Disney Bound

WE did it! We booked another Disney vacation.
My mom, Lucy, Blake, and I are all going down end of November to early December.
We are going to spend a few days in the parks and then head out on a four nigh DISNEY CRUISE!!! So. EXCITED.

I have been a little sad lately, after returning home in February from a FABULOUS Disney vacation with some dear friends I literally had no idea when I'd be returning to Disney. It was a bit sad.

This year in the midst of trying to get things prepared for the rest of the year and trying to plan out vacation time, with a limited number of Sundays off I have to carefully plan what I am doing with them. My husband is out of vacation time and I still had a couple of weeks left to use up. I REFUSE to waste vacation time, even if it means sitting at home and crocheting, making photobooks, cooking, and cleaning.

After talking with my mom and my husband, my mom and I decided to go down to Disney during the Christmas season. We are leaving Marc behind as he needs to work.

We are spending four nights at the Polynesian Resort and then taking a four night Very Merry Christmas time cruise in the Bahamas.

I have been on one previous Disney cruise back when I was in high school, so my memory of the trip is a big vague. I am excited for the chance to take a trip with my mom and kiddos.






In the mean time I will be working on:

• outfits for Lucy and Blake
• a couple shirts for mom and I
• pirate costumes
• our fish extenders gifts
• finishing our February WDW trip photobook

Anyone have any upcoming vacations?
What are you excited for?

TWO Days to WDW

I am doing it. I am taking my six and a half month old daughter to Walt Disney World. And I am THRILLED and excited.

Packing has been interesting, usually I am a pack as little as I can and attempt to get it to fit into a carry on bag type of a traveler, this trip, NOT SO MUCH, I have given into the fact that unless I am traveling w/out Lucy I am going to have to check a bag. Uggg. I have entered a new phase of life.

I recognize that the pace of the trip will be a little bit slower than usual, we won't be up early and out late and we won't be able to move at the same pace, however, I think it will be just as fun. We'll have to learn the art of the rider swap, be able to watch Lucy's reaction to the parades and some of the rides that she will be able to go on, and soak up LOTS of sun! The forecast has the weather in the 70s all WEEK and currently only one day has a chance of rain.

Alright, I must be off to go wash some diapers and laundry and do some packing.

Walt Disney World Here WE COME!!!!

Wine and Dine Half Marathon 2015

Lucy. How I love thee and always will.

She messed with my race schedule (as well as totally shifting my life in many ways). I wasn't able to run last summer like I had wanted to, I missed out on many of my favorite races and as motivation to get myself off the couch back into - I have convinced Marc to run a runDisney (his first and what will be his longest distance) race with me, we are going to be running the Wine and Dine this coming November, I have been talking about this race since I found out I was pregnant and realized that this sweet baby girl would wreck beautiful havoc on my race schedule (yes, there are far more important things in life, however, I do still love to run). Originally I was hoping to do the Tower of Terror 10 miler however, since they aren't running that race in 2015 it was off the list for this year, hard to run a race that isn't happening.

I am jazzed about the November race on several levels:

• I won't have to be putting on crap tons (yes, this is a technical distance) of miles on the treadmill in the winter months, I will get to train all summer/fall (where hopefully we will still be snow free come early November)
• Who doesn't love runDisney races?!
• My parents are coming along to hang out with Lucy while Marc and I run
• Who doesn't love Disney?!
• I am not as jazzed about the late evening time slot, however, I will adjust and be just fine - Suzi and I ran the Wine and Dine a few years ago and I MUCH prefer the before the crack of dawn time slot over the late evening time slot
• HOWEVER, I am WAYYY less nervous about running ridiculously late (okay not really ridiculously late for most people, just people like me who like to go to bed early) than I was before the Wine and Dine having done it before
• I love Disney. End Story.

365 DAYS from today I WILL be running the Wine and Dine Half Marathon..... let the countdown begin and the training continue!

Coast 2 Coast - runDisney

Click here to view this photo book larger

Part of my favorite thing after returning from a trip (yes, yes I know this one got WAYYYYY delayed) is creating the photobook. Here is from my runDisney Coast 2 Coast challenge. I ran the Tinkerbell Half Marathon in Disneyland and the Wine and Dine Half Marathon in Walt Disney World! LOVED IT!

