Not very good at Blogging.....

Clearly, I’m not very good at the blogging stuff. So, hold on to your seats for a long blog… with lots of pictures!

The end of July was the ‘girls’ trip to Vegas. Now, it’s not what you would typically think of as a ‘girls’ weekend in Vegas. It was my mom, my sister in law, and my mother in law. We had fun. I won. I shopped. I ate. Does it get much better than that?

After I got back from Vegas, 4 days later we were off for Disneyland! All had great fun! Thank gosh for speed passes! We must of rode Buzz Light Year 4 or 5 times a day! I was surprised at how many rides a 15 month old can go on!

Then off to Rock Falls, IL. Now, typically we fly into Chicago and hop in the rental car and drive the 3 hours to Rock Falls. Not this time. We spent some time in the Windy City. Chicago is awesome. After we got to our hotel, the boys (David, dad, and brother) took off to catch a Cubs game. They had an awesome time sitting in the ‘bleachers’ with all the partiers. Something tells me that they will be doing that again. Mom, Ashlynn, Brianna, and I took in American Girl store. We had dinner there and did some serious shopping. After the American Girl store, us girls took a horse drawn carriage ride down Michigan Ave & the waterfront. It was wonderful!

Then we were off to Rock Falls to do the family thing. It was so much fun watching Ashlynn play with all of her cousins. The older cousins played with Brianna (who was not her happy self at all!). For some reason our good byes was harder than normal for me this year. I think it had to do with seeing Ashlynn playing with her cousins. She is the youngest (except for Brianna) but she did a really good job keeping up with them. She also admires Brittany so much. Brittany is my cousin’s 15-year-old daughter. Brittany makes a perfect role model. I just wish that Ashlynn & Brianna were closer to their cousins. Instead, we settle for once every 2 year visits.

Although.... I guess that is why I hold on so dearly to my freinds here. I have no extended family here, so you guy's are MY FAMILY!

Family updates from a pretty boring family

Wow, where does the time go? Some times I feel like someone has a fast forward button and likes to play games with me. We’ve been busy with just life, nothing exciting at all. I don’t have anything new to report. Weight is the same. Not up, not down. Kids are good, with the exception of a cough they can’t seem to shake. Now David has a sore throat. Good times. Ashlynn had a teeth cleaning yesterday. Everything looks great. He took a look in Brianna’s mouth… poor little girl is cutting 4 teeth right now (2 of them are her molars) No wonder everything is going straight into her mouth to chew!

Went to the cabin for the 4th of July. We went to the Park's Parade. Well, the dime size hail put a damper in that plan. My poor mom and her friend drove there on the quads! What's a girl to do when in a hail storm riding on a quad... ride to the closest bar and wait the storm out! Good for them!!
Ashlynn went fishing for the first time. She loved it.... for about 15 minutes and then she was done. She was too cute in her pink hat, pink princess fish pole with matching backpack, and her pink princess tackle box!! (sorry about all the pictures, they are from my camera phone... not the best quality)

We went to Tempe Marketplace for dinner the other night. It was just one of those wonderful nights. We walked, we laughed, we (Ashlynn mostly) even skipped. Brianna was being a little independent. She wouldn't ride in the stroller, so I tried to carry her, but that's not what she wanted. So I put her down to hold her hand... still not what she wanted. She wanted down to walk all by herself. Every time she would take off in the wrong direction, I would take her by the hand. She would then squat in a sumo position (all her weight in her butt) and stay there until I would let go of her hand. As soon as I let go of her hand, she would pop up and start walking again. It was one of the funniest things she's done! I'm telling you, this kid is going to have me running!!! While walking we came across a splash pad. Ashlynn had fun getting wet and chasing Brianna. Brianna thought it was a game to see how close she could 'sneak' up to the spouts before it 'saw' her and sprayed water out. She would than run laughing! I have decided here is nothing as sweet sounding as kids laughing! You know those great big belly laughs!

Hoping to get some scrap-booking done this Friday. I have too many pages to even count that I’m behind on!!! Wish me luck.

That’s the Hightower’s in a nut shell.

Both girls at 1 year

Not a fair comparison... Ashlynn's photo is the only picture I have at work around her 1st birthday and Brianna's photo is a professional photo... none the less here they are:

Ashlynn at 1 year



Brianna at 1 year:



The girls together today:

Ashlynn's dance picture

Here it is.... actually I took a picture of a picture with my camera phone... so the quality is terrible. But she's still cute!

Ashlynn's 1st Dance Recital

Hi there! Ashlynn had her first dance recital on Sat. night. It was awesome. My normally shy little girl was dancing and doing her thing. For the finale all 100+ kids from the studio went on stage, she was standing in the front actually dancing.... well sort of. She just bounced a lot and waved her arms in the air, but she danced non the less! I am so proud of her! Here are some pictures from the rehearsal (Fri. night) and recital (Sat. night). There wasn't any good pictures of her in her costume. The dance studio took pictues a couple of weeks ago, so I will post a few of thier's when I get them.


Emily & Brianna at the rehearsal. The rehearsal took 4 1/2 hours. Emily and Cassie stayed with me the whole time! What a great friend!!! I sent David and Brianna home after hour 2!


Ashlynn after recital at 11:10 at night! Poor little girl was exhausted!



She wanted to wear her finale shirt as her PJ's. She looks like she's doing the 'sprinkler' move!

This is how every family should eat dinner....

In a Dora tent of course! Ashlynn's been asking to eat dinner in her Dora tent for a few days, and tonight we gave in.






It was a tight fit, but well worth the laughs we all had. The last picture is of Ashlynn, 'given' me the flex' as David asked her to do.

Weight Watchers - Weeks 3 & 4 and my baby's 1st birthday

Oh a lot to catch up on... I will start with weight watchers (today) and work backwards...
I didn't weight in last week, trust me, it would of been bad! Today I weighed in and I'm up 0.2 pounds. Not terrible, but definitely not great. I just wasted 2 weeks. Arg!
On a happier note: My baby turned 1 on May 9th. We had a birthday party for her on the 10th. It was more for the older kids, but Brianna still had a ball. It always warms my heart to see everyone that attends my daughters' birthday parties. I have several friends that had more than one party to attend that day and they still found time to fit us in. It just means the world to me, especially sense we all know that Brianna won't remember it at all.... To the friends that couldn't make I totally understand how busy our lives are and you can't be in 2 places at once.





This past Sat. was a busy one for the Hightower girls. We had Ashlynn's dance pictures in the morning, a gymnastics showcase at 12:30 and Emily's dance recital that night. Ashlynn had a ball watching all girls dance on stage! She would ask me at each dance if Emily was in it. My hope was that Ashlynn would see how the recital works so when she is faced with it for the first time (in 2 weeks) she won't freeze on stage. And, I think it just might work... keep your fingers crossed for me.

A couple pictures of Ashlynn at the Gymnastic Showcase

She isn't picking... I promise! She is showing me that she is #1!

Mother's Day
Mother's day was perfect. Got up went to church then met the families at Buco de Beppo (one of the many reason's I didn't' weigh in last week). Ashlynn made me this wonderful Mother's Day card at preschool. I thought I would share part of it with everyone.

What can I possible add... Ashlynn summed it up!