Dear Davis–6 Months

     I am not mentally prepared for this (even though I’ve had two and half extra weeks to be). Sweet baby Davis, you are six months old! Half a year! Basically an adult! You have learned so much just in the past couple of weeks. You have the most fun personality and love to smile at everything. I seriously find it hard to believe that we are getting ready for your first Christmas and watching you almost crawl around our house. We are certifiably obsessed with you!

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This month you are busy. So busy. You want to know every detail of everything. You are a people watcher and an observer, and you are loving life. You’ve learned lots of new sounds (yelling and tiny screaming and a strange oink/quack sound you make in your throat) and are showing them off in a big way. You haven’t mastered crawling, but you can rock and raise up on your hands and feet. In the past few days, you’ve taken on a sort of army crawl where you push forward with your knees and then fling yourself forward. Crawling is coming…our shelves are not safe.
I say it every month, but your personality is just the best! You are so happy and love people. You smile and laugh and jump any time someone talks to you, and it is just the sweetest! You met Santa (twice so far), and I think he’s your new bestie. You are definitely on the nice list.
You have loved being on a schedule this month and have been such a good baby! You are trying all sorts of new foods and love all people. We are in such a sweet spot right now. You love to play and learn new things, and we love watching you. We are so looking forward to your first Christmas. Just a few more days until Santa visits the McGuire house for the first time!

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Loves
All food
Sitting
Sophie the Giraffe
Jumping
Smiling

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This is your newest trick! You push across the floor with your knees (almost crawling but not quite) and then pull over anything you can get your hands around. Busy.

Stats
Length: 26 1/4
Weight: 16 lb. 12 oz.
Head: 90th percentile
Eating: 8oz every 3-4 hours and food with cereal twice a day
Sleeping: 7:00ish to 6:00ish and two or three naps

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Be still my heart! The girls had these dresses last year, and when I saw this sweet John John, I knew it had to be yours! This was also your first time to wear shoes…for about 10 minutes. I wish December had 20 Sundays so you could wear this 20 times!

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We went to Family Worship Night at church to watch the girls, and you loved it! You stayed up way past your bedtime listening to the sweet singing and even managed to stay smiley for a few pictures. It was so exciting to think about watching you singing with the choir in just a few years!

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This precious outfit made an appearance again for school to see Santa. You loved him again. Also, three cheers for Natalie who found your cute shirt at Goodwill. Score.

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It’s getting harder to get pictures…you have so much you want to look at and do.

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Oh my baby…you are so big! These monthlies just get me every time.

We love you so much!

It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year

     It is Christmastime in the McGuire house, and I am so excited to show you around!  In my estimation, there are approximately elevnty thousand ornaments, seventy-five nativities, fifteen hundred lights, and three stockings.  We are loving celebrating in our new home, and I have had the best time making everything festive.

DSCF4351I don’t why it is so hard to get a decent picture of a Christmas tree…
This is our first married year with a real tree, and I am in looove!  We put all of our personal ornaments on this tree so I can see them all the time!

     My tree style is definitely “more is more".”  I start with white lights near the trunk then colored lights on the outer branches (and by I, I mean my husband).  Then we do the “stuff ins” – big things that don’t hang.  I’m actually going to Dollar Tree sometime this week to buy giant bows for stuff ins.  I get two of each color and stick them together back to back to make a ball (thank my mother for that one!).  Stuffed animals, books, and stockings work as stuff ins too.  The gnomes live under the tree every year.  They’re a much sweeter alternative to that creepy elf…

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This is the  closest you can get to standing in my living room…unless I know you in real live person, in which case, come on!  The shelves don’t actually angle back like that, but there was no way to take a picture straight on without blocking out some of the fun.  This year I left all of the shelf décor and just added the Christmas to it, but I have dreams of filling those babies to bursting with all Christmas!

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Our stockings came from TJ Maxx or Marshalls a few years ago, and Davis’ came from Lands End.  I love it so much…I may have gotten a little misty when it arrived.

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Two of my favorite nativities.  The others are nestled in the shelves.

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Silver tree and my most favorite Santa pillow of all time!

     That’s the living room in all its coziness.  If I didn’t live in the most poorly lit house in America, I would be able to show you how glowy it is.  You’ll have to stop by for that.  Let’s back into the dining room and see some more of my favorite things!

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There’s not a great place to put a tree in here…but I made it work.  This one has more of a color scheme than the living room trees.  Of course I love all of my ornaments, but this one doesn’t have any personal ones.  It does however have Persimmon the Christmas Pig and Hildegard Hedgehog and the best sparkling pom-pom sticks I’ve ever seen.

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We actually have three ceramic trees that my Nana made.  I have the behemoth and my  mother and aunt each have one.  You can’t really tell from the photo, but it’s pretty giant.  It uses a normal, household sized bulb and weighs at least 48 pounds.
The picture on the right is a wider shot of the dining room.  The apothecary jars came from Marshalls and Target (less than $15 apiece), and all of the vintage glass ornaments (my love language) came from my mother.  That Santa is part of the same kooky family as Milton (the moose on the left), Persimmon (in the tree), and the squirrel (unnamed as of yet) on the mantel.  I also have a Halloween cat, an Easter bunny, a Turkey, and a small cat ornament…and a standing appointment with a therapist to discuss my problem.  Kidding about that last one, but seriously…I’m obsessed.

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They’re all Annalee dolls, and I find them at TJ Maxx and Marshalls all the time.  Also, for some reason, the jars look dangerously crooked in this picture.  They’re not…my camera makes everything look tilted.

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Merry Christmas from the kitchen.  I have my Christmas mugs out, a tea towel on the oven door, and a few fun tins sprinkled around. 

