The Mergenthaler Family

We have a very talented young woman who lives at our house.  She keeps our family organized by writing everything on a calendar on the wall and checking it often.  She makes great meals even though she actually doesn't love to cook or bake all that much.  She spends at least an hour each day helping the children with homework and doing extra academic activities with them to help them in areas they are struggling.  She manages to keep her head in stressful situations (most of the time).  She is a great nurse (although not very symptathetic) and has a knack for figuring out what ails each family member and finding what will help them to get well.  She keeps our house clean and sanitary only because cleaning a bathroom is less distasteful that using a dirty bathroom.  Sometimes she suprises me by all that she accomplishes in a single day.  Did you know this young lady is handy with a tool set too?  Well, it's true!  She knows how ...

One night when Rick was at work or out of town, we entertained ourselves by putting on our own American Idol tryouts.  I think this was Makayla's idea.  The kids dressed up and performed or impersonated the judges, Jennifer Lopez and Randy, by saying, "I'm sorry, Baby, not this time." or "That was great, Dawg!" My favorite contestant was a little boy with a dimple and an afro hairdo . . . "Seanny" was the best singer and had the grooviest dance moves.  The other contestants paled in comparison. Though Sean is cuter than a button, he is certainly a lot of trouble lately.  His fascination with the bathrooms has grown exponentially over the past few weeks.  His favorite toy is the toilet.  In order to avoid some unsanitary situations, we have two bathroom rules: "Always flush!" AND "Close the door."  Unfortunately, the kids are forgetful and I am often in the bathroom cleaning up a mess. I feel like I always have to know exactl...

Sean celebrated his 1st birthday on February 1st.  Because we were on an airplane plane to Disney World that day, we celebrated his birthday (along with Makayla's) on the Sunday before we left. One of Sean's favorite foods is macaroni and cheese, so his birthday dinner was easy to make and all of the kids liked it.  After dinner, we opened presents.  He likes things that light up and make noise.  So we got him a little bear that sings and wiggles its ears.  We also got him new pacifiers.  I think he is our first baby since Emily that loves "binkies".  Usually by the time our babies hit one year I have broken them of the binkie habit, but Sean is a little tougher.  I don't like kids to be sucking on a pacifier when they should be talking.  I have tried to make the rule that he can only have his binkie at bed time or in the car, but I haven't been great at enforcing it.  Birthday cake was after presents.  He liked the ca...

I often have more to write about than time to write it.  As a result, I haven't been updating our blog as often as I used to.  Rick mentioned to me that I may be losing readers because my posts are sparse, lengthy and not very funny.  It's true that I'm probably tyring to cram too much in on the rare occassion that I write.  If you find reading our blog boring, I'm sorry.  Maybe I'm just not funny anymore.  Oh well, at least I'm putting up some cute pictures of the kids for grandparents and family to see and that's what really matters to me.  To reduce the length of this post, I'm not going to write about Andrew's recent preschool field trips or our birthday celebrations.  I'll skip right to our Disney trip.  If I come back another day to write about the other things, you'll see some really cute pictures, but don't count on it.  I'll be lucky to get this one finished. Our flight to Orlando this time was out of the Des Mo...

Oh, what do you do in the winter time when all the world is white?  (and cold) Really, how do we manage to keep busy children entertained through the cold winter months?  Well, honestly, they do essentially the same thing they would any other time of year--play outside. One benefit of living in  a winter climate is snow.  Playing in the snow provides hours of entertainment if the temperature outside is not too cold.  For my friends on the west coast, "too cold" means less than 15 degrees or "too windy" which makes it "too cold."  We have had a mild winter thus far, and we didn't really have snow to play with until Christmas Eve.  Since then, the kids have enjoyed sledding in the backyard, making snowmen, and building snow forts.  Best of all, they are old enough and independent enough to be playing outside in the cold without me.  I stay inside with Sean. A few weeks ago, we had perfect weather for building snowmen and snow forts....