Outings

Towards the end of January, we had a few fun outings. On the 22nd, we went to a pizza night that the high school jazz band was performing at. Joseph works with some of the boys in the band at church so we came to support them. Some friends joined us with their little boy so Ashton had a play mate. It was held in a sports arena so the kiddos could run around while the parents could eat and have an adult conversation. At first, Ashton was spooked by the loud noise of the music but after a few songs, she got over it and loved it.

The next night, Joseph and I had a date night in Houston. It makes for a long night for a babysitter but Ashton loves her babysitter. We went out to eat at a Spanish restaurant. Joe enjoyed walking down memory lane and eating some of his favorite foods from Spain. After that, we went to the Harlem Globetrotters. It was a really fun show. I was nervous when they did cool stunts but it was still a lot of fun. By the end of the night, we were ready to go back home and get some sleep.

Here are some fun pictures of Ashton lately.

She had to bring her strawberry with to the park.

Why I love living in Texas. 75 degrees in January.

Playing in the dyer.

Wetting her hair just like I do when I have to brush her's.

A Few of My Favorite Things

For those who are interested in Ashton's life from back home, here are a few of her favorite things. Sorry for the lack of pictures. If Ashton sees my phone, she wants it. So I hide it for most of the day. This leads to a lack of pictures.

1. Going to the park. Since the weather warmed up again to the 60's, we've enjoyed some wonderful afternoons at our local park. There, she loves going down slides, sitting in the swing for 0.32 seconds, "stirring" the gravel with a stick, and climbing up and down stairs.

This is her pushing her face against a little window in the playground tunnel. Probably not the cleanest surface to lick but oh well. This might explain her constant runny nose these days.

2. Talking. Ashton's vocabulary keeps expanding, which I love. Each day, it gets a little easier to understand what she wants. Her word list now includes: Dog, Duck, Done, More, No, Baby, Mama, Dada, Papa, Nana (means Grandma and banana), Shoe, Sit, Go, Bye, Hi, Up, Ick, and Daniel. "Daniel" means she wants to watch Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood on Netflix. I don't like that she now has a word to watch a show. My preference is for her not to watch any TV during the day. Some days, she gets lucky and she gets one episode.

3. Reading. She loves her books. Ashton especially likes the book her great-grandma got her about cats. It is just a book with a lot of pictures of random cats. She also likes pointing at everything in her books and asking what they are.

4. Picking up trash at the park. She then promptly says, "Ick" and hands it to me. At least that is an improvement from when she would just try to eat it.

5. Dumping everything out of its container, namely her snacks. That's fun. It also explains the current condition of our house. I'm tired of cleaning up everything only for her to dump it back out a few minutes later.

6. Copying me in anything. When Ashton sees me do something, she wants to do it "just like mommy." She likes to wipe the floor with a towel, sweep the floor, put dishes away, set the table, type on the computer, draw and color on papers, put groceries on the check out belt, brush her hair, and put on make-up.

7. I can't forget to put her juice on this list. Ashton doesn't nurse anymore but she still has a big desire to suck on her straw cups. I'm glad we never pushed the pacifier with her because I think it would have been a very hard habit to break now. But she loves to drink out of her straw cups. On a typical day, Ashton will drink 45-60 ounces a day. We put about an ounce of apple juice mixed with 8 ounces of water. It tastes terrible but she loves it. The only trick is limiting it at night or else she will wake up with a full diaper in the wee hours of the morning. I asked the doctor about this at her last appointment to rule out Type I Diabetes. He said it was okay and she is just a super hydrated kid that pees a lot. Thank goodness we use cloth diapers because she goes through a ton of diapers every day.

8. Art projects with me. My sister in law gave Ashton and I an art book for toddlers for Christmas. We've done a few things from the book. I love that Ashton is getting to the age to do some of these projects. They don't last too long but it helps give us something to do. We made some fun goop out of corn starch and water. She liked it.

 9. Dressing herself. She has my fashion sense.

 That's some of Ashton's favorite things. Those back home will get a chance to see this in person in just a few short weeks! She is full of fun and energy so be prepared!

Video Dump

I forget to look on Joseph's phone for pictures and videos. I looked today and found these priceless moments. We love our baby girl! Enjoy! (I apologize for the fact that you have to turn your head to see some of them).

Our Month So Far

2015 has been busy already for the Wilcox household. We started out the year with Terry and Anah visiting from Austin with their boys. They made us the last stop before moving to Utah. We had a lot of fun going swimming, playing at the park, and opening more presents. Ashton really enjoyed having cousins to play with again and will miss that.

We finally finished our entertainment center. We like it a lot. We kept looking for one with doors at furniture stores. But with people having huge TVs now, they don't make many with doors. So we built one as having doors was very important to me.

Ashton had her 15-month check up with the doctor. She is healthy and happy. She weighed 23 pounds and is 32 inches long. When I was her age, I weighed the same but was two inches shorter. Ashton continues to be pretty tall. Her first set of molars are almost in. I'm excited that she now has more teeth in her mouth than are left to come in. We're over half way with stupid teething!

It melts my heart that Ashton loves reading so much. This is her reading to herself at the library. She loves visiting the library every week.

