Out Hunting.

I must say that after going bow hunting and gun hunting multiple times I do like them both but when it is cold out like it has been, gun hunting is way better. It is amazing that Brandon and I can sit up in a tree stand and deer will walk right underneath us during bow season, but sitting up in a blind with a heater at my feet is so much more comfortable. The freezing wind constantly blowing in my face with only hand warmers in my gloves to keep me warm didn't work out for me very well. Now that gun season is here I am able to sit right in front of the Mr. Heater with the warmth surrounding me and the glow warming up the whole gun blind.
Of course we usually keep at least three of the windows open so I am still not completely warm, but it is still way better than sitting out in the open twenty feet in the air feeling like a marshmallow with all the layers of clothes that I had on. I was so happy to throw some of the under layers from bow season up at the top shelf of the closet. Also, now that Brandon has filled both of his buck tags, we go out there just to try and fill mine and some doe tags. It is also a lot easier for me to move around a little bit. It is so hard for me to sit still for a couple hours. Sitting up in that tree stand I was constantly getting reminders from Brandon that I shouldn't be moving so much because the deer could see us. Now I still get a few reminders when I forget that the deer could still possibly see us from the chest up through the windows, but at least I am able to move my feet around more.

Christmas Lights.

My boyfriend's mom's house is always completely decked out with Christmas decorations and lights during the holidays. This year I was fortunate enough to be able to share the experience with Brandon of finding all the Christmas stuff that still worked and setting everything up in the freezing weather... After finding everything that worked and putting it all up it took a total of multiple hours outside for three consecutive days. The first day was completely crazy with me dragging around an extension cord and plugging in all the figurines, candy canes, blow up snowmen and other crazy Christmas stuff. Then we moved on to all the totes filled to the top of Christmas lights tangled like someone spun them all together just for fun. Maybe they even tried to weave them together like a basket or a rug, who knows! I do not even want to know how long it took us to untangle the dozens of strands to find out that half of them did not even work! It is so irritating to find lights that are really bright and pretty and to find out that only half of them or not even half of them even work. Ahh. It was crazy. Some of the strands that only some of them worked we tried to fix by finding burnt out bulbs and replacing them with ones that worked. We also tried changing the fuses in the light strands that did not work at all, but half the time that didn't even help. It was pretty sad having to throw away a bunch of beautiful lights and blow up Christmas decorations because they were made cheap to only last a few years, but there was nothing more that we could do. In the end we ended up putting up everything that worked, and buying a few more strands even though we probably didn't need them and it looks amazing, like always.

Gymnastics.

In our small town of Bad Axe, Michigan, we have a small dance studio. I've never really been interested in the dance aspect of the studio, but I am interested in the gymnastics tumbling class they provide. When I lived in Phoenix, Arizona I started gymnastics when I was three years old. Starting the balance beam, the bars, and tumbling, but once we moved to Bad Axe they didn't have anything like that within fifty miles of where we lived so I had to settle with Sherry's Dance Studio and Gymnastics. I've grown to love this little studio though. After being a part of it for over ten years now last year was supposed to be my last year, my senior year of high school. The past two years though, I was assisting my gymnastics instructor with teaching the children and I was able to come back this year and not only help teach, but also participate in my class.

some of my little water cooler monsters!

I have to say teaching children ranging from five years old to high school seniors is definitely an experience in itself. There is never a dull moment especially with the five and six year old class! They do get a little irritating sometimes, but there is with everything people do. One of my favorite things that the children do is when one student gets something the whole class seems to think they need it too. I had one little girl that wanted a band  aid for her finger and less than two minutes later I had two more students that also needed band aids... There is one class of seven to nine year olds that think they are constantly dying of thirst. After allowing one student to get a drink from the water cooler, there would always be at least five more students behind the first one asking for a drink too. I don't know what they are thinking, that we're having a work break and everyone tells jokes around the water cooler?

Mario.

The New Super Mario Bros. for the Wii has to be one of of my top favorites for the Wii console. When I got the game about a year or two ago my friends and I were immediately obsessed with it. We played it as much as we could. Just about every single weekend during the winter and maybe sometimes during the week if we had a snow day or something we were sitting right there on the floor in front of the big screen tv, legs crossed with a Wii remote in our hands while the guys were outside doing whatever boys do... All spring summer and fall this year though I had never put the game into the Wii console, that is until a couple weeks ago when my boyfriend, Brandon, and I decided to play it one day that we were cooped up in the house. From that day on Brandon and I played the New Super Mario Bros. every morning that we had the chance to, and at night on nights when we had nothing to do and could not find a movie to rent that we hadn't already seen or wanted to watch.
We tend to get a little on edge while playing this game. If someone walked in and didn't know any better they would think we were crazy and sat on the couch everyday playing Super Mario Brothers and constantly arguing and yelling at each other. Usually though even though we get a little irritated when we bounce on each others head, accidentally kill ourselves or each other, or have to constantly repeat a level because we can't beat it, we know that we are just messing around and don't really get actually angry with each other. I'm going to be sad when we beat the entire game, we are already at world 9, the last world!