Now to anxiously await the arrival of my photobook.

What do you do with your pictures after a trip?
Do you make a yearly photobook?

Downtown Puerto Vallarta

One early evening we took the city bus downtown and walked to old Puerto Vallarta and here are a few images from our time down there. Riding the city bus in Puerto Vallarta is an experience in and of itself, first there is not a time frame for when buses will becoming or going, they all just run continuously and stop pretty much wherever, so we had a little trouble getting back on the bus to return to the hotel. The bus drivers all seriously felt like they were driving for NASCAR and were racing one another, really I never felt unsafe, however it really was quite the experience. If you are ever in Puerto Vallarta I recommend riding the buses at least a couple times, plus they are way cheap.

Downtown we did a little shopping, hello bringing home Mexican vanilla, and wandering around. We saw a ton of cool architecture and the Church of Our Lady Guadalupe was GORGEOUS, worth stopping in for sure. There was a wedding going to take place later that night (on a Tuesday) and it was interesting to see the cultural differences in wedding attire.  

There were tons of these birds diving in the water
I found them fascinating to watch

Animal Kingdom

I love Animal Kingdom. I love their commitment to the animals, the commitment to help teach the people about the world around us and how we can better live in it, I love their commitment to animals who are endangered and their attempts at helping to increase the population of certain animals due to their limited number. I love the ways in which it is laid out. I love the huge tree in the middle with all the animals carved into it. Ahhh soooo much fun (and this is why I can't pick a favorite park at WDW, I LOVE THEM ALL). This is going to be the quickest fly through of Animal Kingdom ever. I am hoping to come back and do a post on the Jingle Jungle Parade, the Nemo show, and the Festival of the Lion King (which they are planning on moving to another location and have already started the construction on that - it will be interesting to see how long it takes them to get it done and moved - such a great show).

Kilimanjaro Safaris is ALWAYS a highlight for me. This trip we were able to ride several times (which I highly encourage every does because it is ALWAYS different due to the ways in which the animals move around and some are in hiding and some you can see). When we first arrived in the park we went straight back there and walked right onto the ride, which was amazing, it was early in the morning and all of the animals were out and moving about. We even got to see the lions moving around and what not. My favorite favorite favorite is the giraffes (I LOVE them and am fascinated by them - I am seriously going to paint my guest bedroom with giraffe spots on it. I am jazzed to move and start painting, thanks for volunteering to come help mom). This time they even had a baby giraffe. Soooooooo cute. The other crazy thing to see was a couple animals that WDW is working fervently to keep off of the extinct list. They have several endangered animals that they are trying to breed and hopefully be able to release populations of them back into the wild. I am thankful for organizations who work hard on things like this.

     The other fun around the park is obviously The Festival of the Lion King which is about a half hour mini broadway show of sorts, the flying gymnastic monkeys are my favorite! I am always impressed at what they are able to do with only setting up a minimal amount of gear. The fire twirler is also fairly impressive, I know he is trained in how to be able to do that kind of stuff but it always slightly scares me to see someone playing with fire like that, I fear there isn't much of a margin for error and it would really hurt to get burned (part of this goes back to my summer working as a hospital chaplain and I remember hearing people talk about the pain of being burned, the smell, and the pain they experienced every day as their bandages were changed). The music is fun as well and I love that they really work to get the audience involved. We did see the building that they are planning on moving the festival of the lion king into, and then transforming that space into avatar land (which I am not 100% sold on yet).

     There are also several other things which I really enjoy including: It's Tough to be a Bug, Mahara Jungle Trek, Expedition Everest, Pangani Forest, and Rafiki's Planet Watch. I feel that Rafiki's Planet Watch often gets over looked, a couple things I really enjoy about it is: there is always a couple characters to meet out there with little to no wait, the view inside the vet clinic (one time we saw a Zebra having surgery, which was ridiculously cool), the train ride out where you get to see where all the animals bunk down at night, and the small animals/reptiles/bugs that they have. In my opinion it is totally worth the trip out there (some complain it is too far out and not worth it - I totally disagree). Expedition Everest is always fun, I am not certain that I would ever want to wait an hour or anything for it, we fast pass it or ride when the wait is twenty minutes or less. True story: I have been spoiled by being able to travel in the "off season" to Disney when the crowds are generally fairly low, I seriously can't imagine traveling during the peek seasons any more. I have been spoiled without a doubt.

