The Mergenthaler Family

I talk to plants. I know it's weird, but it doesn't feel weird when I do it. Last week, Makayla and I planted twenty-five raspberry stalks. Makayla handed me the plants one at a time. As I dug a new home for each of them, I said things like, "What a lovely day to join us here on Picadilly Road. You have nice strong roots. I'm going to make a home for you right here. Settle in. Keep growing. You're going to be so happy with us. Thank you for working hard to make us raspberries. I can't wait to see what you become." You know, positive affirmations and stuff like that. Makayla smiled at my words. I don't know if it was a my-mom-is-crazy smile or a I-wanted-to-do-that-but-thought-it-would-be-too-weird smile. When we were finishing up our work, Brooklyn joined us. She heard me talking, "Wow, you are just beautiful. I think you'll be happy right here next to your friends." "Who are you talking to, Mom?" "The plants." Brookly...

Wordpress notified me of a spike in blog traffic about a month ago. I didn’t think anything of until Sean came home from school and told me about the Sean Mergenthaler Fan Club. I’m not sure how it started. I know a lot of kids think Sean is dreamy. I mean, his long eyelashes, sparkling hazel eyes, white teeth, and dimple—he’s a looker. Somehow, one of this girl friends (not girlfriend) found our family blog. They scanned it for cute pictures of the cute boy. They sent the pics around to their friend group and joked about starting a fan club with the website, seanishot.com.  Since I don’t want to disappoint his adoring public, I’ll upload a few fun pictures of their object of affection: (Sean, if you read this, maybe my phone isn’t the best place to leave selfies. Hehe) Sean isn’t the only cute Mergenthaler. Let’s shine the spotlight on some other cute family members: We’re a pretty fantastic group, right? Can we count this as that birthday post I promised? Oh, I know! You should s...

The doctor asked Gavin if he likes to play in the snow. He said, “Ya, it’s lots of fun. I like sliding on ice. But sometimes I don’t like when the cold gets in my veins and it hurts so bad.” I haven’t felt like myself this winter. I’m sure it’s a combination of a lot of things, but maybe a good way to describe the combination of weather, stress, and medication changes is “cold in the veins.” It’s almost March and I have a million pictures languishing on my phone from Christmas and birthdays and other family fun. Since I stink at making photo books or printing pictures or backing up photos in general, but I value the memories, I’m going to throw a picture summary on here.  Part of my solo “adventure” parking in the crime riddled NYC neighborhood of Jamaica to make a flight out of JFK airport. I wrote about scary experience in my journal. I’m happy to be safe and alive and that our car wasn’t damaged or stolen.  I arrived home just after midnight on the 23rd after driving throug...