Bronner's.

Last weekend my boyfriend and I drove down to Bronner's Christmas Wonderland in Frankenmuth, Michigan. Apparently it is the world's largest Christmas store. I hadn't been there in about two or three years and Brandon hadn't been there since he was a kid, so on our way back from Bay City after Christmas shopping the day before we decided to drive there and check it out. Turning into the parking lot there was cars everywhere. It looked like we pulled into a busy airport parking lot or something. It had only opened about an hour before we arrived and the parking was completely crazy. We ended up driving around in circles for what seemed like forever and thankfully found one that was not a terrible hike from the entrance. Walking into Bronner's brought back the memories of the craziness. I forgot how packed it was and all of the people bumping into me constantly. I was glad that I made the decision not to bring my purse because i would have had to constantly be checking to make sure that I still had it and that no one tampered with it. We got handed a map when we walked in and I was very thankful that we had it when trying to figure out where all the different ornaments were. We didn't go in there for anything specific, so we just kind of wandered around the different sections and checking everything out. We were a little disappointed in the selection of dog ornaments. Brandon has two Yorkie's and the Yorkie ornaments did not look very realistic compared to some of the other dog ornaments. So in the end we decided to get one that said "I <3 my Yorkie." We also found some pretty unique trees and ornaments like the Bud Light and Budweiser ornament and tree and a tree that had deer antlers coming out of the center of a tree. 

Christmas Trees.

Christmas is always a crazy time of year. With all of the different things such as the outside Christmas lights going up, finding the different ornaments and other Christmas decorations, and putting the Christmas tree up, I just about lose my mind. Thinking about Christmas trees, I almost want to slam my head against the wall. I am usually the one that gets the ambition to get out the Christmas tree and all of the other Christmas decorations at both my mom's house and my dad's house. Usually with my mom, we will go out to a tree farm and pick out a nice real Christmas tree... usually on like one of the coldest days of December! This year though, my mom and her husband, Bob, decided that they wanted to buy a fake Christmas tree because in the long run it was cheaper and the one they had picked out was on sale. So they ended up buying a pre-lit tree that looked like it was frosted with snow. On the bright side though, my mother and I no longer get dozens of scratches along our hands and arms while trying to string lights around the tree. We always looked like we were attacked by vicious cats or something by the time we were done with the lights and ornaments. Another plus to this is that when we hang the heavy ornaments we can bend the branches so that the ornaments do not slip off the ends. I also have to think about my Christmas tree at my dad's house. I am pretty sure that it won't get put up by my brother, my dad, or his girlfriend, so it looks like its up to me to get them going on putting that one up too. I know from experience that there is no way I could bring that huge tree up from the basement and put it up by myself!

Thanksgiving.

Thanksgiving has always been a crazy time for me. Getting together with family is right up there at the very top of my list, but sometimes it gets pretty hard to actually find the time to see all of them. Since my parents are divorced its usually pretty hectic when the holiday season starts approaching. I have to figure out how to work my schedule around two separate thanksgiving dinners. The two sides of the family do not usually make it fair either. Whats the fun in having thanksgiving for one side on a different day or one at lunch and one at dinner? I'm pretty sure they think, "hey lets plan them at the same time so it is really hard for Ashlynne and Ryan to come to both dinners at the time that we actually eat!" It is not just my dad and my mom's family either. I also have to add in my boyfriend and his family as well. With my boyfriend also having divorced parents I thought it was going to be super difficult. Four different thanksgiving celebrations on the same day did not sound like fun at all. After talking to Brandon though, he told me that for Thanksgiving his dad's family usually does not get together. So, we only had to deal with three Thanksgiving dinners on Thanksgiving day. Brandon's mom was also very helpful with this problem. She tried to work around both side's of my families dinners. Another issue with our Thanksgiving schedule was that Brandon and I had planned on going out hunting during the afternoon. My dad's side of the family always has Thanksgiving at my house around 3:00 or 4:00, but my aunt Jackie decided to have it later, around 5:00. Usually this would be a good thing with working around my dad and my mom's schedule, but with hunting we don't get done until dark. So we ended up going to my mom's, hunting, my dads, then to Brandon's mom, being fashionably late to all three dinners.