    The Jingle Jungle Parade, the Festival of the Lion King, and the Finding Nemo shows are always on my must do list as well. (Obviously, not the Jingle Jungle parade when it isn't the holiday season, in non holiday season it is just the Jungle parade, of which I love to see as well) I am impressed at the high quality of the shows that they do repeatedly throughout the day (the parade is only once though). I am impressed by the actors and actresses and how fun it is. There really isn't a bad seat in the Festival of the Lion King or the Finding Nemo show, they all are good really. 

   Other things to note about Animal Kingdom, there are some fun "magic photos" available, one where you get to pose like you are holding Simba like a baby, tinkerbell in your hand (this one is available at every park), stitch in the ground, and a couple of others, but baby Simba is my favorite. There are also usually some pretty good photopass options - around the tree of life, with expedition Everest in the background, and many around the different areas. I will have a post coming on the photo pass - who knows when, I guess you will have to keep reading to discover my opinions and thoughts regarding the photopass. 

Do you enjoy Animal Kingdom?

What is your favorite thing/attraction at Animal Kingdom?

What is your favorite Animal?

Magic Kingdom

I have decided that you all are just going to have to deal with a plethora of Disney in the next while, mostly because I have literally over 3,000 photos to sort through, and while yes, I know they are not all amazing, I want to be able to share a good ton of them with you. Also, in this post I will only be doing some highlights of different things not my review of everything. And please note I do promise there will be one on each park coming as well as one on: Wine & Dine Half Marathon, Wine & Dine Food and Wine Festival, Mickey's Very Merry Magical Christmas Party, Character meet and greets, photopass, magic bands, and I am guess one on yummy meal places. Soooooo much to write about and soooooo many (yes, probably excessive, but it is what it is) pictures to sort through. I will try to not overwhelm you all with all pictures and try to include some text. 

   Anyways, without further adieu here we gooooooooo......  The new fantasyland is now opened and wonderful. The new expansion is fairly wonderful, however they do not yet have the new minecart ride up and running, I imagine it will be open in the not too distant future because they were working on it like CRAZY while we were there and it has some serious structure to it and it appears they are working around the clock (or nearly). It looks like it will be awesome.

   Be Our Guest is now open (and amazing, review to come) as is Gaston's Tavern. Gaston's features all sorts of food from: pork shanks, to cinnamon rolls, and LeFou's Brew - which is a sugary frozen apple drink. The pork shank deeply resembled the turkey leg in my opinion, I wasn't brave enough to try it (due to the millions of other amazing options at Magic Kingdom) but one of my party did try it and he said it was very similar in taste to a turkey leg. The LeFou's Brew, was tasty but way to sweet for my liking, however another member of our party thought it was the best thing since sliced bread.

      I always, always, ALWAYS, love the electrical light parade, I have a ton of pictures of it. I love the music with lots of lights. SOoooooooo fun, and I remember watching this parade when I a kid. There is something ridiculously magical about this parade for me. Love it! 

     While normally I am anti-Christmas until after Thanksgiving however, it was fabulous to see mainstreet all lit up for Christmas. It was great to hear the Christmas carols and feel the festivities. I will post more about Mickey's Very Merry Magical Christmas Party in another post, in short, it was AWESOME. 

       The ride lines were short, we really didn't have to wait more than about ten minutes for anything so we got to ride things over and over again and then combined with our magic bands we were set to go. I will post more on the magic bands in another post. We also got to visit all the characters we wanted, while I am not huge into visiting the characters, I do think it is fun to stop by and get my picture with some of them from time to time. 

The jungle cruise was converted to the jingle cruise

Can't go wrong with the stage shows

wishes

What is your favorite part of Magic Kingdom?

Do you have a favorite Disney character?

I'm Leaving On A Jet Plane

Oh, my bags are packed, I am ready to go.......

