This Thanksgiving Weekend

we had our second round of Thanksgiving, this time with a roast beast instead of turkey. And this time I actually remembered to make our little friend, Thankful Tom Turkey.

The girlies were able to write their own (both said their family, and that was totally unprompted), Porter said the TV, but I think he meant to tell me that he was watching the TV and not to stand in front of it and ask him silly questions. My Dad hadn't written on his yet, but later he added, "RaNae". Awwww....



Adi-Baby made the place cards, and added a single feather to every plate.

**How do you like our oh-so-classy-paper-towell-napkins? Only the truly chic people have them**



I skipped out of early-morning Black Friday shopping this year *phew* due to the early-morning parade the girlies were in.

So here are my oh-so-handsome men watching the fire truck go by. No, you can't see the truck, but can you see the worried brow on Porter-Pot's face? He was a bit scared of the sirens.

And I'm pretty sure OP was more excited over the trucks than Porter.



As the girlies came marching up, they were both shaking their thangs to Part In The U.S.A. As soon as Miss Pipes saw us, she dropped her arms and GLARED.

Apparantly she didn't much like participating in a parade in 30 degree weather.


Here's my boys again. Have I mentioned how much I love these dudes?



Here is Nana.

She was cold.



Right after I snapped this pic, Piper burst into tears.

Poor baby- but after some cookies she felt all better (so much like her Momma).





When we got home, I left with my Momma to see what was left of the Black Friday sales.

Not much.

But we went to Kohls, where we had a $10 off if you spend $20 coupon, plus a 15% off coupon AND the Early Bird sale prices were still on. So, yeah, we rocked them.


Later, I was mocking OP because he had to go out in the cold and put up Christmas Lights, as he promised (apparantly he has never read the "CONTAINS LEAD" warning on the light boxes).




And then he said that I had to help him (meaning untangle the cords and clean up the broken bulbs).

Yeah, I wasn't super happy about that.



And here is what happens when OP gets too impatient to wait for our neighbor's extra-tall ladder.

He turns into a monkey.










He survived, and I survived, but Porter did suffer a smashed thumb from the girls toppling his car over onto him.

And then we had leftovers for dinner (Porter had cereal- yep, he's still that picky).

The end.

Gobble, Gobble

My lil' Whitney came up here to the freezin' cold state to celebrate Thanksgiving a bit early with us all.

Well, to be honest, she came up to see the New Moon premier with our Momma and me, and we happened to squeeze in a little turkey.

Anywho, here's a few shots of our early Thanksgiving:



Nana and the kiddos:


Me and Whit, rockin' matching sweaters



The fam. It was a bit difficult getting a group shot all the five of us, but this was the best that we could get.


And here is Porter's impersonation of Papa when you pull out the camera...


I think that we're going to have another mini-dinner on the real Thanksgiving, with ham instead of the turkey (we are currently drowning in leftover turkey).

But I will probably be spending most of Thursday drawing up my plan of attack for Black Friday.

Oh, yes, I am so hitting the sales.

It's snow, baby!

From the second that the first flake fell, there were three little ones around here that kept begging to go out and play in it.

Now, OP and I kept putting it off- not because we're fun-suckers (which we just might be a bit), but because we knew that playing in the snow entails thirty minutes of prepping (otherwise known as getting the kids dressed in the cold-weather gear), five minutes of play, and then twenty minutes of undressing.

We finally gave in.

Poor Miss Adi, her mommy buys all of her clothes at least two sizes too big.



Mr. Porter Pot just plain enjoyed being outside.


Why are the girls hiding behind the lil' jungle gym thingy?


That's why:


And yes, five minutes after going outside, they were begging to come in and warm their freezing rumps up by the fire.

But hey, that's all part of being a cold-weather parent, right?

One year ago today...

I have been neglecting my camera the past few days.

Having three sick kids, three trips to the doc's office in a week, and trying to remember three different antibiotic schedules has really drained me of any effort to do anything extra-curricular.

So I opened up my old photo files and looked up what we were doing exactly one year ago today.


Adi and Pipes played in the freezing cold snow.

Porter apparently decided to wear his food all over his clothes (oh. my. goodness. I had forgotten just how stinkin' adorable his curly blond locks were).

And I decided it would be fun to annoy OP while he played Warcraft.

So, nothing much has changed.

The Sickies

We are officially down at this house.

Nope, not the swine flu.

{Not yet, anyway}

Nope. We are starting our own fad. Strep and impetigo.

Awesome, I know.

What is impetigo? That sore on Piper's lip... yeah that's what it is.

Now Adi has strep, and Porter Pot has a runny nose- no sign of strep yet.

So that is what the Merrills are doing this week. Eating popsicles and ice cream and watching a lot of Disney movies.