Truck Driver

What is with all of these crazy drivers these days!?
Just this morning on the way to Delta College, Joanna and I came across so many drivers that in our opinion should not be allowed to own a driver's license. Of course with driving about sixty miles to school it would be expected to at least come across one crazy driver. On this lucky Morning Joanna and I were blessed with running into a lovely semi driver that had the bright idea to back out on the road in front of our car and another car that was coming from the opposite direction because he wanted to back into a field that was across the road from him. At first I thought that he was just going to back up a little bit on the road in front of the car so he could get on the road, but then he cut the wheel and backed into our lane too! I could tell that Joanna was thinking the same thing and she wasn't planning on stopping, so I had to tell her to stop. I'm glad that I told her when I did because the semi driver didn't give us much time to realize what he was doing and we probably would have hit him. I mean what the heck was he thinking. He obviously did not know how to back up a semi trailer because we sat there on the road for five minutes waiting for him to get out of the way. The guy that was guiding him into the entrance of the field must not have been one of the sharpest crayons in the box either because he was definitely not very good at guiding the driver. We weren't sure if he was just nervous and in a hurry because he was blocking traffic or he just sucked at reverse but that driver needs to learn not to back his semi up onto the road in the middle of traffic.

(I couldn't help but to take a picture!)

Soaring Eagle

Walking into the Soaring Eagle Casino in Mount Pleasant I hit a wall of noise and lights from the slot machines. This is only my second time going to a casino in my whole life and it is definitely a new experience. Taking a second to bring it all in, I stop and watch all the people around me. Some are at slot machines while others are at the card tables or just walking around. Every once and a while I hear an excited voice screaming, hmm they must have one big. Following Brandon through the maze of noisy machines, I allow him to lead me to one of the slots he wants to play and we sit down. After what only seemed like a few minutes, but really it was over an hour we decided that since we were losing way more than we were winning, we would head over to the Black Jack table. I did not have a clue how to play Black Jack a few hours earlier, but Brandon gave me a quick walk through of the game before we left for the casino. I was a little, okay a lot  iffy about the whole Black Jack thing, but Brandon assured me that it would be okay and he would help me out, so I sat down with twenty dollars while he threw a fifty dollar bill down. I was pretty confused at first, but the other people sitting at the table and the dealer were very nice and there was another girl at the table that also didn't know how to play. Everyone assured me that I was doing pretty good and it seemed like it because my pile of little red chips was growing. Brandon ended up throwing another fifty down, but he was betting like three more chips than I was. In the end I came ahead over one hundred dollars while he came ahead a couple hundred, my big better that he is. So overall it was a pretty good experience and I think we will stick to Black Jack instead of the slots from now on.

Opening Morning

Waking up before the sun comes up is definitely not for me, but opening morning of bow season I did it just for my boyfriend. The alarm going off right next to my ear should have been a huge eye opener, but instead I just rolled to the end of the bed, unplugged the phone and shoved it into Brandon's waiting hand. As the morning person that he is, he rolled out of bed and jumped into the shower as I just pulled the covers over my head and snuggled my head into my waiting feather pillow. I was hoping just to get another ten minutes of my wonderful beauty sleep until I had to fight myself to get up and get dressed so that I could walk into the freezing wind and sit in a tree stand for hours.

Reawakening to Brandon throwing his wet towel on me and him warning me that he will leave without me if I am not ready, I forced my bare feet to the carpet and stood up in order to find my hunting clothes which were waiting in a pile in order of what goes on first thanks to my OCD boyfriend. After putting on layers upon layers of under armor and my camouflage lined with light pink on the inside I trudged into the bathroom to brush my teeth as I could hear the faint sound Brandon rushing me in the background. After shoving my feet into my brand new camouflage boots and rolling my too long pants up thanks to my short legs I was ready to climb into the truck and ride to the woods. Arriving at the woods I was warned to be quiet as we walked towards the "Pond Blind" so that I could sit next to Brandon for three hours in the freezing wind on some hard boards and see nothing but a few does and a huge buck that never came in close enough to aim at. Man I must be a good girlfriend. :)