Then on the 9th, Joseph and Ashton flew to Utah for his sister's wedding. Initially the plan was for him to go by himself but as time passed, we decided to take advantage of the fact that Ashton flies for free. Joseph nicely offered to take her and I quickly took him up on it. Their flight left at 6:30 so we were up at 3:30am. Ashton actually woke up first. How nice of her! Stupid teeth/cold/sleep problems/whatever else can possibly cause a toddler to not want to sleep!

Snow for the first time.

Some cousins at the wedding

Loved eating Joseph's cheesecake

Playing with Whitey the cat

Airplane entertainment

I looked forward to five days with a house to myself but by 4pm on Friday, I was missing my baby girl (and Joseph of course) more than I thought. The longest I've been away from Ashton is about seven hours when I went to Houston for a day. This trip definitely helped me prepare for future trips we're planning (aka Spain!) where I'll be away from Ashton.

I planned a baby shower the Saturday that Joseph and Ashton were out of town. It was fun to decorate and it gave me the excuse to actually clean the house as opposed to picking up only the visible crumbs. I also dusted. I think that's the first time since we moved into our house that I have done that. The theme was Noah's Ark "two by two" as my friend is having twins.

The rest of the weekend was spent sleeping, working on crafts, and organizing some things around the house.

I went to pick them up from the airport and got a gate pass. That way, I could go through security and meet them at the gate. Ashton ran right to me and never let go. She laid her head on my shoulder and was so quiet and still. It was pretty cute and a nice feeling to know I was missed.

The rest of the month will continue to be busy. Stay tuned for more exciting events!

Christmas 2014

We had a wonderful little Christmas in Lake Jackson this year. It is always hard to be away from our families during the holidays but it is also nice to have our own family traditions.

We started some traditions over the past few years of being together but this was the first year we actually could do them all. With the Alabama/Mississippi/Florida trip in December, it set a lot of planning back so I barely got up Christmas decor. To make up for it, we're leaving it up for several more weeks. Actually, that's just my excuse to not have to take down the Christmas lights.

Christmas Eve, we did a simple dinner with bread and salad. We did this to remember the simplicity that surrounded the birth of Jesus Christ. It was nice not to worry about making a larger, more time-consuming meal. We also opened new Christmas pajamas. It was a fun night with Ashton as she loved unwrapping presents.

Christmas morning started with Ashton waking up at 7am. We're always hopeful she'll sleep in one of these days. Well, Christmas Day was not that day. Oh well. Maybe next year. Ashton enjoyed opening presents but got pretty bored towards the end. She just wanted to play with her toys instead of open more of them. Here are some things she got:

One of her stocking gifts was full-strength apple juice. Typically, we dilute her juice with a LOT of water. She loved her juice!

My anniversary/Christmas/we've waited long enough gift! Joseph surprised me big time with it.

Her main focus was getting every piece of wrapping paper off.

Very excited to have her own baby doll. She puts it in her small stroller and pushes it around.

Her fancy New Balance running shoes from my brother.

I finally finished this pillow lounger. Ashton wasn't too impressed but I love it.

A talking picnic basket. She liked it until we got sick of pushing the buttons for it.

She also got the start of her college savings account. We're pretty boring parents as we thought that was an awesome gift. Overall, she loved her presents.

After presents and yummy cinnamon rolls, we went to the neighborhood park to burn off some energy. That evening, we had some friends over for dinner and playtime with Ashton and her (boy)friend, Will.

Vacation 2014: Hattiesburg

Friday was probably the most exciting day of the vacation for me. Not only did Joseph take Ashton for three hours so it was a mini-vacation for me, I also got to celebrate my graduation.

It was fun walking around campus finally and seeing where I actually "went" to school. I also got to meet my professors face to face, which was a lot of fun. They have heard so much my family so it was fun for all of us to meet. The speaker at the graduation focused on teaching and raising our children to be good citizens. It was nice to me because he spoke about how we can view children as tantrum throwing, terrible, vomit inducing, drooling, crying messes (which Ashton was being due to teeth and a week away from her home). Or we can view them as opportunities to change the world. By teaching Ashton and raising her to be a good, strong, motivated woman, I can help her change the world. It was a much needed talk for me as I was exhausted.

I will say, I was surprised by the size. USM is about half the size of BYU. BYU never seemed that big to me. But now I realize how big it was. At my undergraduate graduation, there were just over 700 students walking from just the school of business. I was number 698 if I remember correctly. At this graduation, there were maybe 300 students represented about five different colleges. For the sake of not listening to 700 names, it was nice.

Now I'm officially done with school. It has finally sunk in. I have applied to teach online at BYU-Idaho so we'll see what happens. The classes I am eligible to teach are all currently taking applicants for an "interest pool." So basically, they only call me if they need someone for a specific semester. It would be nice to have that job so I can keep up my resume for when I enter the workforce full-time again.

Walking across

Joe must have been proud to have her sleeping.

That night, she spilled all my M&Ms out on the hotel floor. You can tell it was a stressful week when I buy M&Ms

Had to buy a t-shirt with my new school

Vacation 2014: Mobile

After the zoo on Thursday, we drove to Mobile. We spent the night there and went to the Bellingrath Home and Garden Christmas lights show. It was pretty cool. Initially, we planned to do more in Mobile but due to Ashton's temperament, we made some changes. It was still cool to see the lights. Ashton also started getting her molars in Mobile so that was even more fun.