I Love to See the Temple....

After 9 months of waiting, Collin, Ashlyn and I were finally able to go to the temple to be sealed together forever as a family on November 12. I had been looking forward to this since Ashlyn had come into our lives. The reason it took so long before we were able to go together was just due to Michigan Law. Our entire adoption was finalized through Michigan state court, so basically once we left that state it has been a series of filing more paperwork, bi-monthly home studies, holding our breath, and more and more waiting. I can't complain because some people (mostly international) have to wait so much longer to finalize, but it still seemed like so long! I feel like I can finally catch my breath because now, no matter what, this sweet spirit will be in our family forever. I am SO thankful for the blessing we have of the temple. I always had been before, but having Ashlyn has brought a whole new appreciation and meaning of the temple to me. Thanks to this wonderful blessing we were able to receive in the temple, it is as if our sweet Ashlyn grew right inside my tummy and joined our family like *most* families have babies join them.

The day started out with like 50 mph winds and sideways blizzard snow. Go figure, we were in Idaho Falls! Anway, that didn't really make a difference to us. It ended up being a crazier day than I had originally anticipated. (of course. if there is one thing that has been most drastically changed in my life since being a mom it is that absolutely nothing will go as I think or plan). Grandma and Charles took our whole fam out to breakfast, which was fun for a while until Ashlyn got super grouchy. Collin and I had to take our food to go and get her home to get a good nap in before we headed to the temple. Thankfully she slept well and got up in time to get her ready. I was nervous to drop her off in the little nursery at the temple, but the ladies in charge were so excited to take care of her. Of course.

I had always thought that when that time came that we would all go into the sealing room together I would be bawling. Mainly because it seemed like such a long wait and I would tear up every time I would think about how excited I was to go to the temple. Well turns out I was ok most of the time. The only time I totally lost it was when they brought Ashlyn into the room, after Collin and I had already been in there and the sealer had already spoken to us. She had the biggest smile on her face and it got even bigger as soon as she saw Collin and me. I love her more than I ever thought possible already, but being in that situation just overwhelmed me.

Anyway, she was the life of the party, like usual. Doing her cute little smile and bobbing her head back and forth, which she thinks is just hilarious. She was making everyone laugh the whole time. It was so wonderful. She got a little crabby at the end as everyone was leaving.... but that was ok. After everything when I got back down to the nursery to get her we had some diaper issues and then I found out that instead of mixing her bottle with formula they had just fed her the straight water.... so no wonder she was hungry! It was pretty funny. She was well taken care of though, and lucky she is such a good natured sweetie, she just rolled with pretty much everything.

This is the ONLY picture I have of the 3 of us of that day (besides the temple pic). I won't bother explaining because it makes me mad, but basically 2 of my sisters dropped the ball on taking pictures at her blessing, I guess I will find someone more responsible next time! I do have alot of ugly pictures of Tara, Andrea, Jodee, and Paul though if you're interested. (insert grumpy face here)

But anyway, after the temple we went straight across the parking lot to my grandma's church for Ash's blessing. Collin's mom, brothers Beau, Morgan, and Jim were there, the first two with their families. A lot of my aunts, uncles, and siblings were there too. It was really fun to have everyone there together. We just did it in the relief society room, we did her blessing first and then had some food. My family and Collin's mom were SO super helpful in getting everything ready, it really saved me from being super stressed about it. It was really nice. If you're wondering, the priesthood brothers didn't hold her in the typical "baby blessing" pose--there is no way that would have been cool with her! So Collin just held her in his arms upright and they all put a hand on her back. I guess in the middle she snatched a little pin Collin had in his lapel out and put it in her mouth-thankfully my dad saw it and pulled it out quick. Thank freakin goodness I wasn't watching close enough to see that!!

Anyway, it was a great, tiring day. We are so blessed to have such great family and friends who came to support us, and we're so thankful for the blessings of the gospel.


Here are a couple other pics from the weekend:

Hitched

My little brother Cory got married last weekend to a super sweet girl I am excited to get to know better! Cory and Hayley got hitched in the Rexburg temple on 11.11.11. Fun!

I was worried about how Ashlyn would do through all the craziness since I knew we would basically be gone all day long. She did great! She seriously spoils me. She is so adaptable and easy going, for which I am very grateful! I hope it continues!

