday kids.  Chelsi's birthday is tomorrow, but we won't be home together as a family until Saturday, so we're going to have her cake and ice cream then.

Happy Birthday Haebinah!

Kaelin was born 11 years ago on the island of Jeju in South Korea.  Today, she is a young lady and very much looks like one.  I hope she continues to grow into the person she has already become.  Happy Birthday Kaelin!  My kids are so lucky.  They're loved here and half way across the world.  I know that the adoption agency personnel love all of my kids because we're all family now.  I could tell when we visited.  I'm sure there's another woman in Korea who's a little sad right now.  If only she knew how much love she found.

Laidback kinda holiday

Unless doing something with friends we're pretty laidback for holidays and don't whoop it up a lot.  The older ones weren't really interested in going into town to watch fireworks, so we just grilled some burgers and had lemonade and corn on the cob.  We did think Jaemin would love the corn, but turns out he's not a big fan of it still on the cob.  We made some waffles and had our frozen yogurt and strawberry preserved on top, later.  Pretty nice, relaxing day.  We may do some fireworks this weekend or we may not......going to be a lot hotter.
Cole had an appointment for his orthodontist.  Looks like he'll still have them on when he starts school. He wants them to move just a little bit more.  We didn't pay for a perfect bite, but he's going to end up with one.  Lucky Cole.
Only Chase had cavities this year.  I told him I could tell he wasn't brushing as much as he should have, but he didn't listen 'cause don't you know it, moms know nothing.  Eye roll here.  The rest of our teeth were good.  Chelsi just has to go back for sealants to protect her teeth.  Of course Brian had to hear the dentist brag about my dental health the whole time he looked at his teeth.  There's something to be said about good genes.  Kaelins teeth have straightened out with age, so no braces.  Glad I didn't listen to him last year when he said to put them on her.  All 3 of my youngest babies have good enamel.  Yay!  As always the dentist shows mercy to this private paying family and the bill wasn't too awful.

Late Easter Pic

Brian took most of them, so they're blurry, but we did have some.  I just didn't want to focus on pictures.  It's too hard to just enjoy sometimes.

Christmas 2012

As with every family holiday there are some fighting with the stress.  Last night was Brian's grandmas with all the aunts and cousins. I sort of dread it just for it's uncomfortableness.  It's just a different environment for me to handle.  No one's really rude or anything like that; it's just me.  We left shortly after dinner so we could go to the local church.  The first song was Away in a Manger which Jaemin had just learned at daycare.  He belted out every word as loud as he could and you could hear him above everyone.  It was pretty cute.

Today was our laid back Christmas Day.  Since B isn't coming home with E until tomorrow we're not having my side's Christmas until this weekend.  That meant we only had to go to Brian's mom and dad's this morning and then come home for naps and have the day to ourselves to kick back.  We did the same thing we did last year and just ate junk food and played games and watched movies.  We had cheesecake, wings, toasted ravioli, little smokies, shrimp and carrots for health.  :)  Tonight we decided to have ice cream sundaes to top it all off.  We squeezed in Home Alone (kind of a tradition with the kids) and watched Jaemin's new Christmas present from his grandma, Madagascar 3. We played a round of Headbands and 2 rounds of Apples to Apples.  They had a REALLY great time playing games and we had a ton of laughs.  I wish I had pictures of everyone wearing their headbands, but decided it was time to focus on us and not in the back taking pictures.

They all got really fun gifts and though it's still not as spoiled as some kids they were really good with them all and are very thankful.  So far, from us, and 3 grandparents they got iPods, the cases for them, tons of games (Apples to Apples, Headbands, Hungry Hungry Herd, Thomas Trouble, etc.), Madagascar 3, Brave, Barbie stuff, Dance games for the Wii, Bass Pro gift cards, hunting stuff and books.  Their iPods have all been updated, synced and are ready for their play.  The girls may have gotten used iPods (handmedowns), but they know enough to know they're fortunate to have those.

I'm thankful to have thankful kids.  They told me they had a really good time today and that's the memories I want for them.  It wasn't the gifts that made the fun, we opened them last night.  It was the playing games together and eating together that made them have fun.  Cole even mentioned the food we were eating wasn't anything I would normally ever buy.  I said I know.  He said "that's what makes this special."  You got it!

It was nice.  Here they are today....happy and healthy.

Happy Halloween 2012

The kids made a HAUL!  Since there was a football game tonight people were trying hard to get rid of their candy (us included).  I'm going to stop buying more than 1 bag of candy to give out because we only get enough for about a 1/2 a bag.  But, Jaemin finally got into it and had fun.

