Henry is one!!

Henry's Tol was Saturday and it went really well. We decided to continue with our monkey theme for the party because James really wanted to make a special monkey cake for Henry. Fortunately we had several family members at our house the morning before the party. I know we couldn't have gotten it all done without them! It is traditional for a Tol party to have towers on the table made out of special rice cakes. We couldn't find any premade ones at the Korean market and decided it was best if we just made ours out of sandwich cookies instead. My mom and sister-in-law Debi patiently stacked the cookies for us. We served banana pudding to go with the monkey theme, and we also served goon mandu (Korean fried dumplings) with a homemade dipping sauce. Yum!

James gave Henry a large piece of his cake (it was an entire ear from the monkey), and that kid chowed down! He shoveled it in with obvious joy and ate every bite. There was mass destruction of both his party clothes and the high chair afterwards. My camera battery died just as he was getting super messy. When he had devoured every bit of cake, we took him and wiped him down with nearly a pack of baby wipes and then changed him into his hanbok. Oh, and he spit up quite a bit in the process, which wasn't surprising in the least.

Then we took him back to his guests so that he could perform the toljabee, which is where there are symbolic objects set in front of the baby for him to pick from. In this tradition, Koreans believe that the first object a baby picks will represent what he will become as an adult. The baby then selects another object and that has a secondary influence on the baby. We set the following items in front of Henry: 100 dollar bill (wealth), bow and arrow (brave/warrior), spool of thread (long life), cell phone (technology), baseball (athlete), book (scholar), Korean rice stick (wealth...yes, we had two money representations!). He immediately went right for the baseball and in that process grabbed the 100 dollar bill too. We decided he got the money by accident and let him chose something else. Not surprisingly he went for the rice stick. He is a little eater! So...it seems we have an athlete who will be quite wealthy (picked money twice!). I guess Daddy should start sharpening those athletic skills.

Following the toljabee it was time for presents, and believe me---there were GOBS of them! Gift bags, tissue paper, and toys were everywhere. Henry got so many fun things to play with.

Henry likes his cousin Coby (and the Wii too!).

His grandma gave him this. Very fun! Love the drooly shirt.

It turned out to be wonderful. Henry was on his best, cutest behavior and seemed to really enjoy having so much fuss made over him. It was wonderful sharing his special celebration with so many close family and friends!

I also want to add that we sold our house!! After going back and forth several times following the buyer's inspection, it's finally official! They close on Aug. 26, so we are trying to quickly make decisions about where we are going to live. I also am about to set my classroom up for this year (even though I'll take FMLA leave until November). Setting up my classroom involves lots of unpacking and preparation, which is really stressful when combined with the packing/moving to a new house. More to come about all of this on a later post.

First post-placement visit

We had our first post-placement visit with our social worker Saturday. Henry had an upset tummy, a shorter than normal nap, and was very fussy all day so we were a little concerned for how it would go. Fortunately, after some initial fussiness, he did very well. He was cruising around the furniture and even smiling at her. Then he charmed her by blowing a kiss, and that pretty much sealed the deal! Thank goodness he saved up his HUGE meltdown for a short while later as we were in the car coming home from the party supply store. Oh yeah...my kid is about to turn 1!!! We are having a Tol party for him next weekend, which is the traditional Korean 1st birthday celebration. You can learn more about it here: http://www.lifeinkorea.com/culture/tol/tol.cfm

I've had several people ask me about this lately, so I think I should explain that we have not adopted Henry yet. Korea allows families to finalize the adoptions in the US 6 months after receiving the child. In the meantime, however, we are required to have 3 post-placement visits with a social worker and complete monthly reports on his development/progress. At the end of 6 months we will go to a judge here and then Henry will "officially" become a Jesse!

Here are some new pictures of our little man:

Blowing kisses--the cutest thing ever!!

I took him to Barnes and Noble and let him play with the train set.

He was very excited about the books there too. Yay!

Mommy forcing some smooches upon him.

We took him to our favorite Korean restaurant for the first time and he loved the rice and Miso soup!

Doesn't he look like a man in that pose?