Goodbye 2011

Last night us Merrills had a rockin' New Years Eve party at home with just the six of us.  Even Mr. Wyatt was awake for 20 minutes of it!


What kind of New Years would it be without food?

I had the girlies plan the food and this is what they wanted... except for the kabobs.  Those were OP's request.  Those mini pepperonis were a huge hit.

**Thanks Zach and Marissa for the popcorn cups- as you can see they've already been put to use**

We then had to wait for Daddy to get home from work at 8:15 (the kids had it all timed perfectly) for the party to start.

 We ate junk food and watched Netflix till he made his appearance.

After OP got home I let the kiddos dive into their party bags (while the breadwinner showered).

This bag of complete New Years fun included noisemakers, glow sticks, masks, necklaces, poppers and a Twix bar.  Yes, I am the most fantastic mother in the whole world.  Thank you.

They all got fancied up.

Adi took her stuff off right after the pic,

Porter kept taking them off and then reapplying all night (he thought he was a superhero when he had them on)

Pipes was the only one who actually wore the whole she-bang till bed time.

We had some fun outside with the glow sticks.

It was right about this time that Mr. Wyatt awoke.  It might have had something to do with the kiddos getting their noisemakers...

He wanted to eat.

And eat

He's learned that when Mom sticks her camera in his face he will soon be blinded by a bright flash of light.  So he automatically makes this face.

I then resort to trickery to get a pic with his eyes open.

Back to the party: once Daddy got all cleaned up, we cracked into our mountain of games to play.

OP and Adi played dominoes.

**Like those baskets of laundry in the background?  Yeah, they're pretty much always there.  Different clothes, same old baskets**


This is Orrin telling me that if I post this picture of him on my blog he'll break my camera.

Challenge accepted.

Piper and Porter played our new Rio Party Game they got for Christmas on the Wii. 

Yeah, there was a lot of yelling going on in this room.

I got Wyatt ready for bed and tried to get a decent picture of him.

He was tired, teething and just plain angry.

So he got his baba, blanket and binki and was put to bed.

Doesn't he look like he's wondering why the heck is Mom still in here with her stupid camera?

The kiddos and I played the marble game.

This marble game is a super elite game that only the coolest of the cool know about.  And even less have played it.

We all then played Don't Eat Pete! with M&Ms.

And then Uno.

This is the face OP makes when Adi plays a draw four card on hime.

It was 10 o'clock when this game ended and I had had a very long day full of Walmart and Fry's shopping expeditions, laundry, cooking, cleaning, teething baby... so I declared it to be midnight.  I am the party pooper.

We went outside and threw poppers at each other  the sidewalk.

See the flashes of light?  Sweet!

Then we lit up some sparklers.

and wrote our names in the air

(to this day I still feel as giddy as I did when I was 8 years old when you hand me a sparkler)

Porter got a little scared of his when it started to burn low.  So he threw it at Orrin.

I laughed till I cried watching Orrin do ninja moves to avoid being caught on fire.

Then we went in, tucked the kiddos in bed, and I fell asleep on the couch watching ID Disappeared. 

Not such a great show to watch when your hubby works the kind of schedule mine does.

Anywho, happy 2012 people!  I hope this year is as full of adventure, fun and excitement as the last one!