Ashton's Marriage Outlook

Recently, Joseph was doing some family history work on FamilySearch. He saw this and told me about it:



We talked about how easy it would be to simply insert a name for Ashton's husband now. There are several young boys at church that we would love Ashton to marry. While she hasn't had her first kiss yet, she has shared plenty of toys and food from her mouth to a friend's mouth. It's hard to yell at her because it's her way of sharing. I do call one of her friends her boyfriend. Mainly because the little boy always looks for Ashton and then cries when he has to leave her. And he has cute curly hair, which makes it even better.

So I do think about who she will marry. I wonder if the person is alive yet. I wonder if his parents are taking the time to pray at every meal even though their son screams during it. I wonder if the parents put a picture of the temple in his bedroom and sings, "I Love to See the Temple" every night. I pray that the parents of the boy Ashton will marry is working diligently to raise him to treat Ashton with kindness. I pray his parents will take the time to the simple things like read the scriptures as a family, pray together, and hold family home evening. I pray they are teaching their son to keep the commandments and live a life that would please Heavenly Father.

Yes, it would be so simple to add a husband for her right now, especially since we know several good little toddlers. But I do pray often for the family who she will marry into since I have little say in that. Over the past few nights as I sing to her, I get this feeling that time will pass by so quickly. Before I know it, Ashton will be dressed in white on her wedding day. And I pray that her husband will be able to tolerate her persistence and stubbornness! Until then, I will work on tolerating it.

Busy Fall

Since we got back about two weeks ago, we've been pretty busy. Here's what we've been up to.

Our ward boundaries realigned while I was gone so we basically have a brand new ward. That means brand new callings. Joseph was called as deacons quorum adviser so he continues to go to Wednesday night activities and possibly some campouts. However, he no longer is required to go to youth dances an hour away so that makes me happy. I was called as Relief Society secretary. Our ward is much larger now, which is nice and includes the whole area of Lake Jackson/Freeport. Now the countdown is on until Ashton goes to nursery- five more months!

We went to the local pumpkin patch. And by pumpkin patch, I mean a church that puts random pumpkins in their yard. Ashton liked it. We got her a small pumpkin to help carve but she wasn't too impressed. She screamed at me as I attempted to carve her pumpkin.

Ashton and I went to the Houston Zoo with some friends. I forgot to take pictures but she loved it.

We tried to catch Ashton's dance moves on video. Here's a four second clip of it.

Joseph had his golden birthday. I threw a party for him with some friends. It was really fun and I'm glad we have good friends who can celebrate with us. Ashton enjoyed helping clean the house before the party.

The cupcakes I made for his party. The cake stand looked nice once I made it but it was pretty wobbly.

She likes sweeping but she LOVES stepping in the piles I sweep up even more.

Eating her cupcake

Joseph and I got tickets to the opera, Otello, in Houston. His work had a good deal for cheap tickets. We went up with another couple from church. Ashton did great with a babysitter! We went out to dinner and then to the opera. It was fun to get all dressed up and not have a whiny baby from 4pm on. However, the next morning, I couldn't wait for Ashton to wake up because I missed her so much.

I've been working on some crafts too this fall. I made this towel for a friend's daughter. I have to finish the other one for Ashton still. I also made Ashton a dress and am working on a rain coat for her.

 In our area, there are lots of pecan trees. We all went one Sunday afternoon to pick pecans. Ashton had lots of fun.

 This duck was a garage sale find. Best two dollars spent! It's supposed to be a bathtub but Ashton loves just sitting in it.

The rest of the year is pretty busy too. Joseph's parents come next week for a few days. Then, both of Joseph's brothers and their families come for Thanksgiving. And then we leave for our family vacation in December for a week. Busy, busy!

Part 4

The return trip... started very early! When I bought tickets over the summer, I chose the 7:30am departure time. However, the airlines changed my flight to 6:30am! That meant we were all up at 5am. Ick! But Ashton did very well. She ate breakfast on the first short plane ride to Chicago. Then we played at the Chicago airport and made friends. On the next plane, I used Benedryl because I did not want a repeat of the first trip. She settled down pretty quickly and took a nap. It was a short nap but she was really calm and relaxed for the rest of the plane. I will definitely bring Benedryl on future flights. It was well worth it! We did run out of diapers on the plane so that was f.u.n. I used lots of Kleenex and a plastic-y diaper changing pad as a makeshift diaper to get us through until we landed. Once we got our luggage, I could put her back in a cloth diaper. She was soaked though as was I.

Typical Ashton, reading books

Looks like she's about to sneeze.

Once home, she thought it was Christmas with all "new" toys. She has chosen different books as her favorites now, which is nice because I was getting tired of reading, "Brown Bear, Brown Bear" 500 times a day.

Her first thing to do was take all the toys out and look at them.

Scored this fun bath toy from Barnes and Noble with a gift card I had for the last few years. Ashton isn't nearly as amused by it as we are.

The day after we got back, Ashton and I went to the county fair. It was their free admission day. Normally, it costs 10 to 15 dollars a person so that is too expensive for us. I took Ashton to the petting zoo (one of the only free things at the fair) and she LOVED it. I was nervous that she would get scared by the big animals. But she warmed up to them pretty quickly. We had a blast.

How I thought the entire visit would go. But this lasted just a few moments

Part 3

 For the first time in several years, I was in Wisconsin for my birthday. The day before, we went shopping and I got some new clothes. My sister came up for the weekend again and we celebrated our birthdays together. Ashton enjoyed some more time with Molly, the dog.

Eating ice cream cake with Aunt Trescha

Ice cream cake yumminess

Best friends

Riding her toy around my mom's house

Mohawk bath time

They loved sharing toys

 The last weekend during our trip, my sister had a birthday party for herself in Madison. So we traveled down to see her for the day. Ashton did surprisingly well considering it was 2.5 hours to get there, playing at a house with lots of new people and animals, and then another 2.5 hour drive home.

  

Another thing I look forward to when visiting Wisconsin is playing Spades. My parents and I played a few nights and then we also played with my aunt and uncle. I won one game as seen below.

  

Overall, Ashton did very well in Wisconsin. I was pretty confident she was going to be a clingy, fussy toddler the entire trip. And instead, she was very nice to people and wasn't very clingy at all. It was exhausting being the only parent present but we skyped with Joseph every night, which helped. She learned lots of new tricks while we were gone such as putting things in the toilet, saying the word, Dog, unrolling the toilet paper, pulling the drain plug during bath time, and giving kisses and high fives. We are glad we could stay for so long and enjoy time with family.