Losing Teeth

It had become an obsession with her.

She had yet to lose any teeth, while her classmates had teeth raining down out of their mouths.

There were many tears involved in the whole thing.

And then, three days ago, right before dinner, Adi gave a triumphant shout (no joke).

"MY TOOTH IS LOOSE!!"

She worked hard on getting it to loosen every waking moment of the day.

And yesterday, that baby was ready to be pulled...






Papa offered Adi $5 to let him pull it out.

She held out for $10.



And then, disaster struck.

The tooth was lost last night right before bed.

Adi was sobbing. How would the tooth fairy come if there wasn't a tooth for her to take?

I was at the store when this all happened and OP, who is unfamiliar with the whole tooth fairy thing, told her that she would just leave 75 cents instead of a dollar if there was no tooth.

Which, of course, increased Adi's broken-hearted sobs.

I came home and set her straight.

Mommy and Daddy would scour the house after she went to bed, find the tooth, and slip it under her pillow just in time for the tooth fairy.

Of course, I didn't actually find the tooth (do you know how little that thing is?).

But, the fairy came...






"This is the straightest dollar ever!" she exclaimed this morning.

And it was too. Fresh and crisp.

And now I'm a bit worried about Adi stumbling on the tooth somewhere...

This little boy gave us a scare last night

Mr. Porter Pot has a little bit of asthma.

Usually we have no problems with it.

But when P.G. gets a cold (like he has now) and goes to sleep (like he did last night) it tends to flare up.

Last night about 1 am (why does everything happen at that time?), Porter came barking in our room, gasping for breath.

OP (who is asthmatic as well) was out of bed in a flash and ran him into the bathroom. He turned on the shower as hot as it can go and held Porter while urging him to take deep breaths.

I, on the other hand, ran around like a chicken with it's head cut off.

Oh yeah, I am way awesome under pressure.

Slowly (after a blessing) Porter started taking deeper, longer breaths, Orrin stopped shaking, and I stopped running into walls. I held my baby boy and fought to keep him calm and not start crying (me, not him).

This morning he is back to terrorizing his sisters and I am back to thanking my lucky stars that he is doing better and that my hubby can keep a cool head in scary situations.

That way, I can loose my head as I see fit.

I am that nerd

that you see in the grocery store buying these:



Oh yes.

I am so Team Jacob.


Although I did buy two Edward boxes for my momma and sister.


But I am still pro-Jacob all the way (I just pretend Breaking Dawn never happened).

Oh, and did I mention a mere 15 more days?

This is Halloween

The meal:

Momma's homemade chili, I fried up some scones, spider cake, popcorn balls, candy popcorn... yum.

Then we went Trick-or-treating. I'm pretty sure Piper was digging it. She also was smart enough to wear a coat.

Adi refused, saying that she had on long sleeves and didn't need it. Well, she did. She was the first to say that she wanted to go home.

Porter was so excited over the knock-and-get-candy thing. Everytime he'd get something new in his bag, he'd run to OP and yell, "Dad! More treats!"

But this little spillage happened about twenty five times last night. No exaggeration.

Did I mention how much Pipes enjoyed trick or treating?

We then went home and watched Monsters, Inc. while inspecting the goods.

Porter shoved about thirty seven pieces of candy into his mouth before we could wrestle the bag away from him.

We found out that our neighborhood gives out really good candy... and cans of pop.

Piper was trying to count her candy, but kept getting distracted by the TV.

And here is the vulture, err, daddy "inspecting" their treats (meaning he's eying what he's gonna take out once the kiddos go to bed).

One Spooky Afternoon

In September I told the girlies that they could have a Halloween Tea Party with their friends.

And then I promptly forgot all about it.

Until last week when Miss Adi reminded me.

And reminded me.

And reminded me.

So, here is what I threw together in three days:

The place settings (and I spelled half of the girls' names wrong on the pumpkins).

Dried Zombie tongues, or chocolate-dipped Pringles. I used a lot of karo syrup and sprinkles to get the candied look around the bowls, plates and cups.

Frankenstein's bolts, or chocolate dipped marshmallows. There was a lot of dipping going on the day before :)

Spider bread with cheesy dip. Hardly any of the girls would even try this, and I had made two bug loaves. I really upset over this since I had to have great control not to eat the bread myself after I had made it the day before.

And the witches brew (sprite with green food coloring). After I poured some into their cups, I came around and sprinkled a very little bit of petrified bat wings (kool aid mix). This had an awesome (and totally unexpected) reaction of bubbling...

The prom queen,

and the vampire bride (who refused to wear her veil).

And here's the thank yous to give out...


And now Adi is already planning next year's event.