Brother Issues

After eighteen years with my one and only brother I have realized that we definitely have our ups and downs. In our younger years we fought back and fourth constantly, but as we grew up we shifted closer and closer together. After he realized that he was the cool older brother and I just constantly wanted to hang out with him and his friends because I loved him, he didn't mind too much when I was constantly by his side. (Of course there was a little coaxing by my parents and his friends!) Don't think that everything was perfect after that though, we still pushed our limits with each other a little too far sometimes and get irritated for stupid reasons, but that's what brothers and sisters do right? As we reached our teenage years dating began which interfered with the relationship with my brother and I. He would get mad at me for becoming friends with his girlfriends and he would get very protective with my towards my boyfriends, but that all changed. The one girl that he stayed with for about three years became a huge wedge between him and I. Eventually we did get over it after he broke up with her, but it was weird. Now things have completely twisted all over again. While dating my now ex boyfriend, my brother was friends with my ex, but they weren't close, but now that we are broken up my brother seems to want to be best friends with him. They have become completely inseperable and it is rediculous. I got a phone call from my dad while at work warning me that my ex was at my house drinking with my brother, needless to say I did not return home until very late that night. My brother has been completely unresponsive and childish towards me, he has apparently disowned me because of my curent boyfriends past, which is just that, his past. So as of now we are not on speaking grounds and it is very disturbing since he has been my lifetime best friend and I don't know what to do.

Small Town Drama

Why does everyone seem like they have to stick their noses in other people's business?
The transition from a big city, Phoenix, Arizona, to the small town of Bad Axe, Michigan didn't seem like a big deal, that is until I grew up. Now I can see that every move you make is being monitored and judged by at least a small group of people. It's not just Bad Axe either, it seems to be the entire county, Huron County. It seems to suck a person in like a giant black vortex. If you don't have a plan to get yourself out, you will most likely be stuck living in the drama and nosiness for ever.

Huron County is like a huge high school. No one seemed to be able to let go all of the drama that makes up the high school. Every one thinks they can talk  badly about a person or make fun of them, even though it is not right. People do not know the full story of a person's life. The expression of you not really knowing someone until you walk a mile in someone's shoes comes to mind now, but could it really only be a mile? I know that my life story could not be learned in one measly mile.

Taking myself back to high school, I can see that everyone seemed to stab everyone in the back. What is the point of pretending to be someone's best friend? I really do not understand. Yes you should be nice to everyone, even if you don't particularly like someone, but to pretend to be their best friend? Gossiping about people is pretty much Huron County's national past time. Ignoring everything and everyone seems to work for me. You can't let what other people think about you bother you, if you do, it will just eat away at your insides until you can't take it anymore and you finally snap. Huron County is such a wonderful place to live... if the drama didn't exist anyway. It is nice to get away from the city life and be able to walk around a woods and see deer come within a few yards of you and I would never move away if I didn't have to deal with the small town drama.

Moving On

How can two people be in a long term relationship without trusting their significant other?

This is one of the reasons that I was able to remove myself from the relationship so easily. I was not able to do anything that I wanted, unless I asked him first. It was pretty bad when I have never spent the night at my best friend of three years house until I broke up with him. At first I thought that I would be heartbroken when I went through with the breakup, but I surprisingly was not really sad at all. I am beginning to realize that I had removed myself from my relationship with him a long time ago, but did not realize it until recently. After being with the same person and experiencing so many firsts with him, it was like looking into a fog. I did not know my life without him, and it was terrifying. Once the fog cleared it was like an instant relief though, a huge weight was lifted off of my shoulders. I could breath again.

Although we broke up, I still had to deal with him. He was turning into a stalker or something. I had to turn my cell phone off because he was calling it again and again. Thank God for silent and vibrate, or I think I would have gone insane. The day after the breakup he came to my house three separate times within two hours, trapping me in the room by standing in front of every doorway that we went into. I understand that breakups are hard for some people, but trying to trap me only makes it worse. Although I still get the occasional facebook message, text or phone call from him, it seems to be getting better and I feel like I am able to move on and live my life happily.

Life

At the age of eighteen, I am realizing that life isn't as simple as it seemed to be when I was a child. Figuring life out is a lifelong project. 

As a child everything was easy, I was handled like a fragile piece of china. As I grew older though, I realized life had a bigger meaning. After almost eight years of city life in the Arizona desert, my parents picked my brother and I up and moved to the small town of Bad Axe, Michigan.

Looking back, it seems that life started going downhill after arriving here. After a few years i was wrung through my parents divorce. Although it has been years since the divorce, I still feel like its new. Its almost like losing a family member, everything gets turned upside down and backwards. I was forced to choose between living with one parent or the other and peoples opinions were very persuading. I wish I could have seen what people were trying to tell me, but my decisions made me who I am today.

 My life seems to be finally turning for the better, and I am a lot happier than I have been in a long time. After dating a guy for almost four years and breaking up with him one month after we got engaged, I am beginning to really realize how valuable life is. Being with someone that feels the need to control my entire life is not the way that i want to live anymore and I am very glad that I realized this before we got married. I finally was able to let go and understand that I could not be with someone for the rest of my life that felt the need to control me and had no trust for me.