November 20

I'm thankful for a couple of things today.

First, I'm thankful that Audrey is OK after falling down the stairs tonight. I was right behind her, and I saw her fall. But I was too far away to catch her or help her. So I just had to watch her fall and flip all the way down the stairs. It was so horrible! She cried for a couple of minutes, but then she was fine for the rest of the night, so I don't think she got hurt. It just looked really, really bad.
I'm also thankful that Christmastime is almost here! We put up our fake tree in the basement tonight. We will buy and decorate a real tree after Thanksgiving that will be our pretty tree in the living room. (I am very determined that getting a real tree every year will be a tradition for us!). The fake tree is for all of the sentimental ornaments that don't match--like the handmade ones, the ones we receive as gifts, Audrey's ornaments, and some of my childhood ornaments.

This is the first year that Audrey has been interested in the Christmas tree and Christmas in general. She liked "helping" put the ornaments on the tree. I'm not sure that she fully understands the idea that once the ornaments are on the tree they are supposed to STAY on the tree. I'm sure we will be working on that lots in the upcoming weeks!
In this picture, Audrey is showing the Santa ornament to her baby. We saw Santa at the mall earlier this week. It was the first time Audrey had ever heard about Santa, but she has been talking about him ever since! She has been asking and asking to drive to the mall so she can say "Hi Santa". And then I told her that she could sit on Santa's lap, and she keeps saying "hold you, Santa" (which really means, "hold me, Santa"...silly pronouns!). I don't really have any intention of making a big deal about Santa or of trying to convince her that he is real. But she is so excited about him right now, that it is fun to talk to her about it.

I'm really looking forward to this Christmas season. Last December, we had the craziest month ever! This year looks like it is going to be much calmer, which hopefully means less stressful. And now that Audrey is old enough to understand more about Christmas I think we are going to have a lot of fun around here!!