But wait! There's more!

I also wanted to tell everyone that I passed my last class for my BYU undergrad and will be officially graduated as of December 18!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Thanksgiving with the Skankeys!!!

For Thanksgiving this year we went down to Yuma, Arizona (the lettuce capital of the world, according to Tish) to spend it with my family's really good friends the Skankeys. Yes, that really is their name. It's awesome. My family has known the Skankeys since basically forever. Tish has been a second mom to me. But anyway, we spent the Thanksgiving holiday with them and we had so much fun! We ate, and ate, and ate, and ate, and ate some more! We are still stuffed silly. :)

Day 1 - Thursday
Sand Dune Sledding.

Robert took us out to the sand dunes (eaarrrrrly in the morning) with Bryce, Kirstin and Sam to slide down the sand dunes on boogie boards! The worst part was having to hike back up the dunes after you'd gone down, but it was still really fun!

It was soooo windy when we got there!

Everything was sandy by the time we got back

John was much more adventurous than me (big surprise). He went down head first!

This was my trip down the big hill. I started with the little one first. But on this trip, I fell at the bottom and hit the back of my head really hard and tweaked my neck. Ouch! I couldn't tilt my head back for the rest of the week and it was hard to turn my head too.

Running down the hill

John making the loooong trek back up the hill

The sand dunes :)

John's trip down the dunes

My trip down the hill (don't worry, this isn't the one where I hit my head) (First it shows Robert going down, then i'm really far away. And when I fall backwards...that's on purpose ha ha)

Day 1 - Thursday Cont.
The Big Pie Bake Off

Tish had us participate in a pie bake off, Boys vs. Girls. Me and Kirstin against John, Bryce and Sam. The boys ended up winning. (but we don't talk about that. I think it was a fluke ha ha) But it was still really fun.

Team AWESOME

Team Manly (that's what they called themselves...)

Mixing mixing

More mixing

The boys had a larger can of pie filling, so they made two, the girls' pie is in the back (with the really cute crust)

Day 1 - Thursday Cont.
LOTS of food. LOTS.

We went to the Workmans' home with the Skankeys to have a BIG turkey dinner. There was so much yummy food! We ate and ate and ate and ate. yummmm. It always amazes me how much food John can put down. AND have like, half a pie! ;) After dinner and clean up we played some games and then went to the theater to see the movie The Blind Side. It was really good! We all left feeling so grateful for the blessings we've been given of a home and family and education. We are so blessed.

Day 2 - Friday
Black Friday and Homework. A Mellow Day

We slept in because we stayed up soooo late with all the fun we were having. John needed to get some homework done that morning so after we went to lunch at Kneaders with Tish, Grandma Baldwin and Kirstin, we dropped John off back at the hotel and the girls went shopping. The black friday sales were CRAZY! The lines looped ALLLL the way around the store! I was looking for Christmas presents for John, so I can't tell you what I found, because John reads this ;) After fun shopping, I went back to the hotel and picked up John and we went over to the Skankey's house for ANOTHER turkey dinner! (we seriously just ate and ate this trip) Tish found her turkey on clearance and soon we began calling the turkey "Clarence the Clearance Turkey" and we'd all laugh. They decided they'd name their turkey every year.

Clarence was very tasty

yay for yummy food!

The Workmans came over to play more games!
The Skankeys introduced us to a game called Ticket to Ride. It's so much fun!

Day 3 - Saturday
Not so mellow day - i.e. BYU vs. Utah football game

While most of the day was spent in anticipation of the BYU game, everyone made me watch the new Star Trek movie, even though i've never watched Star Trek in my life. So i was the only one who didn't fully know what was going on, but it was still a good movie. I didn't mind watching it. But of course, every time Spock did his whole "live long and prosper" thing, everyone did the little hand sign. I thought it was hilarious. Surrounded by nerds!!! But you gotta love them!


Then came the fateful BYU game. We are so excited BYU won!! It was so intense, mostly because of who we were with, watching the game. Robert and Mark Workman were way into the game and we all cheered SO LOUD when George made that amazing touchdown in overtime! HURRAY!!!!!!! GO COUGS!!! It was the perfect end to the trip.

Day 4 - Sunday
Church and Ride Home

Sunday we checked out of our hotel and went to church in the morning and then came back and had a very yummy lunch of turkey leftovers and everything else we ate the days before. Then we finally had to leave our friends and come home and back to reality. We had so much fun this week. We love the Skankeys!!

Cowles Mountain

Okay, so by Utah standards, it's not exactly a 'mountain', but it IS the highest point in the San Diego county. And since we live practically next door, we figured we should probably hike it :) It took us about 2 hours to get up and down, it was rocky and dusty and hot, but there was an awesome breeze the higher we got up. When we got to the top, they had displays of the views and markers showing you what you were looking at. We could see Mexico from where we were! (yeah i know, we live like, right next to the border. well, we thought it was cool.)

And now our muscles are sore. :)



But it was fun :)

100 Things We Are Thankful For

One of the first family home evening activities that we did was compile a list of 100 things we are thankful for. It was really good for us to do that at the time, because we were in the middle of medical adventures with MRSA and John started getting sick. So it was a good reminder for us of how incredibly blessed we are. (but you'll notice a theme of being grateful for modern medicine...it's been a big help!!)

So, here it goes!

