Snyder Family

Stawberry Jam

2011-06-30T10:49:00.000-04:00

Ashley mashing up the strawberries for the jam

She is such a big helper

The fruits of our labor

2011-06-25T10:43:00.000-04:00

Daddy and Ashley camping in the backyard. Mommy slept in the comforts of a nice bed and air conditioning. :)

Big Girl Bike

2011-06-23T23:12:00.000-04:00

For Ashley's birthday we got her a big girl bike. This is her first time riding it. She rode the bike every day several times a day. Then she took a little tumble and now we have to coax her to ride her bike.

And they are off!

Home safe and sound

My two favorite people!

Today is Ashley's 4th Birthday!

2011-06-21T10:41:00.000-04:00

Today Ashley is 4 years old. What a little blessing God gave us. It is amazing to see how much her looks have changed over the years. I love my little sweetie very much.

Sprinklers

2011-06-17T08:58:00.000-04:00

Running through the sprinklers is Ashley form of staying cool this summer.

I don't know if you can tell but her clothes are soaked.

Pure Joy!

We finally put a swimsuit on her.

Fun

2011-06-16T13:22:00.000-04:00

Right now this is one of Ashley's favorite things to do. She loves to ride the mower before daddy mows the yard.

Fall and Winter

2011-01-19T17:04:00.000-05:00

Ok I am a little behind on posting. Ok maybe a lot behind on posting. My goal for this year is to do much better at posting. Here we have our little princess for halloween. She was so excited to go trick-or-treating. Once we started she was done after three houses. This was ok with mommy. After that we went visit daddy at the fire station so he could see her costume.

Daddy and Ashley decided to make cookies one evening. Ashley had to have her chef hat and apron on. Then they patiently waited for them to come out of the oven.

Bubble Fun

2010-04-29T10:44:00.000-04:00

Ashley loves to play with bubbles. For some reason this day she was trying to lick the bubbles.

Cute Furry Little Visitors

2010-04-29T10:28:00.000-04:00

We had these cute little bunnies for 2 weeks. I was amazed how fast they grew.

This was the first we found them

This was the day before they hopped away.

Ashley's First Snowman

2010-01-13T13:32:00.001-05:00

Christmas Morning In Tenn.

2010-01-13T13:21:00.001-05:00

Liyah's Birthday Party

2010-01-13T13:13:00.002-05:00

The Girls Decorating Their Christmas Tree

2010-01-13T13:04:00.003-05:00

Excited

2009-11-07T10:09:00.002-05:00

Sorry I have not been posting lately. Photos are not wanting to load. Hopefully I will figure out why soon. On to the exciting news. We are officially licensed as foster parents. We are getting our first placement on Monday. Her name is Liyah and she is 8 years old. Our first placement happened a lot quicker than we were expecting. I have been moving stuff out of the room that will be hers. The room was our office. The room is cleaned and ready to be painted. We are going to let her pick the color of the room and the bedding to go with it. We have her enrolled in school already. Courtney took care of this yesterday. She will start on Tuesday. We are praying that the transition goes well. She was here on Wednesday for a visit. The visit went well. Ashley was her little shadow the whole time she was here.

R.I.P Mackenzie

2009-09-27T13:12:00.003-04:00

It was a very sad day in the Snyder household yesterday. We no longer have our dog Mackenzie. She was hit by a car yesterday morning. Luckily Ashley did not see it happen. Ashley doesn't understand what happened. She was crying because mommy and daddy were crying. Mackenzie was our baby before Ashley was our baby. Our dog Tunny seems to be doing okay without Mackenzie around.

Foster Care

2009-09-07T01:34:00.002-04:00

We have started the process of becoming foster parents. We have done two sets of classes, had two home visits, fingerprints, and some paperwork. We are not moving to quickly with the paperwork we still have quite a bit to do. The paperwork seems so daunting. Oh well a little at a time. I still need to do a CPR class. We are excited and nervous about this journey. The unknown always makes you a little nervous.

2 Years Old

2009-08-01T12:15:00.003-04:00

This is what happens when Ashley dresses herself.

Lately Ashley makes this face every time I take her picture.

Ashley is now two. She weighs 25 lbs. and is 34.25 in. tall. She can count to ten and can say her ABC's. She repeats every word you say. Everything is MINE and DON'T. She also is very independent. She is into Elmo and Barney right now. So we have to limit her video watching. She could watch a video 5 times. She loves to play outside. Her favorite foods right now are blueberries and tomatoes. We are so lucky that she is a good eater. She loves fruits and vegetables.

First Oreo

2009-06-20T12:16:00.004-04:00

Ashley enjoyed her first Oreo cookie. Well actually it was two.

What? You want me to take it out of the milk.

YUMMY!

I guess I will share with daddy.

Vacation in Houston

2009-06-15T15:10:00.004-04:00

This was Ashley first plane ride. The flight to Houston was uneventful. The flight home not so great. She kept kicking the seat in front of her. This did not make the lady sitting there very happy. Ashley also thought it was a great time to throw a few temper tantrums. On the upside she decided to go to sleep as we were descending.