Anyway.... I had weird things keep happening with our camera, as in I swear I searched all our bags like 3 times over on the way up to Rexburg and I couldn't find it anywhere.... then mysteriously I found it right when we got back to my parents house.. but then somehow it didn't make it to the reception with us either. It was driving me crazy. But I just stole everyone else's pictures and that is what these are! There are hardly any pictures of the actual bride and groom... my family is super self-centered apparently. Jk. Actually, they were in REAL pictures with a photographer most of the time plus they were very busy! So we stayed out of the way and took pictures of ourselves!

Jodee, Andrea, McKae, and Grandma and Charles got charged with keeping Ashlyn happy in the temple waiting room. Apparently she had a pretty good time with Charles's cane.

aw.

yay! for our cute family. Ashlyn was a huge cheese all day. She really charmed everyone. She knows when to turn it on!

aw. my favorite girls.

A word about the reception: I. loved. it. Seriously probably my favorite reception decorations I've ever seen. I am not a hugely detail-oriented person, especially when it comes to something as much work as a wedding reception, but I always notice them and I really, really loved the whole style of Hayley's wedding. It was so fab! They must have spent a ton of time getting everything together. Or else they are SO good at just pulling something off like that. Again, if I had had my own camera I would have taken some pics of all the great decor, but oh well.My sweet grandma and her husband Charles.... they have come from Colorado for all the kids in my family's weddings. (which adds up to 4 now!)

I got hunted down a lot at the reception by old friends wanting to see my sweet baby! She and Collin were MIA for a while, so I went looking for them and found this! Don't be fooled by Ashlyn's face, she was having a grand time playing the piano with Dad.

She was constantly very, very interested in my corsage.

The uglies. Just kidding!

The only small example of some of the cute decor. The cake was so cute too. Although I was a little disappointed, they fed it to each other nicely! I am always hoping for a little cake fight. :)

.....and this is for your enjoyment. Can you tell it was late and we were tired?

So, to end with a great picture here you go. If you know much about Tara, it is that she is usually the one making a hideous face in a picture. So this is quite a rare gem in the fact that it's Tara actually looking normal while me and Megan look "extra pretty." ha ha. Megan, your face is the best!!

Anyways, it was great to spend a day with our family as well as a family we are linked to now. I am super happy for the new couple and think they are so cute together. Love love!

Take Steps!

I meant to post this forever ago. We had the 3rd annual (I believe it is annual now anyway) Take Steps for Crohn's and Colitis here in Boise last month . . it was fun! I didn't plan to be involved in the planning or anything this year but somehow in the end did end up doing some fundraising, donation soliciting, planning, errand running. . . you know how that goes when you can't say no. Lol. Anyway, I think all things considered, which if you want to hear some long stories with rants and strong opinions you can ask me later, the walk went really well! I don't know how much money they raised and honestly don't care enough to check their website . . . but I'm sure it was a lot. I ended up working at the registration table during the pre-walk festivities and there was some good money coming in. All for a good cause, so it's all good. I got to work with one of my old walk/ed-conference planning buddies Courtney Knutson, which was fun because we haven't had a chance to catch up in a while. I also saw a lot of people from the support group I used to run, which was also fun.

Sam and Megan came up that weekend to visit (and do we have any other pictures from that visit? Of course not. Just call me the camera loser.), so they did the walk with us! And that was our whole team! Yahoo!

Thank you to those of you who donated to my walk fundraising. My goal was to get to $100 because that is what you have to raise just to get a shirt. And I did! So, thanks again, you know who you are. I really, really appreciate it. And all those people out there having to deal with Crohn's and Colitis do too.

Ashlyn was a champ through the whole thing! She just chilled in her stroller, and enjoyed the light-up maracas. Totally not age appropriate, I know. But I was watching her closely. :)

And Lucy came along.... she was very excited as you can see she is pulling Sam along! There were actually a lot of dogs there which was AWESOME!

Team Semi-Colons ;) 2011! Thanks again for coming and helping out, Sam and Megan! We had a great weekend with you guys!

Till next year, Take Steps!