Okay, so I can't resist a little John Denver every once in a while.
But it is true, my bags are packed, and I am ready to go. We are on our way back home today. The Mears shuttle will pick us up and take us to the airport and then I am one direct flight away from MSP, where I will take another shuttle to town, and my husband will eventually pick me up.

I am thankful I opted for the shuttle both from home to the airport (2.5ish hour drive depending on traffic) and from the Orlando airport to the hotel. I am thankful that I can sleep on the shuttle if I want, which really on the way down here sleeping on the shuttle was key, since I had to board my first shuttle at 1:15 am. Plus I didn't have to worry about/ pay for parking and what not. Today I give thanks for shuttle drivers.

It will be wonderful to be home to:

• See Marc and Dakota
• sleep in my own bed
• to go back to a routine
• to look at all of our pictures on photopass
• plus I enjoy being able to edit them and add borders and what not
• and let me not forget MAGIC pictures - sooooooooo fun - I always make it my goal to get a bunch of those
• to upload all of my pictures and be able to spend time editing the
• and to finally finish off my Coast to Coast shutterfly book - I have the first half completed and it is now just waiting for the second half of the book
• be able to wash my clothes
• stinky race clothes get even stinkier if not washed immediately, I am thankful for my wetbag which contains most of the smell
• to go back to work 
• I actually really enjoy my colleagues, the people who I get to walk alongside, I miss my youth, and this weekend is a huge 50th anniversary celebration at church which should be wonderful 

RACE DAY

Ahhhhhhh today is the day!!! I am going to earn my coast to coast medal!!! I am totally nervous about the evening run. Our plans are to lay low until early this evening. We do have late brunch reservations for Chef Mickeys today.

We'll see how the rest of the day plays out! We are going to attempt to figure out some sort of a great balance between not doing anything and overdoing ourselves so that at 10:30 tonight we are exhausted. I am much more of an early riser than a stay up late kind of a person. Here's hoping adrenaline kicks in and carries me through lots of the race!

I seriously never thought I would actually be able to pull it off where I would earn my Coast to Coast medal. I can't believe that it is playing out like it is. I am thankful that last January my continuing education timed perfectly with the Tinkerbell Half Marathon. I even packed my Tinkerbell Half Marathon medal so that sometime early this week I can take my Tinkerbell Half Marathon Medal, my Wine and Dine Half Marathon Medal, and my Coast to Coast Medal to the parks with me (talk about carrying around excess weight) and take pictures with them all over the parks. (Yes, I am indeed that person.) We do have a photopass, so that helps a ton.

I have already taken a TON of photos on my real camera (read over a few hundred) so you can bank on a ton of photos when I return home and have the chance to download them all to computer. I will upload a few best of posts for you all.

I can't wait for the run tonight, I am jazzed already, now to not tire myself out before late tonight. I have the wine and dine half marathon to run and an after party to attend!!!

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh sooooooooooooooo excited!

Walt Disney Plans for today - Epcot

Today we have fast pass reservations on our magic bands for:

• Test track - sooooo fun - I know this ride is pretty simple but I really do enjoy it and it always makes me think a bit about how they seriously test cars
• Mission Space - not my favorite ride - however my friends are pretty jazzed so I will go along for the ride
• Soarin - love love love this ride - I think it would be sweet if they would do this ride to other states as well - add in all the locations where there is a Disney location - Florida, Paris, etc

Our dinner reservations are at: Tokyo Dining(super excited about this)


Other highlights for me at Epcot include:

• The land - seriously love, love, love this ride.
• Wandering through the countries - sooooo much to explore.
• Food & Wine festival - this is the first time I have been here for it!Illuminations - ahhhhhh this show does my soul good

I am jazzed to be on vacation - despite being a little sad I am away from home. It feels wonderful to disconnect from work a little, it always takes a few days to unwind from work before I can completely relax.


