Spring Break: Beach Trip

Happy May! I can't believe it's already May. That makes it a little over 3 months since I've posted last. Where has the time gone? I'll try to do better at updating sooner!

So how has life been? BUSY. R is more than halfway done with this semester and we are counting down the days to summer! We had a wonderful sneak peak of it over his Spring Break. We had a beach house and took baby K to the beach for the first time.

 Baby K was crawling and splashing non-stop in the water. We were shocked at how fast she took to it. She crawled so fast and straight into the ocean that R had to scoop her up so quick because a little wave was about to over take her. She didn't want to get out; not even when she was shaking cold and her lips were turning blue. K loved everything about the beach. She loved the water, the sand, the birds, and the wind in her hair. It was such a joy to see her love what such big part of my own childhood. I'm so looking forward to watching her spend her summers in the same place I did.

 Stay posted for our other Spring Break adventure - Whale Watching!!

The Godhead Lesson

Today I taught the Beehives and Mia Maids. It's the only lesson that I'm scheduled to teach this month so I wanted to really make sure that they got the topic. I'm loving the new Come, Follow Me curriculum that we're using. The manuals were so outdated. I've been cutting/supplementing material since I've been a YW Advisor so I'm really excited with the new system.

This month's topic was The Godhead. I know that they've been hearing about this topic in Sunday School and in the other YW lessons this month so I wanted to bring a different perspective to the topic. I chose to follow the Who am I, and who can I become? outline because I loved some of the ideas.

I focused on how who we are in relation to God and Jesus Christ can show us the potential of who we can become. I wanted them to realize how important we are to our Heavenly Father. That even though we are nothing in comparison to Him, we mean everything to Him. We are daughters of God and He sent the Holy Ghost to help us and He sent his son Jesus Christ to create and show the way back to Him. I'm so grateful to know that I can return to Him one day.


For anyone interested in what I used here is my lesson outline:

I created a worksheet with all of the scriptures that we covered so they could write their own notes/ideas as we went through the lesson.

I used part of the talk President Uchtdorf gave during the October 2011 General Conference entitled: You Matter to Him.

I then asked them to think about what God and Christ were like. I then made each girl stand up and stand in front of the chalk board while all of the other girls wrote God-like/Christ-like qualities they saw in her. I took their pictures so they could remember all of the fabulous things the other girls wrote about them. The girls seemed to really enjoy it and I feel that I was able to show them how important they are to Heavenly Father and the potential that they have.

I gave them the handout I created and I also gave them homework! I gave them a copy of the Attribute Activity exercise from Preach My Gospel and told them that if they had it completed and wrote down their goals on which attribute they were going to work on by mutual then I'd give them an extra treat!

New Year's Resolution Insanity

Baby K has recently passed the 6 month mark and the extra baby weight is not looking so excusable anymore. The New Year has led me to making the cliche resolution: lose the extra pounds. I have never really been a gym kind of person and, with baby K around, it would pretty much be impossible to go to one without sacrificing our evening family time. So I had to come up with something else...

Back in the day I used to attend various dance classes to stay fit. I prefer fitness classes because I don't think  that I am self-motivated enough to come up with or stick to my own routine. So I decided to start an at-home fitness workout program: Insanity

My father-in-law has completed the Insanity program with amazing results. He has been able to successfully lose 36 pounds and has adapted a healthy lifestyle to keep it off. I was able to borrow the DVD's and this week R and I started.

My R is so sweet. He is doing Insanity also to support and motivate me. I do much better with buddies than I do by myself. R went and got a scale so we could track our weight loss and I love it. How silly is it that I love our scale? Probably very silly to most but for anyone that knows me very well, they'd get it when they see it.

I love all things teal. Or turquoise. Or aqua. Or mint. Or pretty much anything in that color family. I try to incorporate it into our home decor as much as possible without it looking like too much. This is why I was so thrilled that R picked it himself. Typically he is the first to battle with that color choice because to him everything we own is teal. I promise that is not true but I get why he feels that way.

So here's to a healthier year. We'll be doing our best to eat a little better and work out a little harder. I'll keep you posted on our results. Thankfully Insanity is only a 60 day program because day 4 is already kicking our butts!

Monkey K

Baby K is one of those babies that does not nap. At least not like other babies. Her normal schedule typically includes two 30 minute naps. Once in a while she knocks out for several hours, scaring me to death sometimes because I can't wake her up, but that definitely is not her norm. So what does she do instead of nap?

She discovers how the world works. Or plays. Same thing right? In her case it is. So far baby K been a little early at hitting milestones. She started teething, aka drooling nonstop, at 3 months. You can see the white spots where you know the teeth are going to cut through but still no teeth. Four little white spots but no teeth. Everyone keeps joking that one day she's going to smile she'll go from her grandma smile to a full mouth of teeth. At 3 1/2 months baby K started rolling over. At 4 1/2 months she was army crawling. Now at 6 months she has turned into a full-fledged monkey.

She is climbing everything. I was not expecting this yet! Baby K crawls on her hands and knees so I've been snatching up anything and everything but this pulling herself up to destroy things is overwhelming! She was crawling around on the floor while I stepped into the kitchen for a water bottle. When I walked back into the room I watched her reach up onto the bottom step and pull herself up all the way up to standing. Was that enough for her? Of course not.

She then proceeded to grab for the next step and pulled herself up onto the first step. What was my response? Sheer panic. My sweet little 6 month baby K can climb the stairs. Taking your eyes off her for one second now means: pillows pulled off the couch, leaves pulled off the houseplant, and DVDs pulled from the TV stand while turning on the Xbox, Wii, and Blue-ray player all at the same time.

baby K does much less of this (strapped in otherwise she climbs out)

and way too much more of this

Motherhood: tons of fun. This milestone: not so much. Is there anyone else who has struggled with this? I'd love to hear your tips on how to deal

Holiday Undecorating

Is anyone else sad that the holidays are over? Even though it is definitely a chaotic time with all of the Christmas shopping, interstate travelling, holiday parties, and family visits this holiday was nothing short of magical for my family. Being in a house and celebrating baby K's first Christmas made this holiday season so special. In the weeks following Christmas the other houses in our community began to take down their lights one by one until we were the only ones left. It became very apparent that it was time - time to undecorate.

This weekend R and I started all of our holiday undecorating. As you can imagine, it is not even close to being as fun as it is to decorate. Even though we kept our decorations up well past new year (I just had to display my after Christmas sale finds) it was still so sad. Good bye first Christmas tree. Good bye pretty glitter ornaments. Good bye twinkling Christmas lights. Good bye colorful sequin stockings. Good bye dancing Santa.

Okay... maybe we won't say good bye to our dancing Santa just yet. Why? Because for some weird reason baby K calms down to him mid-scream. She giggles every time she sees him and bounces like crazy when he dances. Once, I put her jumper in front of him and she bounced for a half hour while I cooked dinner. It was great!

Even though keeping Santa out will be tacky, I'll take it over a screaming baby any day. Plus, it's not nearly as tacky as keeping Christmas lights on your house year-round... right?

Welcome to the Ashley Archives

Even though the days are long, the years seem to be speeding by on fast forward. For the new year, I have decided to make a resolution to take more time to treasure the little things. This is my little blog to document and archive the memories of life. My name is Ashley: daughter(in-law), sister(in-law), wife, and most importantly mother. I look forward to sharing the adventures ahead. Welcome to the Ashley Archives