The rest of Halloween

OK. I am so mad. I just put together a huge freaking post about Halloween, carving pumpkins, costumes, trick or treaters... and then with somehow a wrong flick of my wrist I somehow hit delete and it's ALL GONE?!?!?!! BOOO!! I am NOT wasting the time to type it again! So just imagine some cute pictures.

Miss Lucy

So with all the posting about Ashlyn you may think we have forgotten about Lucy. On the contrary! That little dog is definitely still keeping me busy. And in fact, there are days that Lucy provides us much more entertainment than Ashlyn. (it's not that we just have a dog and a kid for entertainment....really.) So I thought I would dedicate this post to Lucy. Although once I uploaded the pictures I realized Ashlyn is in most of them . . . Lucy was also a bumblebee for Halloween! I thought it would be so cool to have her wear her little costume around all day, and then my students could see her when they came that night. . . yeah it was wishful thinking. In fact, just getting her to keep it on long enough to take a picture proved pretty difficult. Luckily, she is obsessed with food so that is my solution to most Lucy problems: bribe her with food. And it works like 99% of the time too. If you could follow her gaze off to the left of the picture you can tell that I am dangling a treat and making her sit to get it. Am I pure evil??

Then there's her new playmate--Ashlyn. I found the two of them laying like this on the floor, with Ashlyn giggling the other day. So cute. And don't you love how Lucy has absolutely no shame to just lay it all out there, spread eagle! And check out her front paws too.

The chocolate chip bags: I need to explain. Right now Ashlyn is way more into household objects (especially kitchen utensils) than toys, which I figure could be either because she's bored with ALL her toys, or she is interested in being a chef someday. So, after I was telling my mom that Ashlyn's absolute favorite little thing is the wire whisk, Mom reminded me that all the kids in our family used to love to play with an empty chocolate chip bag. Since they're not easy to rip or anything but really crinkly. I happened to be baking the next day so I gave Ash a shot with the chocolate chip bag. She was having a great old time except.... for Lucy! Lucy was super jealous of that cool crinkly bag. She kept stealing it! I seriously was like, "are you kidding, now I have to make you guys share?" Which of course neither of them understands at all. So I had to empty out another chocolate chip bag just for Lucy. That picture above is both of them happily crinkling and chewing on their OWN chocolate chip bags. I have a bad feeling this is just the beginning.

Lucy is generally pretty complacent around Ashlyn--as you can see Ashlyn is smacking her in the face and pulling her hair, and usually Lucy just sits there. Unfortunately I can't say Lucy ALWAYS just sits there because there are times she will fight back! But thankfully they are still on good terms with each other . . . so far.

And then we have lots of classic pictures where there are not only people in the picture, but you can see Lucy causing some sort of trauma in the background. Like this one! I have no idea what that is that she's shredding in the background, but let me assure you it's always fun to pick up 800 tiny shredded pieces of baby wipe, cardboard, paper.... or whatever else Lucy digs out of who-the-heck knows where. I have to admit that sometimes just to keep her busy I will give her something to shred. Like today I gave her the empty paper towel roll.... that bought me like an hour of alone time with Ashlyn. Nice. Except. for. the. mess.

She'll come and just lay right next to Ashlyn like "I'm just minding my own business..." yet obviously Ashlyn sees "giant cuddly moving play thing right next to me" and of course goes right after her. Then Lucy will either sit there and ignore her (which happens less and less the more Ashlyn can move around and chase her!), or sigh a big "humph" and get up and move somewhere else. I just want to say "duh, don't freaking sit there by the baby if you don't want to get your hair pulled!" And then I realize I'm trying to reason with a dog . . .

And last but not least I had to put a picture (again the fabulous spread eagle pose) of seriously Lucy's favorite way to lay. She never ever does this unless she's somehow snuggling with a person. We were really asking for it letting her snuggle on our laps every single day when she was little...because she definitely thinks she's a lap dog. As everyone who has been around her can agree too I'm sure! We don't mind though, and it really is sometimes the only one-on-one attention she gets from either me or Collin all day! And yes I know you are probably thinking "one-on-one with a dog? Get a life." Well I know!! But, Lucy was really our first little baby and she is really a good girl. Hope you have enjoyed this post, especially you, Mom and Dad! I know you love Lucy more than anything!

:)