Happy Easter!

Easter is sort of a new start, so I prayed for God to give me patience and more kindness this morning.  I know I need to work on something myself.  The qualities I'm not always the proudest of.

The kids have enjoyed Easter so far.  Last night was chicken dinner at one grandmas.  It was nice except the moment I was about to go off on someone.  I know this will offend some, but I'm sorry.  Think about it slowly and realize that other people have rights too.  You can smoke.  You can do that to your body and though it's wrong you can subject your own children to it.  But, you CANNOT subject my kids to it.  I have kids with health concerns or were born with issues that could make smoking exposure more harmful.  You do NOT hang around my kids when there are plenty of other places for your body to be a wave a cigarette around them.  I counted to ten more than once, but I will not do it again.  This is NOT one of my qualities I will work on.  I can judge you for smoking around my kids when they are little.

This morning the kids behaved relatively well in church.  Even Jaemin...surprise.  Brian had a little baggie with cereal towards the end and that helped.  Yet it was late enough the sugar didn't kick in until after church.  I decided on the way home we should start our own little tradition and let the kids go to the store and pick out whatever kind of donuts they want and eat that when we got home.  They've never gotten to do that before and really liked it.  Jaemin picked out one with blue icing.  He was a pretty darn happy camper.  Easter bunny brought Jaemin a bowling set and since Jaemin loves bowling this was perfect for him.  The girls got hair bands, hair ties and socks.  Hello Kitty is still super big in our house.  The big boys got fishing lures.  And then there was chocolate!  No one has touched it yet....too many donuts.

Grandma's house....hunting....or in Cole's case directing Jaemin.

Hunting at home.

Hauling it all back upstairs.  Poor Jaemin had to have mom's help for his load.

Easter Donuts and afterward.

And apparently after some really sugary donuts and little sister leaving all of her hair ties and hair bands in the chair, big brother gets bored and pretty.

Here are the last pictures from Great Grandma's house this evening.  More fun....too much food and too many sweets.  Jaemin is WOUND up!!

Kaelin helped Jaemin and mostly he stopped to eat.

They looked up and down.

Such a nice day for a quiet Christmas

We had our quiet Christmas for the first time and it was different, but nice.  We had breakfast at Brian's mom and dads and then came home.  Jae finally took his nap and while he did that Cole, Chase, Kaelin and I played Monopoly that they got for Christmas.  Then we started snacking on our unhealthy holiday snackfeast.  We had so much junk food, but the kids enjoyed it.  Then, since grandma went to New York to see B, grandpa came and spent the evening with us, snacking some more and playing Catch Phrase.  Kaelin is HILARIOUS playing this game.  I wish I would have video taped that, but dang she was also pretty good at it even if she didn't know what something was.

Jaemin got a battery powered 4 wheeler as his gift for Christmas.  I almost forgot about it....how could I it was pretty much the only thing he got and the big thing was blocking us from getting in our closet for a week.  We let him try it out, in the dark, at 8 pm last night.  He and I had to stay home from Brian's grandparents because Jaemin has had a cold for about a week and started running a fever last night.  We didn't want to get anyone sick, so he and I got him a Happy Meal with Alvin (the Chipmunks) in it.  He LOVED Alvin and the lady at McDonalds was nice to enough to hunt it down for me so he could be happy on Christmas Eve.  We actually just watched Pollyanna together and then started the Sound of Music.  So, back to the 4 wheeler.  Because Jaemin didn't get to go bye-bye with the other kids we decided to let him go outside to ride his 4 wheeler (motorcycle he calls it) before he went to bed.  Oh my.  I've never seen any kid SO happy let alone my little sweet pea Jaemin.  He never stopped smiling in the 20 minutes we were outside.  He would stand as he rode and yell "WWWEEEEEEE".  He was dangerous on that thing and we have to keep a super close eye on him until he learns to steer better, but wow was he a happy boy!

All of the kids got so many things between us, Santa and some of the grandparents so far.  They all had a great Christmas and it was nice to have it be a little different and less rushed, once.  I will never get Jaemin's face out of my mind from last night.  Oh, if I could have video taped him sweet face in the dark I would have; pure happiness!

The picture from today's 4 wheeler ride aren't near the same smile we got last night, but it's still so cute to see him getting around on that thing.  Oh yeah, those cute little animal sleeps masks were Kaelin's favorite gift....go figure.  And Chelsi and Kaelin are now convinced Santa exists because who else would know Chelsi's Korean name was JiYoung and put it on her doll's dress?

And dad snuck in a Christmas kiss on Jaemin's cheek.

What a blast that 4 wheelers was.