Follow me on instagram for more pictures: sathomson
Really, I am taking most of my photos on my Nikon point and shoot and on my Nikon D300.
[Post trip there will be some serious photo dumping]

Follow me on twitter - no promises on how much I will tweet but as I noted in an earlier post - It seems to be a season of tweeting for me. Follow me at: sarahathomson

Boundary Waters Canoe Area

This past week a few friends and I along with our favorite toddler, took a four day trip up to the BWCA, this is an annual end of the summer trip for most of us. We spent our days: paddling, napping, swimming, portaging canoes, taking ridiculous pictures, jumping off rocks, and eating. It was a GLORIOUS four days. I seriously recommend EVERYONE put the BWCA on their vacation to do list. It is GORGEOUS and we ALWAYS have such a marvelous time. We went up to our favorite lake, Rose, and despite the mosquitos that were out in full force for who knows what reason, I would go back in a heartbeat. 

Have you ever been to the BWCA?

Do you have any favorite routes up there?

What is your favorite food on trail? (Mine was the Thai Peanut Noodles we had one night)

What are your opinions on canoeing?

Back to Work

I feel like I am cheating by leaving only taking off Friday through Wednesday. I haven't missed a Thursday and now I find myself back on a Thursday, seriously the best day in the summer as I work alongside our summer stretch youth. True story: I am glad to not miss a Thursday. It will be interesting to see how they respond and to most of them they won't know I have even been gone. Middle schoolers are such a funny funny group of people, I am thankful that we only have to go through middle school once not to forget that hanging out with middle schoolers keeps me humble.

I am thankful to be back to work, our quick get away was great on many levels. You can count on some good updates about our trip here once I get pictures off the camera and onto my computer and catch up on a little sleep.

Life is indeed good.

Be Our Guest

Reservations have been made for our sit down meals while we are at Disney World for the Wine and Dine Half Marathon.

We have reservations at:
Thursday: Tony's Town Square Restaurant
Friday: Tokyo Dining
Saturday: Chef Mickey's
Sunday: The Garden Grill
Monday: Artist's Point
Tuesday: Mama Melrose's Restorante Italiano
Wednesday: Liberty Tree Tavern (Lunch)
Thursday: Coral Reef Restaurant

I am pretty excited to be headed to all of these restaurants. They should be good. The first night we are eating at Tony's and I haven't eaten there in years, when I was younger, I LOVED Tony's and my parents agree that the food was amazing. Then in the not so distant past (5-8 years) the food just hadn't seemed awesome or anything and so we quit going there. HOWEVER, I have heard that they have made major improvements to Tony's so, I'll keep you posted & we'll see how it is. Hopefully it is back to as good as it once was.

I am not certain how Be Our Guest is filling up so quickly. We tried 180 days out from our first night on property and tried for any of the nights that we are at Disney World to get reservations at Be Our Guest. We even went to the point of staying up late so that we could try to get in, we were 100% flexible on time and wanted a table for either 2 or 3, so we weren't even looking to fit in a large family. I can't figure out who is getting in and how! Seriously. Slightly frustrating that they are booked out so far in advance.

This is our plan for now, once the fireworks and Fantasmic schedule (which I suppose could sort of be classified as a fireworks show) is posted, we may need to revise our plan if Fantasmic is only offered once or twice while we are there. It would be ideal if it happens to be on that Tuesday, but we'll see how it plays out in the next month or so. They currently have the Fantasmic schedule posted out until the end of October, so I am anticipating the schedule to be released any day now.

DISNEYLAND

My parents and I with my our favorite mouse

I have been to Disneyland in the past (I was five and got to go with my older cousins, who I idolized, I still remember this trip and getting to ride on my cousin's shoulders and getting to pick who I rode on all the rides with - loved the trip, but the details are a bit blurry) however this was the first time since then and I am fairly certain a lot has changed since then. I was there one afternoon when I was in college when my college band marched in one of the parades and we had an hour free time to do what we want, so this hardly counts as being there. The first thing I had to do was to get over the fact that Disneyland was not Disney World. While there are several things that were similar and there were things that were alike there were lots and lots of differences and they are wonderful too.

channeling our inner 4 year olds

There are two parks, Disneyland Park and California Adventure, unless you only have a few hours I wouldn't do it without a park hopper. We walked between both parks all day, it is only 149 steps between the two parks (literally, I counted). It was glorious, we became the masters of the "fast pass system" which essentially lets you cut in line and go in a shortened line instead of waiting for the ridiculously long lines some rides would have from time to time. I would go to Disneyland any January, the week we were there was glorious, other than the half marathon day the park was essentially empty, not really but sort of, we never waited in a line more than twenty minutes and we even walked up to many characters for meet and greets.

