Many of you know my good friend, Geniel, and know she has a daughter, Ashley. Ashley is like my little sister/daughter that I never had. We have our own separate relationship from mine and Geniel's friendship. Ashley has been our summer help at work for quite a few years now and that's how we established our own friendship.
Ashley is one amazing girl! A girl you look at and can see that she has it all. She's getting married a week from today (May 26th) and I am so excited for her! She is marrying a really great guy and I know they will have a wonderful life together. Ashley introduced me to my friend, Laura, and so the three of us are now friends. I knew when Ashley announced her engagement that I wanted to throw her a bridal shower but not just a typical LDS bridal shower. I mentioned it to Laura and she jumped right on board with me. So for several months we have planned, prepped, stayed late at work to work on projects, and had a wonderful time doing it all. Ash's shower was on April 30th.
Our theme was "Love Is Sweet" centered around sweet things. We hosted it at a unique and very popular restaurant here in Stockton called Mid-Town Crepery. Their crepes are amazing! Ash invited 40 ladies and I think all but three showed up. They loved the crepes! We gave them a choice of three dessert crepes to choose from. We also had a candy bar with and used our Apothecary jars to hold the candy in. It turned out really cute!!
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Laura is super creative and she came up with some really fun things. For example, we had Ashley get us a map of the state of Utah and Laura hand-stitched a pink heart around Salt Lake City and framed it so they could hang it in their home. We also put together several of Ash and Ben's engagement pictures and mounted them and tied them with ribbon. Then we strung a small rope and hung the pictures from it with white clothes pins. The women loved seeing all the different pictures they took. We also put together little thank-you containers for the women to fill with sweet treats from our candy bar. Instead of games, we put together envelopes with cute paper in them with a piece of advice on the front that the women were supposed to write on the card and give to Ashley to open at a particular time in her life. One of them was "Open when you have your first baby", another one was, "Open when the laundry pile becomes taller than Mount Everest". Just little pieces of advice that we've all neede along the way. It was well received!
Ash's good friend from New York, whose name is also Cara, surprised Ashley and showed up! It was so cute to see how surprised Ashley was when she turned around and Cara was standing there. They both cried! I was so happy with Ashley's turn out and the gifts she received. It's looking like her and Ben will have all the essential things they'll need to start their life together.
I felt so honored to be able to do this for Ashley and to have Laura there in it with me. I couldn't ask for better friends! I am truly blessed by the women in my life. I wish Ashley and Ben all the love, happiness, and joy in the world. The best part is they will be living in Cali so I'll get so see them and still be a small part of their lives.
