A Blast from the Past

While I was home in Oregon, I went through the box of childhood pictures and couldn't help but scan some of them in so that I can have them for forever.

And now you have the pleasure of getting to view a few of them.

Let's start with this one because it pretty much sums up the sort of little girl I was.

I am sitting on our patio in the backyard and I have written on the cement this very wonderful note: 

I need a boyfriend. 

I am 17. 

If you are willing to be my boyfrend, come. 

I am the prinsess! 

From Ashly.

What is not to love about this whole situation?

I am just in my little pretend world (which I pretty much lived in 100% of the time), and in my imagination I am a princess and I'm just advertising for a boyfriend. 

It sounds like I have very few requirements, you just need to come if you want to be my boyfriend.

And my name is Ashley.

Also, in my imagination, I have very long, beautiful hair (because, obviously, that is necessary when you are a princess because what Disney princess doesn't have long hair? None.)

Since my hair was not long on it's own, I wore this pajama dress on top of my head everywhere (including preschool and the dinner table) because it made me look like I had long hair and therefore beautiful.

For Halloween one year, my mom helped me show the world that I was, in fact, a princess by making me this princess costume (actually, it was a Queen Frostine dress, so I guess I was a queen).

Yes, she made that whole costume!

I wore it a lot.

And I was even a princess when I did the dishes.

I basically wore skirts, dresses, leotards and tutus as much as humanly possibly.

I'm pretty certain that I didn't wear a pair of jeans until I was in middle school because they were way too boyish for my feminine, princessy self.

Although, here is a rare occasion when I did dress myself in a pair of pants.

But it looks like this may have been one of the first times my mom ever let me dress myself so I just didn't even know what I was doing, which probably accounts for the pants:

Adam doesn't understand my need to sleep with a fan as close to my face as I can get it with it turned on as high as it will go, so I whipped out this picture to show him that it pretty much got engrained in me when I was really little and to this day I still love my fan this much.

This may be due to the fact that I was born in Texas where it is hot and being hot at night is just not an option.

This picture is a treasure.

Every child needs a picture of themself like this.

Nose picking while watching TV at the grandparents' house.

I was watching ice skating, which accounts for the roller blades on my feet because I am trying to be just like an ice skater.

I also wanted to be a ballerina.

But I only had one single ballet class before I told my mom that I was through with that, so that career option didn't go far. 

Plus, I'm about as flexible as a rock so that didn't help either.

When I was 10, I was Sandy in my 5th grade class version of the play Grease.

I loved it.

But I didn't really understand how to be an actor, I would purposefully and obviously look at each person whose line was next in the scene before they even said their line, so the audience knew who would be speaking next by just watching me.

So that didn't really work out as a career for me either. 

Luckily, art did work out as a carer for me.

Here I am painting Mary, Joseph and Baby Jesus on our sliding glass door, with a stuffed animal in my hand.

I really like this painting, I just like the shapes and their faces and the size of Mary compared to Joseph and that tiny baby Jesus. 

Does anyone else remember Cupcake Dolls?

Their dress turns up into a cupcake shape and their hat looks like the frosting on top?

They were awesome.

I was all about dolls, Polly Pockets, baby dolls, American Dolls (which I never owned but I always asked for Christmas), Melanie's Mall, and especially Barbies.

You guys, I was REALLY into Barbies.

I had an insane Barbie collection that is currently packed up (in multiple huge boxes) in my parents' attic, waiting for the day when I have a child who likes dolls and would like this amazing Barbie collection with tons of furniture.

I kind of can't wait for that day because I really want to see that Barbie collection again.

I would do all sorts of chores around my house just to earn up enough money to go buy a Kelly doll from Kmart.

And my beautiful friend, Marnaloah (who I have known since I was 4), would come over on Saturdays and we would play Barbies from 10am to 6pm. 

Seriously.

Like 8 hours straight.

That's a full-time job.

Barbies were kind of my life for a long time there.

Before I displayed my lack of acting skills in Grease, I was Mary in the church Christmas pageant.

But you just sit there, when you're Mary, so it's not like I needed acting skills.

I particularly appreciate how bored Joseph appears.

 

And then there were my brothers, Matthew and Kevin.

I had a hard time working Matthew into my little imaginative world, which is probably why we fought so much when we were little.

But now we're friends!

And that little baby below is going to be graduating from high school next spring-- what?!

I can't believe how grown up and funny and smart Kevin is now.

 And that concludes our journey to the past.