A bit late

I'm a little late on posting some Christmas festivities, but these pictures are too cute to pass by. Gavin's firm puts on a great Santa party and we had so much fun at it this year. Emery was quite the site in her little Christmas tutu and leg warmers my mom sent her. And the Santa and Mrs. Claus were AMAZING. They did magic tricks, talked to all the kids about kindness and being good, and gave them little stockings full of candy and toys. It was a great party. 

Here's Emery with Mrs. Claus, just trying to take it all in:

 Here she is on Santa's lap. She didn't scream or cry, which I was glad about, but she wasn't exactly happy either. She just sat there trying to figure out if she should scream or laugh or just get away.

I wanted a few better shots of her outfit. She looked so cute! 

If you notice behind Santa and Mrs. Claus is a big glass wall. Some people were in that conference room eating and others were out sitting on Santa's lap. Emery was inside the room and decides to stick her face on the glass and starting blowing out her cheeks on the glass to the people on the other side. It was HILARIOUS and I wish I had a picture of it. A few people tried to take some with their phones but I never found out if they turned out or not. She's such a little ham!

Christmas craft

For Christmas this year I decided to make a ruffle tote I found online for my nieces.  It's a simple canvas bag with no-sew ruffles, which is perfect for me since I don't own a sewing machine yet. They were really easy to make and I'm excited how well they turned out. 

You can find the tutorial for it here: ruffle tote

Scary Night

On Monday night I had a nightmare. You know the ones that don't go away even after you've been awake for hours? I had one of those.

In my dream we were asleep and woke up to our security system going off because someone was in the house. He was upstairs in Emery's room (don't know how I knew that in the dream but I did) and Gavin went to go find him while I sit there freaking out, trying to call 911. Then I see him go out the back door and we rush out there and he's hopped the fence and is running across the empty lot behind our house. I start screaming at him to GET BACK HERE RIGHT NOW, and he turns around and says, "Are you serious?" but he listens and comes back (what? who does that? dream robber that's who). I then proceed to throw him to the ground and put him in this choke hold while yelling, "What did you to do my daughter?! Why were you in there?! What did you do?!" Then the cops come and take him away. As they are walking him to the car I start feeling all sad and run after him, give him a hug, and say, "Merry Christmas. I'm sad it all turned out this way" and I feel all bad for beating him up for breaking into MY HOUSE (don't get your hopes up would-be robbers, that's NOT happening in real life). He makes some threat about how this is just the beginning but I ignore it and just think how nice he is (blech, also not happening). Then I end up at school and I'm super scared because I never checked on Emery during all of that and I don't know if she's ok. It's a stupid dream, but I woke up TERRIFIED with the "nightmare goosebumps" that won't let you relax and the heebie-jeebies that stuck around all morning long.

Since then I have been turning on the security system at night. I usually don't worry about activating it but the dream freaked me out enough that I thought, why not? Last night the I re-lived the Monday nightmare, some of it anyway. Around 2:00 am I hear a siren going off, it's loud and I can't quite place it in my sleepiness. Gavin and I are stirring when I'm jolted awake as I realize, IT'S THE HOUSE ALARM. FOR REAL. "Gavin, it's the house!" We both jump out of bed and he rushes to the box to see where the breach is while the siren's screams fill the house. I run to the stairs, looking frantically around when Gavin shuts off the alarm and I hear wind blowing fiercely outside. The wind was blowing so strong it blew open a door that wasn't shut all the way, setting off the alarm. No robber for me to wish a Merry Christmas to this time, thank goodness.

Needless to say we were quite shaken up. It did make me think about our "game plan" though and what we would do in the event of a break-in. As terrifying as it was I think I'm actually grateful it happened as a "practice run" so if it ever happens for real (pray that it never does) I won't make the mistakes I made this time.