Cruella de Ville
I seriously could not stop laughing at her, she was AMAZING
she acted exactly as I imagine she would if she were real - soooooo funny
my dad is a character in and of itself 

Disneyland and California Adventure were both wonderful. I equally loved them both, they both have amazing aspects to them. The new Carsland is PHENOMENAL! I loved the radiator springs ride and we got to ride it a lot due to the small crowds, it is awesome. I can't imagine the line for it in the summer when the line in the winter got long at times. The most we saw the line was at 150 minutes (no thanks in my opinion).



I loved the World of Color show at California Adventure, I could watch that show every night, seriously, it was wonderful. I highly recommend going, and getting the "pass" to get in a good section. It was fun to watch, one night we even watched from the "splash zone" and really we only got misted on, I wouldn't necessarily say it was a "splash zone."

a photo of the Ferris wheel just before World of Color began

Food was great, I recommend splitting meals because the portions are huge, we often shared because we couldn't quite finish them all. I enjoyed the Wine Country Terracotta restaurant  it was fabulous,  one day we figured out that from some of the tables you have an outstanding view of the parade (discovered on accident), I totally recommend making a reservation during a parade time.

I could go on about vacation and Disneyland and California Adventure for posts upon posts, seriously. We had a blast, it was fun to spend time with a good friend and my parents. I have planned a few posts about the vacation and the running of the Tinkerbell Half Marathon. If you want to know anything in particular or want more pictures and posts let me know, I could do many more. I loved this trip.

Back

I am back at home and had a marvelous time at continuing education and vacation. It was glorious. I really do intend on getting some posts up with pictures and all that happiness, I just need a couple days to get caught up on work, laundry, cleaning, and everything else I seemed to have missed including spending time with my sweet puppy who has been ultra snugly since my return and with Marc. It has been glorious to be back, I love vacation and continuing education, but I also like the everyday moments in life.

So.... look for posts to come. I will get to them.

Totally unrelated side note: I am ridiculously jealous of all my friends down south of here who are getting a snow day. I would nearly kill to have a snow day. I miss them.

All my bags are packed I am ready to go.....

What a wonderful vacation! Seriously.

I am on my way back home today.

I have missed my Marc and my Dakota, as well as all of my friends in Brainerd.

It will be good to be back in my own bed tonight (pending flights go as I hope they will).

Anticipate tons and tons of pictures in the days come.

California

I seriously can't believe I am actually here in California! I remember when we were booking our vacation and continuing education event thinking about how far away these ten days were and now we are here, loving every minute of it.

I am thankful for the sunshine and the chance to run and be outside without feeling like I am heading out into the antarctic. I am thankful for time with my parents (who now that I am not a teenager any more I actually adore), friends both new and old, and time for myself. It is glorious. While I miss people and things back
home I am still jazzed to be out and about.

The Extravaganza is by far my favorite continuing education event each year, I love the diversity of people, I love the freedom to ask questions, I love the chance to gather with colleagues who are wresting with many of the same issues I am wrestling with at work. I love the variety of speakers and the chance to worship without having to lead.

Side perk: we are in Anaheim, so I was able to run the Tinkerbell Half Marathon last weekend and we all are frequenters of Disneyland when we have some free time. WHOOP WHOOP.

I am certain when I return home you can bank on being overwhelmed with tons of photos.

TOMORROW RACE DAY

Tomorrow I shall earn the first half of my Coast to Coast medal. I AM SUPER EXCITED! I LOVE to runDisney! Seriously, if I could afford it (I have to fly to every race and stay in a hotel) I would run every runDisney race every year. I LOVE them sooooo much, they really are magical. Despite the fact that there are sooooooooo many people who run them. I love it.

