Unconditional Love

Today, I'm thankful for the fact that I am comfortable enough in my own skin that I can make a complete a** of myself in public.   For example - my brother and I made up a dance. It's called The Unconditional Love Dance - meaning that a person who loves you unconditionally should continue to love you even after seeing you dance like this (thanks for the video, mom):



That would be some true love, right there.

I'm also thankful for cameras/pictures.  I love the fact that we can capture moments of our lives on film, so that we can later reflect back and reminisce about those many meaningful moments (such as the one previously mentioned).

Speaking of pictures, here are a few more marvelously memorable moments from my trip for your viewing pleasure:

One of the days we were in Hawaii, we went snorkeling at Ke'e Beach. I was amazed at how many fish I saw- and also how vibrant their colors were. I also saw a sea turtle resting under a rock, which was pretty dang cool. The water was vividly blue. It was gorgeous. No pictures of that, sorry.

Emily and Kennedy did some boogie boarding in the ocean.

Marie watched them from the side lines.

We saw a beaching Monk Seal. It was so cute :)

This beach is at the end of the road, on the northwestern side of Kauai. Right next to the beach is a trail head where you can start the hike to see the Na Pali coast (which is one of the most spectacular sights I've ever witnessed- see this old blog post).  Since we didn't have hiking shoes with us, and the trail was muddy, we decided to just go up a little bit so that we could see the first lookout. We left the kids back at the beach with their grandma (and with the soon-to-be-hungry baby...).

This was our first spectacular view. Um... wow? Yeah. If you look closely, you can see our three little girls playing in the water.

See? ( I was testing my camera's zooming capability. I was impressed.)

Here is the view of the Na Pali coast. Beautiful, eh?

 And this is my sweeter than sweet sister-in-law, Jen  :)

At this point in our hike, baby Aysia was hungry and wanted mommy. So Brandon and Jen ran down the trail as quickly as they could to relieve our mother of the screaming infant... Sorry, mom. :)

Which reminds me- I'm thankful for my mom. This really deserves its own separate blog post, but for now I will just say this: my mom is such a wonderful person.  She is extremely loving, kind, caring, smart, funny, creative, supportive, accepting, generous, beautiful, compassionate, talented, etc... and, above everything else, she still loves me after seeing me perform the aforementioned dance.

Shout out

I'd like to give a little shout out to the woman who carried me in her womb for nine months and then went through excruciating pain to give birth to me, who patiently and painfully raised me through my adolescence... and who is now in Hawaii with me, celebrating her birthday (yesterday).



Happy Birthday, mama. I love you lots and lots. This trip has been fantastic because of you!

Baby Mama

I have the best mom in the world. Please don't argue with me. I already know I'm right. And I will tell you why.


She has loved me unconditionally since the day I was born. And I am sure of that.

She has always supported me. No matter what I wanted to do with my life. In fact, I remember once when I was a teenager, she had said to me "You know, Ashley... if you decided you are a lesbian, I would be ok with that. I would still love you." I thought she was completely insane when she had said that to me (since I was totally boy-crazy), but I understand now why she said it.

She is absolutely beautiful. In every way. I mean, just look how hot she looks in this swimsuit.

She dressed our family so cute. She always put me in cute clothes, made sure I matched, curled my hair... and as soon as I could do it all myself, I sucked at it.

(see below)





And even though her children decided to be completely nerdy and lack all sense of style, she was still so proud of us. Even when I went through my totally awkward stage where I wore pop-can tops for all of my jewelry, and pants that were 3 sizes too big for me because they were "cool," and dyed my hair with kool-aid, she still loved me. I can't even begin to fathom how tough that would have been for a mother.

She and her siblings are extremely odd. And I love them dearly. It makes family gatherings SO much fun. They have the weird gene. She totally passed it on to my brother. It must have skipped me because, seriously... I mean... anyone you talk to will tell you I am SO not weird. Really. No, honestly. . . What, you don't believe me? Psh. Whatever.

Anyway, she is very silly. And it makes it so much fun to be around her. She also encourages my silly side. One particular day when Ashlee and I were about 14, we were at my house and my mom convinced us that each piece of furniture had a distinct "pitch." So my mother had a great laugh at our expense as Ashlee and I went around to each bed/chair/wall and said "oh.... oh..." raising our voices up and down until it would resonate back to us so we'd know we found the right pitch. I can't believe we fell for that. She was so full of crap.

A few years ago, she moved up to Seattle. And although I miss her, it is so much fun to go visit her and have good quality mommy/daughter time.

She is super duper intelligent. If I ever have a question about pretty much any topic, I just ask her. She's like a walking Wikipedia. And dictionary. She is a word nerd.... and that quality has definitely begun to rub off on me.

She is a strong woman. She raised me on her own for a big part of my life. I am only now able to imagine how difficult that would have been.

She is more talented than anybody I know. Honestly. I have never known anyone who is SO gifted in so many areas: music, art, crafts, photography, computers, sewing, writing, business, web design... the list goes on.

She is always there when I need to talk. Especially if it's late at night, like 3 in the morning, since that's about how late she stays up.

I can always go to her for advice and I know she'll never judge me.

She has always called me "Baby." And still does. Every time we talk. And I love it.

She has shown me how to be a good mother.

If I ever get down on myself, she always knows how to boost me up. She believes in me and in what she knows I can do.

She is a fantastic grandmother. She always sends cute little packages for EVERY holiday, which contain anything from candy, decorations, photographs, to creatively-shaped pasta, magazines, etc. She is always thinking of me. And of others. She is extremely selfless and is always willing to help.

My mother taught me so many things:

Life is not black and white.
People aren't just "good" or "bad."
Love people for what they do and who they are. Not what they may believe.
Eat lunch with the kid who sits alone every day.
Love yourself.
BE yourself.
Be proud of who you are and what you can do.
You can do anything.
It's ok to be different.
It's ok to question.
Explore every avenue.
Follow your dreams.
You are worth it.
Boys are stupid.
Stand up for what you believe in.
Every girl needs a good cry once in a while.
You are strong.
You are loved.

I love you, mom.