100 Things We Are Thankful For
(in no particular order)

1. each other!
2. a good can opener ;)
3. the gospel
4. the atonement
5. Jesus Christ
6. doctors
7. medicine
8. the internet
9. the scriptures
10. our temple marriage/eternal family
11. good friends
12. beautiful weather
13. we have working bodies
14. America
15. Wonderful families!!!
16. temples
17. we married our best friends
18. we have financial support
19. we have a car
20. John is in school/getting his masters
21. God loves us
22. the beauty of the earth
23. presents!
24. we have a nice apt to live in
25. a bus stop around the corner
26. the Bosens!
27. John's GA position
28. lights
29. air conditioning
30. Washer
31. Dryer
32. a library on the corner of our street
33. the power of prayer
34. we don't have worse health conditions ;)
35. the prophet(s)
36. indoor plumbing (yes!!)
37. the priesthood
38. our musical abilities/talents
39. pastry school
40. kisses!
41. mango dessert
42. BYU
43. church leaders
44. the piano
45. the Spirit
46. a bed/place to sleep
47. cell phones
48. clothes to wear
49. freedoms
50. our senses
51. God's hand in history
52. our talents
53. our relationship
54. the Lord's protection
55. patriarchal blessings
56. John's mission to Texas
57. being raised in the gospel
58. games!
59. books
60. ICE CREAM
61. Mike mugs
62. the Skankeys
63. IKEA
64. the commandments
65. antibiotics
66. nausea medication ;)
67. general conference
68. that Ashley can graduate BYU
69. refrigerator magnets
70. Journals
71. Hymns
72. the sacrament
73. baptism
74. our extended families
75. pictures/memories
76. our kitchen (and fun gadgets!)
77. the dining table
78. movement of the universe
79. sprite and crackers
80. music
81. art
82. carpeted floors
83. good professors/teachers
84. animals
85. return policies
86. libraries
87. policemen/firemen
88. a bus route for John
89. home/visiting teachers
90. temple workers
91. growing experiences
92. laptops
93. good people
94. a bike
95. yogurt (and probiotics)
96. clean water
97. hot water
98. priesthood blessings
99. electricity
100. the Plan of Salvation

Well, there you have it!! Happy Gratitude Month!!! :)

We're still alive!!

We've made it 3 whole months of marriage and we're still alive!! yay! And that's saying something, considering we've been sick almost all of it ;) But we're here! And John is feeling better!! Hurray! He's still got a little bitty bit of a cough left, but he's doing so much better compared to last week. Thank goodness! We're reeeeaaallly hoping this is the end of that adventure, we're doing everything we can to prevent further infection, but i guess we'll see, huh? ;)

Another One!

I've picked up another new hobby. Painting! John sent me on an "assignment" to explore a place I'd never been. I went to Mission Trails Regional Park not too far from our house. I packed up some paint and canvas paper, and painted a landscape scene of the mountains. But I'm not going to show you that one. In the process, I learned I'm not a landscape painter ;) But I enjoyed painting so much, I worked on another this afternoon and I painted the draper temple, where John and I were married! :)

Ta Da!!

I'm actually quite proud of myself, as I've never really done this before :)

But the update on the Sicky:
As of today, John is doing MUCH better, he hasn't coughed hardly at all today and he says he's feeling much better. He hasn't had a fever for several days. We went back to the doctor on Wednesday because John was getting a rash on Tuesday and we thought he was allergic to the antibiotics urgent care had put him on. But by the time we actually got to the doctor's the rash was basically gone. So we were very confused. But it hasn't come or anything, so that's a relief. But since the doctor's on Wednesday, he's just been getting better, which is a huge relief to us. I haven't gotten anything from him yet, and we're hoping it stays that way. We want to be done being sick!!!

Not Again!!

Oh no!! The bacteria has found us again! Or, rather, it has found John again. Poor guy, and it keeps showing up on his face. We had to go to Urgent care again yesterday because of some big red bumps forming on John's chin. NOT your average acne problem either...this was big stuff. The bummer thing is that John just keeps having these infections spring up on his face! First it was a boil, then a stye, then cellulitis, and now this (we didn't get a name for it). The doctor (who was very strange...) gave him some more antibiotics so we are hoping that helps. But this morning at about 4, John woke up with a temperature of about 100.3. Yuk. He was dizzy and achy and had a bit of a cough too. He took some ibuprofen to keep the fever at bay and around 8 the fever had pretty much dissipated. But he's still on ibuprofen to keep it away for now. So I'm making him rest and drink lots of fluids and just to lay low for now and we'll see what happens i guess.

A New Hobby

So we finally got our wedding pictures from our photographer and I set to work getting them printed out. As a wedding gift, we got a scrapbooking album with pages and some paper and stickers to create our wedding album. When i got the pictures printed, I got started.

Now I'm HOOKED. I love to scrapbook! I had so much fun putting these pages together and making a total mess of the dining table. John said I looked like a pro scrapbooker with all the scraps of paper and glue and stickers and junk everywhere. ha ha

But i wanted to show everyone what I've done, mostly because this is my first time scrapbooking and i'm so excited and proud of myself :)

Engagement Pictures

Getting my endowment

This one is my favorite so far

Pictures of everyone at the temple for our sealing

So that's only about half of what I did yesterday and I had so much fun! Unfortunately, I'm out of the paper I want to use as the background for our color coordinated pictures at the wedding. So I guess I'll have to wait until I can get more. But it's a start! I can't wait to keep working on it.