Today is the fine balance of not eating anything that I will regret, not over working my legs, and not under working my legs, and getting to bed at a decent time [which seriously is the worst part for me because I am like a little child waiting for Santa to come and have the worst time falling asleep - however I do always wake up wired and ready to go]. Today I will get in a short run, I will enjoy California, and I will think through tomorrow's clothing choices and probably change my mind on what I will wear at least a hundred times. (Really I am debating between two tops and two bottoms - which feels like 10,000 options.)

I have said for years that I will earn my coast to coast medal and I am not certain that I ever actually thought would manage a way to earn the medal. But it is happening. 2013 is going to be the year.

One thing I need to decide before tomorrow - to stop and take pictures with characters along the way or not. Seriously this is a tough debate, we'll see how I am running before I totally decide. I am running with my camera (yes, this may seem ridiculous but I can't imagine not running with it) - not to mention is does fit in my belt so I can always throw it in there if I want/need to. Plus who doesn't want to take pictures as they are running. It distracts me (which around mile 8-9 is welcomed). I am certain you can bank on a slew of photos coming at some point. They will probably be very delayed since I am in southern California till the 28th, but when I return home it will be picture overload on here.

Pre-Vacation

While I am over the top jazzed to be heading out on vacation sometimes it seems almost like more work to go on vacation than it is worth, it never is more work than it is worth because I love vacation. In these days leading up to vacation I about go nuts. Seriously. It is such a slow process getting everything ready to go and getting people to fill in for me and making sure all my lesson plans are written and all that good jazz. I feel like I am currently the queen of the lists. I have lists for what I need while at the conference, I have lists of what I'll need in Disneyland, I have lists of what I need to run the half marathon, I have lists of lists it seems. Now the goal is to make it all fit under 50 pounds. This can be a serious challenge.

Slowly but surely it'll happen. Slowly but surely I'll weed through what I need versus what I would love to bring. Slowly but surely I will make it happen. There is a certain amount of excitement that goes along with packing as well as anticipation of the trip to come.




What do you always forget to pack?
Do you have any great packing tips?
Do you pack in a suitcase or in a soft sided bag?
Do you like to be able to carry everything on?

2012 In Review

It was a marvelous year, seriously, I cannot complain. It was filled with family, friends, amazing golden retrievers, many new recipes, lots of miles run, I earned several new medals, work was wonderful, and I got engaged. Below is a picture (or two) from each month last year to give a few highlights from the year. While these are a lot of "big" things that happened this last year, I would also say that my year was marked by the every day things, my year was filled with fabulous ministry, a puppy who loves me, and not moving. I couldn't be more thankful for all that I have been given.

January:

Sarah, Vicki, & Stacy - Twins Tour comes to town

Marc, Dakota, & Sarah snow shoeing out on the lake

February:

Extravaganza 2012 - New Orleans LA
Gloria, Suzi, & Sarah

Beginning to repaint the kitchen cabinets

March:

Middle School Spring Break Lock -In
Amber, Vicki, Erika, & Sarah

Linnea is born

Best Friends sharing a stick
Dakota & Luther at Frtiz Loven State Park

April:

Mom & I travel to Florida to visit Grandma & Grandpa
and drive their car back to South Dakota

May:

Vicki, Sarah,  Stacy, & Linnea
Father Hennipen State Park

After the Fargo Half Marathon with my St-End

June:

Twins/Brewers Game
Hannemens, Bennetts, &Thomsons

Duluth Middle School Mission Trip
During the major flood in Duluth, Mn

July:

Maid of Honor in my best friend's wedding
Sarah & Hartj

National Youth Gathering - New Orleans, LA

August:

Boundary Waters - Rose Lake
Vicki, Stacy, Linnea, &Sarah

We're getting MARRIED!
Marc proposed at Fritz Loven Park

September:

Lovely weekend with family
Allison, Cubby, KT, JT, Marc, & Sarah

October:

Fargo meet up with WTS women and spouses and kid
Shera, Sarah, & Molita

Fargo Mini Marathoners
Runner Reformers
Bryant, Lindy, Sarah, & Suzi

November:

Carnival Fantasy - November 2012

More fun aboard the ship

December:

New Stained Glass at church
I feel like my December was consumed by work

What were some of the highlights from your last year?
Anything totally unexpected happen in 2012?
What are you most looking forward to in 2013?
Any major goals for 2013?