Many years ago, Garrett and I took a trip to Florida and left the girls home with our parents for one of the first times ever. The girls were just little and we missed them terribly and wanted to get something special for them. I remember wandering about in all the shops and then Garrett found what we were looking for...a silver necklace with a small cirlce that dangled at the bottom. The cirlce had a word imprinted on it and a few gemstones, too. We looked up what the girls names meant and thought maybe we could find something close to the meaning of their names. We learned that day that McKenna's name meant 'Ascend' and the closest thing we could find to that was 'Believe'...this is her necklace with baby blue stones around the edge (Ashlyn's has been lost). We also learned that Ashlyn's name meant 'Dream or Vision' and one of the cirlces had 'Dream' printed on it with pink stones around the edge, her favorite color. It was perfect! Little did we know back then really how perfectly the meaning of her name fits her. Ashlyn was always an easy and happy baby, always smiling and always fun and to this day it still fits her perfectly. As I write this right now and think about what her name means, I know we picked the right name for her. She is a dream. She is always smiling, she is never grumpy or mad or sad, she is pure joy and not only do we notice that, but so many around us comment on how happy and friendly she is...she is a dream!
For her birthday Garrett and I took Ashlyn out to dinner. She couldn't make up her mind because she wanted to make sure it was somewhere we wanted to go, too. We kept telling her this was her special night out and she could choose. She chose Pizza Factory. It was a fun night out with Ash. She also had her nails done, she got perfume, clothes, a game, earrings, a feather clip and she's looking forward to her friend birthday party on Friday night. Plans were to go ice skating but logistics of getting 14 girls and guys to the rink got to be a little too much, so we are going swimming and playing glow in the dark dodge ball at our friends indoor pool and gym.
This year, she is looking forward to getting her own cell phone, going to Jr high and going to girls camp with her big sister. It's going to be a great year for her. We love you, Ash!
