Our Summer Life

It's now been a week or so since our arrival to California and we are all settled in. Shaye is busy back working hard everyday and I am enjoying the summer life:) I'm not going to get a job out here this year since I came out later and we will only be here for about six more weeks. So lucky for me my sister Mikkel is here and I can hang out with her and Trajen and it seems that our days go by quickly and we are always doing something. It has been great and we have already done some fun things. 

Last Saturday a bunch of us wives took a trip to the Oakland Temple, which is only like 20 minutes away from our house. We had a great time. I want to go every week! I really should at least that would be something good and productive I would be doing.

The temple is located up on a hill with an awesome view! There is an over look where you can see the whole city. This is all of us wives in front of the over look, so you really can't see it.

So that is the city in the distance but you really can't tell from the picture:)

Here we are in front of the temple. Me, Whitney, Ashley, Hollie, Mikkel and Christine.

That weekend the whole office got to go to a baseball game in San Fran. It was a fun game and the Giants won! It was a beautiful day surprisingly, everyone thought it would be really cold cause it had been all week. We were pleasantly surprised, it was prefect!

After the game Shaye and I decided to see a few sights since we were already down town. We went down to the Pier and walked around in the different shops. It was so crowded so we didn't stay there very long. We did see the bushman though. If any of you have been to San Fran you have probably seen the man that hides behind a bush and scares people for fun and some people give him money. It's so funny to me cause this is like this guys career. I saw him there doing the same thing like 3 years ago when I came with some friends and he is still here! I wonder how much money he makes sitting there scaring people? There was also a cat guy with a sign that said "Pet my cat for $1." And people actually do it, crazy! Anyways, here we are in front of the Golden Gate Bridge. We are having fun in California!

Our Move/Vacation/Traveling Adventures

I don't even know where to start it has been awhile since my last post and A LOT has happened. Shaye returned from Cali and we finished packing up our apartment with the help of his Mom and Mike we got everything into one U-Haul and headed back to Cedar City to put our stuff in storage. We still don't know where we will be moving to after the summer but we liked where we stored our stuff last year in Cedar so we just took it back there. So a big thank you to Monica and Mike for all of their help. They are real professional packers and do such a great job, we are lucky they are always willing to help us:) So after the move we headed to Kanab to enjoy some time in Southern Utah before heading back to California. Let me tell you we had A LOT of fun and Shaye certainly got his outdoor fix. As you will see in the many many pictures to follow we spent a great deal of time around a fire, ate LOTS of marshmallows and had tons of fun! We first went to Kanab so we could be at graduation to see my sister Emily and Shaye's brother Brendon graduate. It was a fun time, Emily was the Senior class pres. so she gave a little speech and our cousin Dalton was the Salutatorian so he got to speak too. Anyways, there are many pictures to follow so enjoy:) 

These were are first mallows of the trip. The night after graduation we made smores in the back yard at my parents house.

On Monday night we decided to make tinfoil dinners for everyone. So we headed up the canyon behind my parents house for a nice little family night. The dinners turned out great, (which they always do when Shaye makes them he is a pro tinfoil dinner maker:) This is Nate and Shaye gathering wood for the fire. Nate was loving all of our outdoor activities. 

More marshmallows, I think Nate ate the most mallows of all!

Me and Mom enjoying the nice evening watching the boys cook us dinner, it was great!

One afternoon we took Nate and Jennica for a little hike up Peek-a-boo Canyon. It was great fun. Nate gathered tons of sticks and was trying to build a fire. He is so smart, as long as he keeps the fire outside:)

Southern Utah is so beautiful, I love it!

Shaye and Jenn trying to catch fish in this little stream.

This really was a nice little break for us and we were able to see all of our family. We went up to Beaver for a couple days and went 4-wheeling with Grandpa Chuck and Connie. They took us all over Beaver mountain and we saw some wildlife which made Shaye happy and we also saw some pretty scenery, which made me happy:)

We took a little break to explore in these rocks at the top of the mountain.

This picture doesn't even do the the view justice but behind us was just beautiful, thanks Chuck and Connie for taking us!

