Wednesday, December 31, 2014

December Photo Dump

O Christmas Tree O Christmas Tree
my favorite little reindeer
WE HAVE DOORS in the basement
She is the happiest baby
#friends
Introducing her to all the classics: 5 Little Monkeys Jumping on the bed
#GoPackGo
Hot stuff holding her own head
#MarshallFamily
Our chickens ROCK
Happy Baby at daycare
St. Cloud Fun
Lucy playing with Dad
Triceratops Hats
Pattern by Micah Makes
Best Friends
Lucy loves her friends
Dad on ugly sweater day
Lucy just because she is ridiculously cute
Christmas lights and Best Friends
Festive Photo Shoot
#worldshappiestbaby
Grandpa & Lucy devouring some night time reading
Uncle Cubby & Lucy at the Aquarium
My immediate family
Lucy & Great Uncle John

Post Christmas Eve Family Photo

Great Grandpa & Lucy
She would have sat in his arms forever
Someone thinks she's hot stuff when standing







Tuesday, December 30, 2014

Post Christmas fun

The day after Christmas we stayed down in Minneapolis for the day to enjoy some time with my brother and his girlfriend. We spent the day at the Mall of America and Lucy had a BLAST. She seriously hardly napped at all and was a CHAMPION - she was ridiculously happy to be hanging out with everyone. She alternated between being held and riding around in her carseat (she got hot being carried and eventually we stripped her down to only her onesie). We went and walked through the Aquarium and Lucy was AMAZED to look at all the fish and the different colors, Uncle Cubby was thrilled to carry her around and explain her to all about the fish (Uncle Cubby is working on becoming a Vet). We also ate lunch at a delicious Italian place in the mall.  We had a great time walking around and talking and hanging out.

Uncle Cubby & Lucy
Jellyfish
Uncle Cubby & Lucy 
Lucy had the magic smile to convince Grandma that
she needed this stuffed baby golden retriever (which is super cute)

Christmas

Christmas has come and gone. Christmas has happened and it was WONDERFUL. If I could only give my description of Christmas one word I would say: Family. And then of course Lucy Lucy Lucy.  My grandparents, Lucy's great grandparents even made the long drive up to spend Christmas with Lucy (and the rest of us, but really Lucy). I wish I could adequately capture the love that everyone has for the sweet girl. And SHE LOVED Christmas or really she loved playing with the paper, being held by everyone, blowing spit bubbles, talking with everyone, and being in the midst of the action. It was indeed an outstanding Christmas. 
On Christmas Eve I had to work some, but after I was done (7:00pmish) I came  home and my mom had a feast of appetizers for us all and we opened gifts. Christmas day we went down to my Uncle's house in Minneapolis and then spent the night at my brother's house. We had a great time.
Here are some photos from our Christmas Eve and Christmas Day.
Lucy & Grandma & Grandpa
Lucy showing off her standing skills
Thomsons
Teaching Lucy how to play hearts
Lucy's favorite part of Christmas gifts:
the bows and the wrapping paper
#family
Four Generations of Thomsons
Selfie with my Favorite after
Christmas Eve worship

How was your Christmas?

