The Mergenthaler Family

Sometimes, my Mommy is too busy to feed me when I'm hungry.  That's not so bad because sometimes she's too busy to keep the floor clean, and I'm smart enough to put two and two together. Mmmmmm!  That chocolate animal cracker sure hit the spot!

Andrew's obsession with "The Little Pumpkin" has waned in favor of some more manly options: Although, just on Sunday, he went out to ride his bike with the pumpkin on, topped by a giraffe, topped by a poofy orange coat (and it was about 65 degrees). Grandma Mergenthaler, we got your package today!  The boys were so excited to take pictures in their new Halloween shirts.  Sean's funny face is because the boys wanted to make "scary faces."  This is what he does when he wants us to laugh at him. Before you look at the boys in their Halloween shirts, I want to to see a "before and after" of Sean's first hair cut.  His hair was getting pretty shaggy, but being his mom I didn't want to see it cut.  He does look much better now . . . if not more like Rick than he did before:

I thought we had a stalker visiting our blog.  A few weeks ago, we had a visitor from Ardmore, Alabama.  I didn't think much of it until Ardmore starting visiting every few days for a couple of weeks.  Who was this person?  Did I know them?  This mystery has been at the back of my mind for a few weeks.  I queried my Facebook friends, "Which one of you is from Alabama?" . . . . no answer . . . I posted on our blog, "If you are from Ardmore, and I know you, let me know." . . . no answer . . . Well, the mystery is solved!  I will tell you how the Mergenthaler Investigative Team put together the pieces, but it will take a little bit of explaining about how technology is used in our home.  We have a laptop computer and a desktop computer.  I usually use the laptop upstairs in the kitchen, but my e-mail is on the desktop computer in the basement.  Because I can "remote connect" the laptop to the desktop, I rarely go down to th...

I keep track of visitors on our blog for privacy issues.  Over the last couple of weeks, we have had a visitor from Ardmore, Alabama.  I thought I didn't know anybody there, but I could be wrong.  I know friends move all of the time.  If you are from Ardmore and I know you, let me know by leaving a comment.  Otherwise, this blog is going private in one week.  I will send out invites to those of you who I know are reading and who I have e-mail addresses for, but all of you other readers will have to request an invite. I'd really like to avoid the trouble of going private, so please speak up, Ardmore.

 I caught a few pictures of Emily playing football with the neighbor boys.  The last picture cracks me up.  I watched them play for a little while.  Emily would run the ball all over the place.  Of course, since the next oldest competitor is only eight years old, she was able to outrun them easily.  If, however, she found herself close to being tackled, she'd quickly pass the ball to somebody else and watch them get tackled instead.  That's my girl!

September and October of last year were no fun for Andrew.  He was in a spica cast from his belly button to his ankle.  Because of this, he couldn't take advantage of the activities that most two-year-olds love to do.  One of these activities that he so missed was dressing up.  Yes, boys dress up too, and this little boy is very particular about his wardrobe.  With the approach of Halloween, Andrew was extremely excited about getting out our Halloween costumes so that he could dress-up for Halloween.  He had been bugging me for a few weeks to get "Halloween" out.  I kept telling him, "It is still September.  We should wait until October."  So, he continued to look for evidence to support the fact that I should get out Halloween now .  His best evidences were found in the stores' Halloween displays and the fall decorations people were beginning to put out along our street. Last week, I gave up the argument and got out the box.  Eve...

Believe it or not, Andrew is old enough for preschool.  I am involved in a co-op with members of our church.  We have 5 boys and 2 girls, and all of them are very good kids.  In years past when I have taught preschool, I have often had a trouble maker or two.  All of these kids are great listeners and well-behaved most of the time.  We have preschool on Tuesdays and Thursdays for 2 hours.  Our first class was at our house.  The kids were kind of shy and nervous on their first day--you can tell this from their facial expressions in their "first day of school" picture. Now that we are a month into preschool, Andrew is getting the hang of it and likes to go.  At first he was wary of the experience.  He is not very social and likes to play independently.  In large groups, he gets very quiet.  Preschool has been a good avenue to help him be part of the group and participate in activities with friends. Last Thursday, we had our first f...