     This. Is. My. Favorite. Time. Of. Year.  There is not a single aspect of Christmas that I don’t love.  Things are gearing up, and I couldn’t be more excited.  This weekend we had our choir Christmas performance, and I am exhausted and exhilarated.  We sang a new arrangement of “Little Drummer Boy.”  Y’all.  It was so much.  Every time we sing these songs that are so familiar to me, I hear them with fresh ears and get something new out of them.  I love to decorate and “do Christmas.”  Can you tell?  But the real reason I love Christmas is the reminder that He came for us!  As delicate and fragile as a newborn, but no less God. 
     I could fill our house until it looked like a forest, but that wouldn’t make Christmas any more special.  Christmas is special before the decorating.  We celebrate because we have a God that gave himself up for us.  He loved each us before the first Christmas and still today.  How incredible that our joy isn’t over when the trees are taken down and the lights are wound up.  Our joy is an eternal joy because, hallelujah, Christmas can never be over.  A day or a month or a season isn’t how we define Christmas.  We define Christmas by what our God did for us, does for us, and will do for us when He comes back! 

Merry Christmas!

Friday Favorites

     I have got to get on some sort of schedule with this blogging thing.  Every time I post, I’m reminded how much I love it, but every afternoon after work I’m reminded of how much I love turning my brain totally off.  I’ll figure it out one of these days…#imlying.
     But let’s not dwell on that.  I know I’m squeaking this in at the last minute, but Friday is a time for favorites!  Let’s get down to talking about some of my favorites.  This is my favorite time of year, and right now, everything is a favorite, but I’m going to narrow it down for you.

one

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     This squishy, little peanut is going to be six months old next week.  He is my favorite favorite.  I can’t even believe that the growling, sitting, squealing, almost crawling wild thing in the floor is the same baby!  He is so fun and so silly and just the best little part of our family.

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two

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     So this happened…y’all, I can’t even explain how over-the-moon excited he was over this.  Definitely Keith’s latest favorite.  As I type, this guy (the deer, not the husband) is at the taxidermist being mounted.  That’s right, full shoulder mount.  I’m embracing it.  Also, he promised that it could be decorated for Christmas every year.  Welcome home, Rudolph.

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     No pictures because I was too busy eating everything in sight, but Thanksgiving.  Food is one of my faaaaaaaaaavorites, and the family’s not so bad either.  This year has been so special, and I have been extra thankful for my sweet, little turkey.  As good (really good) as the food is, how much greater is that incredible peace that comes from being thankful?  I have been reminded so much lately of what there is to be thankful for.  Even when circumstances are not what I would prefer or when I’m frustrated or when things are overwhelming, there is always something to be thankful for.  I love carving (see what I did there?) out a special day to be thankful, but every every every day is bringing so much to be thankful for.

Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, since as members of one body you were called to peace. And be thankful.  Colossians 3:15

four

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     It’s been Christmas here for a few weeks now!  All we have left to do is get our real tree (tomorrow).  I am so looking forward to having our first real tree since we’ve been married.  Once everything is all done and lit, I’ll have to get back to you with some pictures.  I have loved having a new place to decorate and am so happy with how everything is looking.  It is so perfect, and every one of my shelves has a sprinkling of Christmas.  What more could I ask for?

     Happy Friday! I hope yours was what you wanted it to be…maybe a little shopping?  Or if you’re more like me…pajamas all day and nonstop Hallmark/Lifetime movies.  Tomorrow we’re decorating my mother’s tree, and then Keith and I are getting ours!  I’m on a holiday high, and I don’t plan on coming down any time soon!

Dear Davis–5 Months

     We are late, late, late for this one, but on your actual 5 month birthday you had a yucky diaper rash and were not in the best mood…then I got lazy.  Better late than never.  This month has been so busy but so fun!  You are learning so much all the time and have really developed quite the personality.

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     You have so many new tricks this month!  You’ve figured out how to spit.  You do it when I touch your face or when you don’t want to sleep or when you want to make a big, dramatic scene when you cry.  You’ve decided that your new favorite hobby is jumping.  You love to be in your jumper and when I hold you you bounce like a kangaroo. We started food, and you loved it!  You’ve had sweet potatoes, squash, and carrots, but I don’t think we’ll be having carrots again soon.  Your poor belly.  That set off the week of ten thousand diapers.  Thank goodness you are better, and we’ll be back to food soon.
     This month I can tell that you are really starting to recognize familiar things.  You smile when I pick you up from daycare and love seeing your family.  When I get a bottle ready, you almost jump out of my arms to get to it.  You get that from your momma.  In the past few days you’ve almost figured out how to sit up, and you have been so good at playing.  You’re grabbing on purpose, and it’s making you so happy!  I cannot believe that in two weeks you will be six months old.  I can’t.  I cannot.

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Loves
Kooky Raccoo
Growling
Spitting and blowing
Clawing faces
Food
Jumping

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IMG_1986Pumpkin patching!

IMG_2003You wore this sweet suit for baby dedication and picture day. #allthehearteyes

IMG_2053We kept Halloween low-key…but you looked all kinds of cute!

IMG_2083I went temporarily insane and took the cousins grocery shopping. Not as bad as I was expecting…but it was much. Suzanne’s face sums it up pretty well.

Stats
Length: Bigger than last time definitely!
Weight: I’m guessing a little less than 20
Head: Big and round
Eating: 7 oz. every 3 hours, cereal in the morning, and sometimes food in the evening
Sleeping: 7:00ish to 6:00ish and definitely napping better at home than daycare

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You are definitely your own person, and it seems exhausting.  You scream laugh and crash hard.  You’re amused by the silliest things and not amused with your sweet toboggan.  I love seeing you grow into yourself.

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These are two separate attempts at pictures. The difference in light is a direct reflection of your mood.

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You are so fun.