Monday, December 29, 2014

2014 Favorites


In just a brief overview of some of the wonderful things I have loved this past year in terms of books, movies, tv shows, websites, and totally random things that are not work related. 
  • Books
    • Belly Laughs by Jenny McCarthy
    • The 19th Wife by David Ebershoff
    • Seven by Jen Hatmaker
    • Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn
    • Divergent by Veronica Roth
    • Insurgent by Veronica Roth
    • Allegiant by Veronica Roth
    • Fault in Our Stars by John Green
    • The Book Thief by Markus Zusak
    • Kingdom Keepers books 6 & 7 by Ridley Pearson
      • totally juvenile fiction - however, if you are a Disney lover you should probably just read this series
  • Movies
    • Frozen (yes, I know it came out in 2013 but really we watched it more than I care to admit in 2014)
    • Captain Phillips (yes, also came out in 2013, but I am behind the 8 ball and enjoyed this movie quite a bit)
    • The Wolf of Wall Street
    • The Book Thief
    • 12 Years Slave
    • Daniel Lee's The Butler
    • Monster's University
    • Mockingjay part 1
  • TV shows
    • Downton Abbey
      • We are borrowing these seasons from a dear friend who owns them - loving this story
    • Big Bang Theory
      • Still love this show
    • Bones 
      • I realize this came out years ago, however, I am finally catching onto the wonderfulness of the whole thing
    • Grey's Anatomy
      • we are a season behind because we watch it on Netflix
    • Call the Midwife
      • I LOVE this series and wish there were 12,000,001 episodes - its on PBS.com and free to watch - go watch it
    • Game of Thrones
      • We stumbled upon this tv series after we caught up on Downton Abbey and ran out of seasons on dvd
      • Several friends recommended it to us - while a bit graphic and the language leaves something to be desired, we surprisingly like it
  • Miscellaneous Things
    • Nikon D300
      • I have fallen more and more in love with this camera this year, while actually using it quite a bit more and learning a ton about the different settings
    • Pilot Frixion Ball Clicker erasable pens
      • I found a few of these pens randomly in the church - who knows who left them and actually bought a pack of them - I LOVE erasable pens
    • I Love This Yarn
      • still by far one of my favorite yarns 
        • okay I actually have other favorite yarns - however, this one I find wonderful in terms of price vs quality vs softness
      • I hate that it is only sold at Hobby Lobby and Hobby Lobby online
        • I don't like yarn shopping online - I like to hold the yarn in my hands
    • The Project Life App
      • A wonderful app for iPhones that allows you to create photobook pages right on your phone
      • WORTH purchasing
      • If you use your iPhone to take pictures and create photobooks it is worth getting this app - I LOVE IT
  • Websites
    • www.ravelry.com
      • yay for free patterns to make sweet stuff
    • www.facebook.com
      • sooo wonderful to keep in touch with family and friends - while some days I hate facebook most days I come back to it and enjoy the ways it allows me to connect with those who are far away
    • www.pinterest.com/sthomson/
    • www.instagram.com/sathomson
    • www.allears.net
      • Yes I am obsessed with Disney and I love being kept up to date on what's happening in the parks
    • www.youtube.com
      • I love having some where that is easy to share videos with family and friends
    • www.shutterfly.com
      • the only way I will consider making photobooks/scrapbooks
      • I also back up all of my photos here
    • www.picmonkey.com
      • love that this is a free website
      • I use this for both work and personal stuff
    • www.pandora.com
      • I seriously listen to this every day at work

Do you have any favorites from 2014 that I should check out?


Wednesday, December 24, 2014

O Christmas Tree

 Our Christmas tree has been up since the Sunday after Thanksgiving. However, it apparently has taken me until now to get the pictures up here, who knows why, I am going to blame the infant and my lack of sleep.  While in my dreams I had hoped that we would go to a Christmas tree farm and cut down our own tree, however, that didn't happen. Mostly due to the fact that we couldn't find a Christmas tree farm within a couple hours of us. Naturally AFTER we had our Christmas tree someone told us about one, so next year perhaps we will get to cut down our own Christmas tree. 
We got our tree at Costco, we looked at several places and due to our ridiculously wonderful and high ceilings, we didn't want a small or short tree.  We wanted something big, something huge, and something that would fill our space a little bit. We also didn't want it to cost us our kidneys and a limb or two. I was a little impatient for the first couple days. I desperately wanted to put lights and ornaments on the tree. However, Marc talked some sense into me and we waited a couple days while the branches settled down and the tree drank at least 1.2 million gallons of water (it felt like every little while we were filling the base with water). 


Our tree is nothing crazy in terms of decorations, however, it is filled with much love and most of the ornaments tell a story (okay not all of them and we do have some filler ornaments but I would bet 75% are story tellers). For example here is the bell ornament my Godparents gave me the year I was born, it is engraved with "1984" and "Baby's first Christmas"

This is one of Marc's ornaments he really does "Live to bike" and he got this ornament from his grandparents one Christmas (or so he told me).
 You had to anticipate seeing at least one of these, I seriously LOVE these HUGE Mickey head ornaments. I got this one a couple years ago when I was down in WDW for the Wine and Dine Half Marathon.
This ornament is also from my Godparents (I actually have gotten a Christmas ornament from them every year since I was born), they gave this to us the year we were married. They have given me the entire Lenox collection of the 12 days of Christmas as well as several other Lenox ornaments. I think these ornaments are GORGEOUS and LOVE putting them on our tree every year. 
I think Marc found this ornament last year just after Christmas for a quarter or something goofy, it was PERFECT, we had just moved into our current house days before Christmas and we were still unpacking on Christmas. 
This ornament my mom brought up for Lucy. It is in the Lenox collection again and is a "Baby's First Christmas" ornament with "2014" and "Lucy" written on it. Perfectly sweet.

Here is my favorite thing about our Christmas tree, I can sit in our chair or on the couch, stare at the Christmas tree, snuggle my sweet babe, and crochet. I will miss this tree when it is gone.

Do you like having a Christmas tree?
What kind of ornaments do you have on your tree?
Do you have any favorite ornaments?