Christmas in Dallas

Last Friday, David, Avery, and I flew out to Dallas to spend Christmas with our family in Texas.  We stayed with Gran and Grandy, David's grandparents, who had thoroughly decked the halls!  The house was decorated, the food was prepared, and the gifts were wrapped.  All that was left to do was enjoy our time, and we did that to the best of our ability!  

Sunday night we celebrated David's 24th Birthday at Luna de Noche, the best Mexican restaurant in Dallas!  Before we left I gave him his present from Avery and I, a Nintendo DS Lite.  I didn't know much about them (just that David wanted one for traveling), but it was the best gift I could have given!  It actually managed to keep him away from work and allowed him to relax a little bit, which was all I wanted him to do during our time away. 

 

On Christmas Eve the entire family was there.  We exchanged gifts and enjoyed Spanish Ole.  A family recipe that I'm thankful to add to my collection.  We were glad PaPa was able to make it for the evening, he is Avery's great-great grandfather!  

 

On Christmas morning we opened stockings and all the gifts from our immediate family.  The greatest gift of all was a cookbook that Lisa made for all the kids, titled "Recipe's from Home".  It was filled with all the kids favorite recipes from childhood.  David had a great time pointing out all the recipes I had to make ASAP!  :)  

We left the day after Christmas, and now we're getting things back to normal around the Grulich household.  Another year has almost come and gone, and David and I realize how immensely we've been blessed!  We are so thankful for our wonderful family and our awesome friends!  We pray each of you have had as great a year as we have!

Click here to see the rest of the pictures.

Christmas at the Grulich's

Last night we celebrated Christmas with the Grulich grandparents.  It was a great night with family, food, and presents!  Avery had a lot of fun opening gifts, both her own and other's.  The gift of the night was the Tickle Me Elmo that grandma and grandpa gave Avery.  As Avery watched in awe, the adults were all cracking up at the genius toy.  Avery also got a slide and Elmo chair, both of which she loves!

For pictures from the evening, click here.

Update

I want to start by apologizing to all of you who check this blog regularly for pictures and updates. I have been M.I.A. this past month! It's not because there's been nothing to share, but because I haven't had time to sit down and collect my thoughts. So I'm sorry, I will try to be better about it!

Avery with the rocking horse Aunt Heidi gave her.

A lot has happened these last few weeks. David and EJ, David's business partner, have hired a new assistant and a new sales person! Which means I'm off the hook! :) ...almost... We're still in the transition phase. But both are wonderful women who we're excited about, and they've already started doing some great things for the company. David and EJ also found an office building they're going to buy, which is an answer to prayer!

Being silly with David.

On the home front, Avery is more fun than ever! She's talking a lot and has become Ms. Independent. I love watching her entertain herself! When she's had enough playing alone, she'll plop a book in my lap and climb on up. When the book is finished she gets down, walks over to the bookshelf, and grabs another...until ALL the books have been read! It's a long process, but there's nothing more rewarding than when she gets in my lap and relaxes against me so I can start the story...I LOVE being a mom! (and I'm so thankful that now I'll get to 'be a mom' full time!)

Playing with the Little Peoples Manger my parents sent her for Christmas.

Yesterday I was getting some last minute Christmas shopping done. Before I left, I grabbed my camera so I could get some pictures of Avery with Santa Claus. She isn't really into it yet...and wondered why I was putting her on this strange man's lap. She wouldn't look away from him for the longest:

But eventually she acknowledged that I was calling her name, and looked at me for help!

Then relaxed just long enough for me to get this picture:

Then we called it quits and said "bye, bye" to Santa Claus.

We hope everyone has a VERY MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Happy (late) Thanksgiving!

We just got back from South Florida where we celebrated Thanksgiving for a whole week! We started off the trip with a visit to Ikea, where I loaded up on some awesome accessories for the house (thanks Heidi for my gift certificate...I used it all!). :) After the girls got back from Ikea, the guys went mountain biking. Despite several scrapes and bruises they had a great time.


We spent Thanksgiving day with my dad's family, the food was delicious and it was so good to catch up with everyone. We have SO much to be thankful for!


Saturday we went sailing! It was Avery's first time on the ocean, and she had a blast! The life jacket didn't last long, but there were 7 adults who couldn't keep their eyes off her so it was fine. :)



We had such a great time! Thanks mom and dad for putting up with us! ;) Click here to see pictures from the week.

Football

We had a very relaxing weekend here at the Grulich household...with LOTS of football! Friday night we went to Chiles' varsity game, Saturday night we watched FSU beat Boston College (GO NOLES!), Sunday we went to Leon's football field so the guys could practice their kicking :), and we topped the weekend off with watching Dallas embarrass Philadelphia. Whew! Good thing we love the sport!

While the guys were kicking I was snapping pictures. Mostly of Avery, but I did get some of David, Taylor, and Carl! Sorry they get dark towards the end, the sun went down early...maybe because of the time change. :)

Here's a great video of Avery with her Uncle Taylor! She's walking! She's been walking for several weeks, so this is a little overdue, but she's really moving now!

Pictures, Pictures, and more Pictures

Yesterday we got together with our good friend Eric, and took lots of pictures!

We started at the pumpkin patch.


And then moved on to the park, where we tried to get a good family photo.


