Gobble Gobble

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone! The holiday was a busy and festive one here at the McElroy household. Amazingly, we served dinner on time, everything was delicious, and the kids played happily together all day. We were joined for dinner by Nona, Mr. Vic Victor, Papa Pat, Urban, Austin, and the entire White clan. Here is a photo of the feast.

And here is Wolf thoroughly enjoying his turkey leg.

Imogen got all dressed up for the occasion, wearing her very first dress.

We had a fantastic visit with the Whites this weekend. The kids had a blast, and Imogen loved meeting her cousins and Uncle Greg (she was already well acquainted with her Aunt Tess, aka the baby whisperer). Here is Greg doing some baby whispering of his own.

Baby Imogen was especially popular with the girls. Here she is being admired by Willow and Erin.

And finally, here is more proof that the kids all had a fantastic time together. Elliot sure does love playing with his cousins!



We hope everyone had a lovely holiday. We're thankful to have all of you wonderful family and friends in our lives.

Cuter by the Double

These are some seriously cute kids we've got here. We are anxiously awaiting the arrival of the Whites today for a fun-filled Thanksgiving weekend. Until then, here are some new pictures for you to enjoy. Have a wonderful holiday!



Eat lots of sweet potatoes and check back for Thanksgiving pictures soon!

Imogen's Making an "A"

One of Elliot's least endearing activities these days is to climb all over me and Imogen while we're nursing. He was doing this very thing yesterday while Imogen was starting to get frustrated and cry, and I was starting to get frustrated and cry myself. Just at the point when I thought I couldn't take it anymore, Elliot said, "Imogen's making an 'A'!". I looked down at her hands, and sure enough, her frustrated little fist was in a perfect sign language "A". How do these tiny people know just how to melt your heart and when?

At preschool, the kids watch a video called Signing Time. We tried to get Elliot to use sign language when he was so late in talking, but he never took to more than a couple of signs ("eat", "milk", and "more" - can you tell what his priorities were?). Murphy's Law, now that he talks non-stop, he loves sign language. His favorite signs are the alphabet, because they allow him yet another way to spell - his favorite activity (aside from hassling Mama and Imogen while nursing, of course). I guess we'll be teaching Idgie sign language now so she can talk to her brother!

Here are a couple of cute videos of the kiddos for you. First, Elliot engaged in another favorite activity - watching Feist's "1234" video on YouTube. Then there's Imogen with the hiccups. What's more adorable than a baby with hiccups?



Hope y'all are having a lovely autumn. We've been enjoying the long Indian summer we're having here in Portland, and so is our cat, Rufus.

Now go rake some leaves!

Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween! On Tuesday, Elliot and Mama carved the two pumpkins we brought home from the pumpkin patch a couple of weeks ago. Here is Rufus posing with the "scary jack-o-lantern" and the "happy jack-o-lantern".

We decorated the front porch with lights, scary skeletons, a thunder machine (thanks, Atman!), a strobe light (thanks again, Atman!), our jack-o-lanterns, and scary music in anticipation of many trick-or-treaters in our new neighborhood. Alas, we only had about 6 or 7 batches of kids. Ah well, more candy for us!

Despite losing one of our real chickens earlier in the week (RIP Dottie - Dixie is now all by herself and looking pathetic since she is molting - we hope she makes it through the winter), we had a very chicken-oriented Halloween. Elliot was a chicken, and Imogen was a baby chick. Here they are in all their poultry cuteness.






We took Elliot trick-or-treating for the first time. He liked ringing bells, but was a bit unclear on the whole concept. At one house, he inspected the candy, decided it wasn't worth his while, and set it back down on the doorstep. By the end of the few blocks he had figured it out, though. Here we are headed out into the night.



And here is Elliot eating his Mike-and-Ikes. He doesn't like chocolate, so it was nice that he got one thing he could enjoy. Yum, yum!

Hope y'all had a great Halloween. Boo!!