Now for our next adventure we went with my family up to the Heaton Ranch up by Alton. My parents have some nice friends in the Heaton family that let them use it for the weekend. My family really doesn't do the camping thing so this was perfect. We were out in the woods but we had beds to sleep in and most importantly, bathrooms! It is such a nice place. The cabin is huge and there is a fun little pond behind it with a little row boat. There are also two zip lines which were tons of fun. There was also a volleyball net set up which we put to use in a very exciting game, well maybe not too exciting. Lets just say you could tell that none of us had ever really played volleyball, but it was fun!

Here's Nate and Shaye going for a little ride around the pond.

Everyone tried out the zip line, even Dad! If you can't tell he was having a great time.

Me and Emily enjoying the cozy fire.

Friday night we had some more family come up and join us for dinner and fun. My aunt Kristi and Brooklyn came up with Grandma Brown. Also my uncle McKay and his family were down for the weekend so they all came out for the fun. We had such a great time with lots of laughs and some great food of course!

Here's Nate taking the love birds for a ride:)

All the girls around the fire.

The sunset was beautiful above the mountains and then there was this full moon.

Here's everyone around the fire.

Brandon decided to take this little boat out and challenge the kids to a boat fight. Unfortunately for Brandon he found that his boat had a hole in it. Soon he was standing with his feet completely covered in water trying to get back to shore.

After a long day of playing everyone was tired.

Mom was so tried she just climbed in her sleeping bag sitting on the couch.

Dad wasn't tired, the night was still young.

Brandon ended up sock less. His socks were soaked from his boating adventure so he thought he would put them on the stove in the house to dry them faster. Well he doesn't recommend it, as you can see they were burnt to a crisp!

The next morning we had a great time playing volleyball, fishing in the pond and playing horseshoes. This is Dad and Shaye playing horseshoes, Shaye was the winner. He beat Dad and Brandon, he has a hidden talent for horseshoe throwing, who knew!:)

After all of our outdoor fun it was time to begin our trek back to California so Shaye could get back to work. So we headed out but made a few more stops:) We stopped to spend a couple great days with Grandma Alta in Vegas. We had so much fun visiting and making our way around Vegas. Grandma Alta's friend was able to get us some free tickets to a couple shows. They were mostly people that are trying to get started in Vegas. One of the guys we went to was a magician and he was on America's Got Talent a few years ago so he was pretty good.

Here we are with Grandma Alta. Thanks so much for all the fun, it was great!

One evening she took us miniture golfing on this really nice golf course. It was the nicest miniature golf course I'd ever seen. It was lots of fun and a perfect night, the weather was great!

We had such a great move/vacation/trip. Now we are in California and just trying to get settled. Shaye is back working and I am cleaning! Our apartments are SO SO nice but there were several single boys living here before we got here so if you could just imagine what it was like. Now it's clean and looks great and I am really enjoying it!

I Did It!

This is a very exciting day and I just wanted to let everyone know that I made it through the month on my own and Shaye will be home TONIGHT!! I couldn't be more excited, I have had enough of the single life. I must say that I did better on my own than I thought I would. I must give thanks to American Idol for giving me something to look forward to each week. And the best part is that Kris Allen won and that is just the way it should be. I must say that I did my part in helping him. I am slightly embarrassed to admit that I did vote but I didn't have anything else to do all by my lonesome, but I'm glad I did cause he won so my voting was not in vain:) I also must thank my wonderful family again I got to go down to my aunt Natalie's a couple times this weekend to see her new baby girl she had last week. She is a beautiful little girl and it was so fun to see her. On Sunday we had a good old Brown family dinner with Grandma and Grandpa as well as Lois and McKay and kids. It was great fun and I was glad I could spend time with them.

Also work as kept me busy while Shaye has been away and everyone I work with is so nice to me and that helped to make my life better. I am sad to be leaving my job I made some great friends and everyone truly was so wonderful to work with. On my last day they were so sweet they put together a surprise going away party for me after work. I had no idea, I was ready to leave work at six and didn't understand why everyone was moving so slow. Then others showed up from different offices and I started to get what was going on. We had some good pizza and a very yummy cake!

They even decorated my office with streamers, balloons and a sign that said "Good luck Ash. We'll miss you." They are all so sweet.

Here are a few of the people I worked with. I talked them into letting me take a picture before we left. I was glad I happened to have my camera in the car, that was a first:) 

So now it will be on to California for us so I will post again when we get all settled there.

