The Most Wonderful Time of the Year!

Mercy insisted on wearing this hat at lunch today. I wasn't about to stop her! I love it!
She cracks me up!

Mercy likes to 'touch' the ornaments on our tree.

She especially likes this ornament. It has a polar bear on top that she adores. I took it off the tree and now it's hers to play with (it is plastic, so no concerns about it breaking and cutting her!).

Another great pic of me and my sweet girl. Thanks, Tyson!

I love Christmas! I love the food, the music, the decorations, and the family time. This year is especially fun with Mercy. Last year she was only a few months old, so she wasn't too interested in anything. This year Mercy is excited by all of it! Everyday she says "Hi tee!" when she sees our Christmas tree. She walks around it and says "touch" as she gently touches, and yes- often grabs- the ornaments on the tree. I've tried giving her a taste of some of the holiday sweets I've been baking, but she doesn't seem to care for it much yet. I suppose that's a good thing! She loves dancing to Christmas carols and watching Christmas videos with us. Kids really do make the holidays so much more magical!

I feel like holiday shopping has kind of gotten away from me this year. I still have a bit of shopping to do this weekend. Eek! I had also hoped to do some crafts, but that too got pushed to the side a bit. Oh well. Next year I won't have graduate research keeping me busy on top of everything else!

The pictures are just a few from this week. Merry Christmas!

Thanksgiving

What a great shot my dad got! I'm usually the one taking pictures, so I don't have a lot with Mercy. We were giving Eskimo kisses.
Grandma and Grandpa gave Mercy a few early Christmas gifts, including this rocking horse.

This princess chair is another early Christmas gift from Grandma and Grandpa.

Mercy's favorite Thanksgiving food was the cranberry sauce!

This is after we cleaned up the cranberry sauce!

Everyone took turns reading to Mercy before bed. That is such a precious time with her, and I know she loved snuggling with her grandma.

Grandpa was entertaining Mercy during her bath one night....she gets so animated and excited around him!

Mercy had a lot of fun hanging out with her Aunt Cia.

Mercy loves her grandparents!

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving at home. My parents and Tyson's sister came out to spend the weekend with us. We had a fun weekend and enjoyed the time spent with our family. Mercy was one spoiled girl all weekend. She always had the undivided attention of at least one person! She is blessed to have many people who love her. It was a great holiday that could have only been made better by having more of our family with us! Thanks to my dad for the pictures- I wasn't very good at remembering to take any this weekend!

Finally!

Mercy Lee is finally walking at 14 months! Yea! She stood up and started walking today while we were video skyping with my parents. I think she was just waiting to walk until she had grandma and grandpa there to cheer her on. Mercy squealed and chattered while she walked and was just as pleased as could be with herself! I'm so proud of my girl! I'll post new pictures soon :)

Baby Bumble Bee!

Mercy and her friend from church! Isn't her friend the cutest pumpkin fairy?

Enjoying a hay ride

Last night we took Mercy to the harvest carnival at our church. She dressed up at a bumble bee, and was just way to cute!!

Family Time

Mercy loves playing with her cousin Junie!
They played so well together.

Junie is really good at sharing, though it looks like Mercy isn't too interested in wearing her head band in this picture!

While we were visiting, I bought Mercy this toy to help her walk. She loves cruising around the house with it!

She also loved riding the rocking horse at Grandma's. Poor baby is allergic to animal hair, so if you notice welts on her face in the pictures, it is from coming in contact with pet hair. We all did our best to minimize it, but it still happened. It's too bad, too, because she LOVES animals, especially Grandma's little dogs.

Mercy loved dancing and snuggling with Grandma. She always does.

We couldn't have dragged these girls off of Grandpa's lap, even if we'd wanted to! They were loving their snuggle time with Grandpa while they watched a movie (Grandpa was loving it too!).

We recently drove to Idaho to spend a week at my parent's house. My brother and his wife spent the week with us as well. We always enjoy spending time with all of them! Mercy gets so spoiled with attention. She especially had fun playing with her cousin, Junie, this time around! They had a lot of fun. While we were there, my dad won first place at the church chili cook off, the guys went golfing, we had fun playing board games, Tyson and I went out on a date, and we celebrated my Grandpa Bohle's 86th birthday. It even snowed! We had a nice week.

Dear Grandma,

Thank you for the pretty purple hat! Everytime I see it I just have to put it on. I love wearing my new hat! I had to wear it today, even though it wasn't that cold outside. Don't I just look so cute? I can't wait to see you and Grandpa on Thursday. I love you!

~Mercy

Pictures

Mercy had a blast at the Puyallup Fair last month!

Mercy and Momma at the petting zoo at the Puyallup Fair.

Riding the carousel at the fair.

Mercy had fun looking at the animals!

Mercy loves playing dress up with Mommy's jewelry!

I've been really bad at updating lately. We've been busy! We've been helping out as youth leaders for our church youth group, I joined MOPs (Mother's of Preschoolers) at our church, and I'm working on my graduate research for graduation. Anyway, we're doing well, and I'll try to update more often, even if it's just pictures!