This picture perfectly portrays the experience...Avery is trying to get away, David's holding her in place, and I'm just making sure my dress stays down.


In the end, we did get some great shots, thanks Eric!



Click here to see the pumpkin patch.
Click here to see the ones from the park.

Wedding Pictures...2 years later!

David and I were finally able to purchase the rights to our wedding pictures! (we had to wait 2 years) I uploaded all of them onto Snapfish for those of you who were waiting to purchase them...that includes me! :) I didn't sort through them like I did when they were on Pictage, so you're getting the good, the bad, and the ugly. Enjoy!

Click the links below to view:

Preparation


Portraits


Group Portraits


Ceremony


Reception

Avery's First Party

This weekend we celebrated Avery's first birthday. We had a ton of family in town for the party, which made it even more special. Avery loved all the attention! She ate a huge lunch, finished it off with several handfuls of chocolate cake, and opened each present with only a little bit of help. Thank you to EVERYONE for the great toys and clothes, she's set for the entire year. :)

All the pictures that I have so far are on Snapfish.

As I said earlier, we had a ton of family in town, including the whole Cook family. I loved every minute they were here! Family is such a blessing!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY AVERY!

October 14th 2006

October 14th 2007


So much has changed in one short year.
David and I are so blessed to have such a sweet little girl!
Happy Birthday Avery!

for pictures from today click here

This Week in the Grulich Household

Today we were planning on doing Avery's '1 year' pictures, but had to cancel two days ago, here's why:

We were playing in her nursery on Thursday when she decided it was time to walk into the next room. Her balance still isn't the best, and as she was passing the door she fell into it. Hence the cut on her nose and upper lip. She cried for a second but then was ready to go again. So no pictures this week, maybe next...we'll see!


Yesterday I got my hair cut! Finally! I've been wanting to chop off some length for awhile now - it was too time consuming with a little one running around. I didn't do anything drastic, but its shorter and hopefully it'll take less time to do.

I was looking at Avery in this picture, but you can see the cut pretty well. :)

And a little bit of fame. CasaSugar is a house website that I visit if I have some spare time. I love to see what people do with their houses and get new ideas for ours. Awhile back I added pictures of Avery's nursery (they were taken before she was born...notice the empty bookshelf and lack of toys). Well CasaSugar posted my pictures! Click here to see her post...and comments from other members (and about the 'orange walls' comment...they're salmon!). haha

I think that's all...but TOMORROW IS AVERY'S FIRST BIRTHDAY! So I'm sure there will be another post soon about that! :)

Daddy's Shoes

Just thought I'd share an adorable picture I got of Avery trying on daddy's shoes this morning.

I hope it made you smile. Have a great day!

Not Moving!

Two posts in one day...wow!

Just wanted to let everyone know...we're not moving! Several of you heard about the house in Waverly that we were planning to renovate and make our new home. We already had the plans drawn up and the details picked out...but a few things didn't work out as planned, and right before the closing today we decided it would be better for us to let David's company purchase it. Nothing like waiting until the last minute! Although we're a little disappointed, we realize that this wasn't the right home and we're excited about the opportunity to find something else. And extremely thankful we found out about these things BEFORE closing! :)

And There Up!!!

YAY! The pictures are finally online again! Thanks to Julie for your help! I decided to go ahead and use Snapfish. The only drawback is you will have to join/sign in to Snapfish to view the photos. The good thing about that is they are a little more secure than on Shutterfly. Don't worry about junk email, I signed up last year to see my friends pictures and I've never had a problem with them sending me stuff. You can still order pictures through the site and have them delivered to your house. I've added two different albums, one of miscellaneous pictures, and one of Lisa's Birthday Party.

Still No Photos...

I still can't figure out any of the other photo sites. But trust me, I'm trying! I've tried Flickr, but there uploader doesn't put the pictures on the website for some reason...can't figure out why. I looked into Snapfish, but anyone who wants to see my pictures has to join Snapfish, and I don't think I can put a link to the pics on here... Photobucket doesn't allow very many pictures to be uploaded for free, I think I would have to pay each month. And that's all I've tried. Any other suggestions? I would love to get my pics back on here for you guys! For now I'll just add some cute ones to each of my posts.

Well this weekend David, Avery and I went to Orlando for a Mona Vie conference. It was an interesting trip...on the way down, poor Avery 'got an upset tummy' all over her car seat. We were car pooling with our good friends Nate and Joy - in their car (still so sorry guys)! We pulled over on the side of the interstate and did our best to clean it up. That was only the first of the upset tummies. Saturday the guys (David, EJ, and Nate) went to the conference, and the girls (me, Shannon, and Joy) went shopping! It sounded like a good idea at the time, but with Avery and Gabe (the Garcia's baby boy) we tired out quickly. We decided to head up to the conference center and hang out until the guys were through. That's where Avery got sick again, SEVERAL times. So I had little Avery in just her diaper...it was an eventful weekend! She's still sick but the pediatrician said it's nothing to worry about just yet. Hopefully she'll be getting better soon! Here's a pic of Avery and Gabe in the bath:



Sunday afternoon we took her up to the park to get some fresh air. We got some cute pictures:

She didn't want ANY help! She thought she was a big girl. :)



What a face!