I'm So Grateful for Family

So life has been interesting for me lately. Shaye is out in California selling alarms and I stayed here in Utah to pack up our apartment and work through the rest of this month. The lease on our apartment isn't up until the end of May so we decided it would be best for me to stay and work since we still have to pay rent this month and I could make a little more money. It has been kind of rough at times cause I get scared easily but I must say that I have done better than I thought I would. Thankfully I have such a wonderful family that are so kind to take care of me and let me hang out with them when I'm lonely. Last weekend I was able to hang out with my aunts Natalie and Kristi after Natalie's baby shower which was so fun and now this weekend I headed down to spend the weekend with my cousin Brittany. It felt just like old times when we were kids. Brittany and I have always been "best friend cousins" we used to spend a couple weeks together in the summer when we were kids. I would go up and stay at her house and she would come down to visit me in Kanab. She is the best and I am so so grateful that I could stay with her this weekend. We had so much fun laughing and chatting up a storm! She is a wonderful cook and was so nice to keep me fed for a few days. Of course we did some great shopping with my wonderful aunt Tye, (Brittany's Mom) as well as my other cousin Lacee. We had a fun girls night where we watched no other than "Twilight" and had some good brownies and ice cream. Also my "best missionary friend" Jenny Willis also joined us for our fun girls night and ended up staying at Brittany's with me since her roommate was out of town and she was home alone too. So we just had a good old sleep over! Brittany's poor husband was probably hating life but he was a good sport:) I'm so grateful for great family and friends, you guys are the best!

Here is Jenny, Brittany and I after church on Sunday. Thanks again Brittany, you are the best!

On Saturday I was also able to see some more of our family at the State Baseball game that Kanab was playing. Shaye's sister Jennica was so nice to call and invite me to come to watch Shaye's little brothers in the State baseball game with her, Larry and Kelly. It turned out to be the most exciting baseball game I've ever seen. One minute Kanab was down 12 to 2 and things were looking pretty ugly, then all the sudden they came back and scored 10 runs in one inning. It was so fun to watch and it was fun to be there to see Kanab win state. Shaye's brother even was apart of the winning play. It was tied 13 to 13 and Brendon was last up to bat. He hit the ball and the kid on third was able to slide home just before being tagged by the catcher and they won the game!

Also I got to see my little sis, Miss Emily after the game. Em's is a senior so that was a good way to end the year with an exciting win in the state game.

Here's Jennica and Brendon after the game. I was sad that Shaye couldn't be there cause he would have loved it. So I'm glad I went to represent for him:) Thanks for inviting me Jenn:)

Good job Kanab what an awesome game! Go Cowboys!

Mission Reunion and Spring Football Game

Well this post is a little bit of a catch up. It is also a little bit of a personal reflection type journal entry. So just a heads up:) A few weeks ago I got to go to my mission reunion and see some of my favorite people in the world. It was so wonderful to see some of the great friends that I made while I was serving as a missionary in the wonderful Massachusetts Boston Mission. It was so fun to see all my friends and remember all the great times we had. My mission was really one of the happiest and best times in my life. I have never learned so much in such a short time. I would say that I learned more as a missionary than in all of my years of schooling. I learned so much about the gospel, life, people, service, relationships and how to communicate with others. I learned that when you are serving others and do what's right you are happy. Really I feel like I learned a lot about life in general and the kind of person I wanted to be. I got the chance to meet so many great people that have influenced my life and really helped me become who I am today. I feel so blessed that I had the opportunity to serve a mission I wish I could go back and enjoy some of those days again, they were great!

Here are just a few of the wonderful girl's I got to serve with. Left to right: Cherie, Me, Jenny and Melissa. I was actually only companions with Jenny but Cherie and I lived in the same apartment for 6 months and she was so nice to take care of me when I was a brand new missionary. Now we are great friends. And Melissa was from St. George so we had our Southern Utah connection. Plus randomly we met at the St. George Temple before we even got to Boston:) And then my wonderful friend Jenny. She and I became the best of friends in the very short three months that we served together. We served in Boston and Cambridge together and had the best time riding all the buses and trains and finding our way around the city. Our favorite was walking across the bridge into Cambridge across the Charles river, what great memories:)

Here we all are with our wonderful mission President and his wife, President and Sister Thompson. They were the best! They taught us so much and looked after us like we were there own kids. Whenever we needed anything or didn't feel well we would call Sister Thompson and she always knew just what to do. Such great people that I am so blessed to know:)