Kind of a downer-post...but Merry Christmas!...and have a game-plan. :)

Helloooooooo

I could talk for hours about things I love about Emery and all the cute things she does, but I try not to go on too long because no one cares as much as Gavin and I do. :) I will mention one thing she is awesome at and that is playing by herself. Some days she wants to just follow me around all day and be super sad if I am not constantly paying attention to her, but those days are few. As soon as she learned to climb up the stairs she would climb up there and play in the toy room for 30-45 minutes, sometimes an hour, all by herself. It's AMAZING! I can cook dinner, blog, read, or do whatever I want, completely uninterrupted. If things get eerily quiet I'll poke my head up there to check on her, and if she sees me she'll just smile, say a few jibberish words and keep on playing. 

It really makes my life easier. I love it. 

As fearless as she is in climbing up the stairs, she is scared to come down them by herself. This is good and bad. Good because she tends to play longer up there because she thinks she's stuck, and bad because when she is done playing she will just sit up there and yell until I come help her down. She used to just come to the railing and stare me down like this:

That's when she was patient about it, but now she just yells. It's funny though, because she knows how to climb down the stairs, I've taught her to turn around and go down on her belly and once I get her first leg going she will go down the whole way by herself. It's just that first initial step that makes her nervous. But we keep practicing and she's getting better at it. Maybe she can make that her New Year's Resolution: go down the stairs without mom's help.

My favorite Christmas poem

The following is one of my favorite Christmas poems. My mom used to read it to us and I love the message it brings. I found the poem and picture here.

From Santa with Love ~ by Michelle Davis

A long time ago in a land far away,

A child was born on a cold winter’s day

He wasn’t the baby you’re thinking about

But another small lad, he stood short and stout

He grew up to be quite a caring old man

He loved little children, everyone in the land

He found the “Good Book” and studied its pages

It was the story of Jesus passed down through the ages

His heart overflowed as he read, could it be?

A love so divine that he died just for me?

A twinkle appeared in his eye on that day

He found a road straight to Heaven and Christ was the way

As Christmas came closer, his heart filled with joy

He’d show God’s people he loved them – every girl, every boy

He made lots of goodies and stocked up his shelves

Yes, Santa was busy and so were his elves

He was filled with such love, that he wanted to share

So he handed out gifts to kids everywhere

Praise be to God, let the Angels sing

For this jolly old man spreads love for the King

As he steps into the chimney, he looks high above

And whispers, "Happy Birthday Dear Jesus, from Santa with Love"

I tear up every time I read it. I love it because it puts into words what "Christmas Spirit" is--feeling the love of Christ in our own hearts so strongly that we desire to share that love with others. I also love it because it ties together Santa to the real meaning of Christmas. Of course I understand that Jesus is the reason for the season and celebrating Him is most important, but Santa is a good tradition that I, like most kids, LOVED growing up. And I still love it. When I was little and would ask my mom if Santa was real she would say, "Santa is the spirit of Christmas. He's the spirit of giving." And it's true, he is. The Santa tradition isn't just about "gimme this, gimme that", but it's about giving gifts to show how much we love others and as a symbol of the greatest gift ever given, the gift from Heavenly Father to us of His Son, Jesus Christ. A gift of which I am very grateful for. 

So Merry Christmas to all our family and friends, and Happy Birthday Dear Jesus, from the Girauds with love.

The Little Mermaid

"Look at this stuff, isn't it neat? Wouldn't you think my collections complete? Wouldn't you think I'm the girl...the girl who has EVERYTHING?"

Yesterday Emery was wandering around with this tupperware container, putting "treasures" into it. She brought it to me and the assortment of goodies she had found made me laugh. She was quite proud of her collection. 

I guess The Little Mermaid characteristics are in our genes because I remember my favorite thing to do when I was really little was put my legs in a pillowcase and pretend I was Ariel. Flopping around on the floor wasn't quite as graceful as swimming in the ocean, maybe I should have taken a play from Emery's book and just collected stuff.

Decorating

A week or two ago we finally put up our little gallery of pictures. It isn't finished yet, we have a few small spaces that I want to fill with some non-picture items, but it is nice to have something up on our walls. I couldn't believe what a difference it made to have that one wall put together. It feels so much more like a home!

This is in the hallway so I had to take the picture at an angle, but you get the gist of it. I am planning on posting a video tour soon, but I want to get a few more things done before I do. I will post one though! Our house is starting to come together, slowly yet surely. I'm really happy about it.