Benjamin was surprised; everyone was so sure that we were having a boy simply because I wanted a girl so badly. I had almost talked myself into the idea of a boy just in case. But it's a girl and I couldn't be happier (not that I wouldn't have been happy with a boy).
Ultrasound of Ashtyn being adorable, her foot up by her head
Her name is going to be Ashtyn Dee Anderson. She was so cute on the ultrasound, already. She had curled up so that her foot was up by her head and and she kept grabbing her foot with her hand. It feels surreal still, thinking of our daughter. I'm starting to feel her now, though, so that makes it even more real to me.
I have been thinking a lot about my grandma Pat lately, especially since we found out our baby is a girl. Grandma Pat died when I was four, but I have always felt a close connection with her. A short while before she found out she was sick, my mom had troubles with the house (water and gas) and we ended up staying with my grandparents for a few months until they were able to fix it. During that time, Grandma Pat found time each day to do something with me, one on one and, because of that, I hold faint memories of her. I have felt her near me during very special times in my life.
Grandma Pat holding her first daughter (my mom)
Despite my close feelings with her, I never knew a lot about my grandma Pat until I was a high school senior, when I read a memoir she had written before passing away. I was surprised to read that, as a teenager, she had loved world dance and that she had even tried out for the folk dance team while at BYU. She hadn't made the team, but was encouraged to take some world dance classes and try out again the next fall. She wrote in her memoir that she felt she had a good chance of making it onto the team, but that she met my grandpa and her priorities changed.
By the time I read this, I had been doing Irish step-dancing for more than ten years and it was my passion. I loved dance more than anything else in high school. One of my friends from dance took me with her to a BYU folk dance performance and we both just fell in love with the idea of being on the team. I could not understand how my grandmother could have given up the same opportunity that I was dreaming of.
Our last performance my senior year
Well, then I graduated from high school and I didn't make it into BYU. I was a little crushed at first, until my mom reminded me that this wasn't the end of my dream. I enrolled at UVU and my mom got me, as an "apartment warming" gift, the Willow Tree Irish Dancer statue. It was to remind me of the goal--the BYU folk dance team--that I was still working towards.
I worked really hard in my classes to get good grades and practiced dance like crazy. I applied for BYU again, this time as a transfer student, and almost couldn't believe it when I got my acceptance letter. It truly was a dream come true for me.
Ben and I got married the week before I started at BYU spring semester. That fall, I tried out for the folk dance team and ... didn't make it.
I was sad, but I wasn't as disappointed as I would have thought. I took a world dance class that semester and the teacher encouraged me to try out that next semester. I was planning on it, but then Ben and I were in California the week of try outs. That day, knowing I was missing try outs, was terrible for me. It was worse than if I had tried out and didn't make it. Turns out, though, that my missing the try out was a blessing in disguise.
About a month after we got home from California, we found out I was pregnant and a month after that, my morning sickness was pretty bad. School got really hard and I know that if I had been able to make it on the team, it would have been very difficult for me to participate.
Now I think back on my grandmother's words, "... but my priorities changed." I understand them a lot more now than I did when I was in high school. I still love dance, but not like I did before. Now there is a bigger place in my heart for my husband and for this little baby that we haven't even met yet.
My adorable husband and I
I guess that's part of starting a family and becoming a mother. The things you care about most change. In high school, I couldn't understand that and the concept would have even made me a little sad. But now I understand. My life can (and should!) be filled with interests and goals, allowing me to always be improving myself. BUT I am no longer the center of my own world. My own interests and hobbies are no longer the most important thing in my life. And that's alright.
That's the way it is supposed to be.
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