September

Football is upon us once more, and this time Erik has a new way of supporting his teams.  Since he's determined that whichever team he cheers for usually loses, he has started rooting for the opposition.  He has actually had some success so far...

Sam is a willing partner, in fact now he holds up the remote and asks for "fooball"

As a side note, we took Sam's binky away for good recently.  With Morgan we gradually cut up, bribed, or threw away all of her pacifiers and still had several days of trauma when the last one disappeared.  With Sam, I had him throw it away, no prep, no fuss, and he has never cried about it.  We couldn't believe it.

Morgan often passes on the football in order to read about herself.

 We got a hold of some Utah peaches and I bravely stepped into the world of canning by myself (by myself I mean I used my mother and sister-in-law shamelessly and kept the peaches all to myself).  We've been really missing the abundance of fresh produce that we took for granted before.

Another family outing to the zoo when Erik had a day off

Morgan has been so many times that she can actually "read" the map, and tell us where the smaller attractions are that aren't listed.  She's very serious about it.

Sam is finally recognizing and identifying animals, and the zoo is a whole new experience for him.  

I think I'm almost caught up now - until I get behind again, that is.

And on to August

We all piled in last minute to satisfy Erik's need for football by going to the Cardinals preview game.  Cause it's FREE.

This is the complimentary photo they took of us.  Now you've had a sneak peak of our epic Christmas card.

Ah, Home Depot day.  All of Morgan's creations are still painted pink, but at least the craftsmanship is getting better.

Happily modeling new duds.  This girl loves clothes.

Demonstrating her new winking ability

Behind the scenes at our family photo shoot.  All of us trying to get the kids to smile is a much better picture.

All out of ice cream and begging for more. I knew he was mine.

If you need to wash out the kiddy pool, wait til the kids are asleep.  Otherwise you get this: fully clothed swimmers that eventually turn into nudists.

July in Pictures

Finishing out our trip to Utah 

Yeah, this happened.  Church basketball is evil.  Then we paid $400 to find out it would heal on its own. We didn't take any pictures of my reaction.

The never-ending 4th of July parade in weather I swear is hotter than AZ

Sam was less excited when he got blasted by the water cannon at the end. Seriously, who thinks its funny to hose down a 1-year old?

Sam revived when we lit fireworks - in fact, he clung to Andrew and said "more!" when it was time to go home.  Morgan was asleep inside the house because she's afraid of fireworks.  Really. I'm not sure that she can be counted a Merkley anymore.

Playing with friends

Visiting old stomping grounds (and trashing the USU bookstore)

Aggies all the way

Teachin' em young

4 generations of Merkley men while visiting Grandpa Merkley in rehabilitation

Torturing my nephew.  This will be blackmail someday.

A little drunk driving

But never fear, we got them sobered up for church

AZ + July = lots of swimming.  It's all you can do outdoors.

And Sam and his fat belly are loving it.

Just to end on an adorable note.

Lake Powell

We went to Lake Powell with family at the end of June.  It is now October.  Don't dwell on it.

Yes, Morgan actually rode on this tube, going about 2 miles an hour, holding on to me.  But she did it, which shocked us all.

Our lovely houseboat

This is what happens when you try to give the kids a bath in the lake.

"I've been waiting all my life to go to Lake Powell!"

This is how Sam looked much of the time, hence the bath.

But really, he loved the water as long as there wasn't soap involved.

The kids were pretty awestruck that Dad could do this

Best time of his brief life

See you again in October - oh wait, we couldn't because the politicians were throwing tantrums and closed a LAKE. We contemplated sending hate mail, but they'd probably just shut down the post office.