Thompson Family-Life

Easter (and Spring!) Crafting

It's not too late to get your Easter Crafting on! We have a super cute bunny printable banner, a digital kit so that you can scrap all of your favorite Easter pics (or print the elements out for Easter treats this week! Make the eggs into tags or wrap small gifts in the printed papers).

Or what about making a quick felt garland with this printable template? Perfect for Easter OR Spring (it will get you in the Spring mood even if the weather isn't cooperating!). Or, you could even make a one (or two!) of those sweet fox dolls to place in your little one's Easter Basket. They are handstitched (no sewing machine required). They are small so they would stitch up quickly!

And speaking of holidays, did you have a fun St. Patrick's Day? Maybe hit a parade or two? If you have some cute photos to scrapbook, this digital (and printable!) kit from Kate Gabrielle would be the perfect accent to your photos.

Hope you're all having a lovely week! I'll be back tomorrow with a sneak peek of a product I've been collaborating on with one of my favorite designers. AND I will also have a giveaway of said product! It's a big one! You don't want to miss it.

P.S. Are you signed up for our newsletter? I just sent one out last night with an exclusive 20% off coupon code for subscribers. Don't miss the next exclusive sale and sign up here!

Merry Christmas!

From our family to your's!

Madeline's Handstitched Ornaments, circa 1970's

Ethan's Mom Madeline, little Ethan & his Dad, Robert

I've been wanting to photograph these for years. They were stitched by my Mother-in-Law, Madeline, in the late 70's. Aren't they so amazing? To be over 30 years old, I think they look pretty good! We always laugh every year when we decorate her tree at all of the super old ornaments she has - half of them literally falling apart. By the time we're done, their tree looks like quite the eccentric sight. But that's what I love about my in-laws' tree every year. It has total personality.

And even though half the ornaments are falling apart, it's because most were handmade! Either by Madeline herself, Ethan and his sister when they were little (yes, she still has PAPER ornaments they made, these things are still holding together!), or ornaments friends made for her. 

Apparently bugs even made their way through many of these ornaments. I'm so glad she salvaged them. I think they are beautiful in all of their raggedness. You can tell a lot of love was put into these! 

She did three sets featuring, The Nutcracker characters, the 12 Days of Christmas Song & The Wizard of Oz. Some of the characters are missing and I honestly had a hard time identifying some of them. I'm not super familiar with the Nutcracker characters, so I had to do some Googling. So I'm thinking, in the photos above from the top row and left to right there's 9 Ladies Dancing, maybe the Sugar Plum Fairy?, a Partridge in a Pear Tree and the Nutcracker's Spanish Dancer?

And below, we have (from left to right) top row: 8 Maids a Milking, the girl in pink - I'm not sure?!, The Nutcracker's Arab Dancer, bottom row: the Nutcracker, Chinese Dancer...

And then we of course have the Cowardly Lion and the Tin Man from the Wizard of Oz. I wonder what happened to Dorothy and the Scarecrow?

I tried to find the original patterns for these on Etsy Vintage and Ebay but didn't come up with anything. I think Madeline has the original pattern still, I need to see if she can find it.

I have to say that when I was first dating Ethan, I was thrilled to find a crafty kindred spirit in my one-day-Mother-in-Law. She's pretty awesome and I'm lucky to have her. Gosh, how many movies have they made centered around mean, crazy Mother-in-Laws!? I got such a sweet deal. She's not only super crafty, but super sweet to me and our boys. We're all pretty lucky to have this lady in our lives.

Christmastime at Night

I think my favorite part of the weeks leading up to Christmas day, are the nights we have at home. We always turn all of the Christmas lights on inside, and turn off most of the other lights in the house. Everywhere you go there are little twinkle lights somewhere. The whole house has a bit of a pink glow. We usually cozy up on the couch and watch holiday movies, and I'm usually making something.

We moved our Christmas village to the top of the new china cabinet that I painted recently, in the kitchen, and I love it here. They used to sit in our Expedit IKEA shelf over the past 4 or 5 years, in our living room, but it never really looked like a village separated in the separate cubbies (the Expedit shelf has since moved away thanks to Craigslist).

That's Maria and Captain Von Trapp up there in front of the church in Salzburg, Austria where they got married. We've visited that church in person and it's *gorgeous*. We also did the Sound of Music tour which was oh-so-awesome if you're a fan of the movie.

These are part of the "Alpine Village" from Department 56. My Mom bought Ethan and I these every Christmas for a few years right after we got married (a long time ago). I've always loved them and they always remind us of our trips to Germany and Austria, and I love that they represent the places where so many Christmas traditions began.

I made different levels setting boxes underneath the sheet of fake snow I bought at Target. I love the one little German cottage sitting high up on the "mountain".

My favorite room of course is the room with the big white tree. The room has this sweet pink glow because of the two trees (one white, one small pink one). There's definitely a pink and yellow theme going on this year.

On the opposite wall is our big screen TV (notice it is cropped out, haha) and this huge Santa plastic mold/light is hanging above it. I just bought the little Santa & Angel with sleigh decoration this year and knew exactly where it needed to go. I love how it looks like Santa is flying past a big Santa Moon.

I love walking down the hallway and seeing that tree.

These angels sit in a cabinet we purchased while in St. Petersburg, Florida in January of this year on my birthday. I still have yet to get some good photos of it! I'm going to take some more with all of the holiday decorations inside this week. I'm debating on whether to paint it a coral color, but after painting that other cabinet, I'm not sure I'm up for that quite yet! I love the way the light bounces off the vintage tinsel. Most of these angels I've found at thrift stores over the past couple years, and two I paid way too much for in Palm Springs, California. ; ) 

This little vintage pompom tinsel tree sits in our playroom/den. I'm going to get better pics of it as well. It's sitting next to our new very fat vintage chair/Craigslist find.

I think this is what I miss the most after all the decorations come down in the new year. I miss that glow and those sparkly lights. 

More Ornament Collections

I found this vintage lot on Etsy or Ebay a couple years ago. Perfect colors? Check. Felt and flocking? Check. The perfect dose of kitsch? Check.

This set of ornaments were handmade by my friend Karen. Her shop is closed for the holidays, but hopefully you can stock up on some ornaments for next year when she reopens! These are just as exquisite in person as they look in this photo. They are lovingly handmade with the most thoughtful and careful craftmanship. These are probably my most favorite ornmanents I own. (Thank-you Karen!)

I found this handmade needlepoint plastic canvas lot on Ebay or Etsy last year, or the year before. I LOVE these. I always try to imagine the person that made them. I love the little Santa shadow boxes. They are just all too perfect.

See more of our ornament collections here.

I'm not sure what it is about this time of year, but I'm crafting and making things like a mad-woman. There's always this almost compulsive desire to MAKE things. I love it. I always cram in too many projects in a short amount of time, but I wouldn't have it any other way! I love the busyness of this time. I love seeing everyone else's busyness. Everything is rush, rush, rush, and that just adds to the excitment of things for me. 

I'm hoping to get some good photos of our decorations in the next couple days. I'm running out of time! Our decor always seems to change in some small way every year. I like changing things up. 

On a sad note, my Cambpell is still so sick! :*( We're going on three weeks of a horrible, horrible cough. I took him to urgent care last night, but his oxygen is good and his lungs sound fine for as bad as he sounds with the coughing. I'm going to look into seeing an allergist for possible reflux causing the cough. The doctor at the ER said the cough could persist for more weeks! But he's missing school because he has coughing fits constantly. Anyone else have a child with chronic cough like this due to reflux? He's been on steroids, antibitiocs, breathing treatments, the works, and nothing seems to give him relief. It breaks my heart.