This is me and my very last companion Misty Heaton. We were only companions for 6 weeks but we became such great friends. It was great to see her since I hadn't seen her since I left Boston almost 3 years ago. I look like I'm so happy to see her. I think I was laughing when we took this and my eyes are half closed, oh well:) It was so great to see everyone but there were lots of my companions that weren't there, like you Kate if you are reading this:)

Well back to the present...last weekend we got to go down to Snow College to watch Brandon's spring football game. It was lots of fun. Shaye and I actually drove to Cedar and Mikkel and I drove over to the game together while our husbands went hunting with some friends. So it worked out well. It was fun to see Brandon play again since we always enjoyed watching him in high school. It was different not to see him in red and white but we will get used to it. 

Here we all are after the game expect Mikkel who we had lost track of for the moment. I think she was moving the car. Sorry Mikkel we should have taken another one with you:) Good job Brandon can't wait until the fall so we can come to all you games!

Happy Easter!

Well it seems like it has been awhile since I put up a new post. Tonight I have some extra time because Shaye is out of town until tomorrow. He had an interview at the hospital down in Cedar City today. I had to stay home for work and now I am just trying to get through the lonely night time hours so what better thing to do but blog:) 

This past weekend was a great one because we got to go down to Southern Utah and it is always great when we get to see family:) It was Easter weekend so we headed down to Kanab on Friday and planned to get there in time for Shaye to play in the alumni baseball tournament. Well we did get there in time and we found just another reason why we need to move back to a small town. On Tuesday we were down in Salt Lake. As we were leaving and literally getting on the freeway we were pulled over by a cop on a motorcycle. He pulled us over for going 10 miles over the speed limit and said he would give us a break and write it for 5 miles over, gee thanks:) So then on Friday as we are driving to Kanab we are going a little fast, you know like 20 miles over the speed limit, of course we pass a cop and he pulls us over. I'm thinking, great two tickets in one week! Then the officer comes to the window and it is a officer we know from Kanab. He says to us"Where are you going in such a hurry?!" Shaye tells him that we are just trying to get to the alumni baseball game. The police officer is like, oh yeah you got to get to that and asks us to just slow down a bit. Can you believe that?! And that is why we NEED to move!

Anyways we did get to the game and Shaye had a great time and his team even won!! It was a fun game to watch and Shaye even made the play to end the game. He made a double play with an out at second and a throw to 1st for a second out! Good job Shaye! 

Here's the proud winner after the game. I just realized he had already taken off his game shirt, they had Kanab Alumni shirts that were cool but he must have taken it off.

Then on Saturday morning the Easter festivities began. Shaye volunteered to take Trajen to the Easter egg hunt at the park. We had a great time and Traj was a pro egg hunter. He got so many eggs we had to stop him so that some of the other kids could have some eggs.

Shaye and Traj getting ready for the big hunt. This is serious business:)

After the morning hunt we headed over to Leeds for the annual Jackson Family Easter dinner and egg hunt. We of course had a great time and enjoyed visiting with all the family. Always the highlight is the big egg hunt. We got some good stuff in our eggs and came away with $23 and some candy:)

Here's Shaye playing some serious games of ping pong at Grandma Jackson's.

This is such a cute picture of Traj and Mikkel. Unfortunately I have been having some allergy problems with my eyes and my one eye looks a little droopy:( 

Here we are with my Dad and Mikkel coloring Easter eggs at my parents house. It was great fun had by all!:)

I thought this picture was so cute of Nate reading a story to little Traj, so sweet.

Here's the boys beating up on Dad. He's such a good sport to play around with them.

It's a bird, it's a plane.....it's Trajen!

Since it was Easter we had to get an Easter picture after church. When I was growing up we always got a new dress for Easter and we would take pictures after church. When we were really young are dresses usually all matched. This year I didn't get a new Easter dress so I just wore one of my sister Emily's so I could feel like it was new, thanks Em's:) So here is our Easter 2009 picture, plus I wanted a picture with the beautiful red cliffs of Kanab.

After church we also went out and did some kite flying on the golf course. Shaye and Nate were having a great time. Look closely you can see them in the distance.

It was a great Easter break, we loved every minute of it. Hopefully we hear this week if we got into any of the hospitals we've applied to. It would be nice to know so I can stop worrying about it!