We had a very nice vacation. We stayed with family. We spent a lot of time in the pool. Ashley had no fear of the water. She would turn around and start climbing into the pool. Of course this had me on edge when we were outside.

One day we went to Kehma Board Walk. Ashley got to ride on the carousel. She really liked that. She did not want to get off. We went on a boat ride which is called "The Beast". This was a lot of fun we were soaked. Ashley was not old enough to ride on the boat. So we took turns, I went with Aunt Linda and Courtney went with Uncle Bruce.

We went to the Houston Zoo with Courtney's cousin and her little boy. It was fun. And of course we forgot to take the camera.

Courtney went to a Houston Astros game with his uncle. The ladies went outlet mall shopping.

We had a very good time. They were excellent hosts.

Easter

2009-04-23T12:17:00.003-04:00

Ashley had a lot of fun on Easter. She got lots of gifts from grandparents. Her favorite bubbles.

Things Ashley Has Been Up To

2009-04-22T22:37:00.006-04:00

Lounging with her puppies.

Ashley's favorite thing to do playing outside.

She loves eating her PacorN!

Ashley's many shoe fashions

Helping mommy with laundry

Test Results

2009-02-19T12:37:00.002-05:00

Sorry it has taken so long to blog. The rest of the results came back negative. Yeh! The doctor said if she had another seizure they want to put her on medication. So for now we live life as usual and pray that she has no more seizures. Thanks for everyones thoughts and prayers.

Ashley Update

2009-01-18T12:25:00.002-05:00

On Wednesday about 7:20 in the morning Ashley had a seizure. We took her to the hospital by ambulance. When we got to the hospital she had another seizure. Since she had two seizures they wanted to run some tests. They did blood work, CT scan, and chest x-rays all of these tests came back negative for anything. So they did a spinal tap to make sure she didn't have viral meningitis. The spinal tap test results came back negative. We are very happy for all of the test results coming back negative. The doctor is still concerned that she had two seizures so he is sending us to a neurologist in Fort Wayne on Wednesday. She will have an EEG done to check her brain waves. She will have to have a bunch of leads put on her head and she has to sit or lay still while they run the test. This should be interesting with an 18 month old. Please keep our family in your prayers.

Funny Faces

2008-11-29T22:43:00.001-05:00

I wanted everyone to experience the funny faces of Ashley.

Playing In The Leaves

2008-11-05T10:06:00.002-05:00

We were playing in the leaves on a beautiful warm fall day. Yes, the little kid in me still likes to play in the leaves. Ashley dove in and started playing. We have to enjoy the nice weather while we have it. We will probably play in the leaves again today.

Halloween 2008

2008-11-02T21:24:00.002-05:00

Why is my mommy making me wear this crazy get up?

Carving The Pumpkin

2008-10-30T11:35:00.003-04:00

Ashley had a lot of fun playing in the pumpkin guts. We had pumpkin slime everywhere.

Helping Daddy Wash His Truck

2008-10-30T11:25:00.004-04:00

Ashley loves hanging out with daddy.

11 awesome years

2008-10-18T18:17:00.004-04:00

Today we are celebrating 11 years of marriage. We look so young in this picture. We celebrated yesterday because Courtney has a class today and tomorrow. So tonight we just had carry out and we are going to watch a movie. A nice relaxing evening.

15 Month Check Up

2008-10-08T09:55:00.003-04:00

Ashley did not do well with going to the doctor's office this time. She cried when the doc wanted to listen to her heart and check her ears. She did not cry as much this time when she got her shots. She now weighs 21.7 pounds and she is 31 inches long. She is wearing 18 month to 2T clothing.

Ashley is running all over and gabbering constantly. She has a very healthy appetite. She will try a new food a least once. Loves eggs, black olives, green beans and orange juices.

1 year old

2008-08-12T14:07:00.003-04:00

I know I need to better at this whole blogging thing. Time just slips away when you are having fun. The first birthday. She did not get as messy as I thought she would with her cake. I had to put her hands into the cake. She got a lot of great toys and clothes.

Vacation

2008-05-29T14:45:00.019-04:00

Two weeks ago we went to Gatlinburg, TN for vacation. We went with five other couples. We stayed at an eight bedroom cabin. We had a great vacation. Everyone chipped in with meals and doing the dishes. I think the main attraction at the cabin was pac man and galaga. There was a pool table, fooz ball, and air hockey lots of entertainment.
We did a lot of hiking. Ashley loved it. Of course she was being carried around in a back pack. We loved the mountains and being outdoors. I am sure we will try to do more hiking we really liked doing that. We did not really like downtown Gatlinburg, to commercializied. To many t-shirt shops and people trying to get you to buy a timeshare. We went to the Ripley's Aquarium it was okay a little pricey.

This is daddy being funny. Note the sign. They were at ground level so there was no danger.

In this picture we are at the highest point of the Smoky Mountains. Ashley was interested by my teeth at that moment. There was some snow and ice in areas that were shaded. It was weird since we were in shorts and t-shirts. The hike to this point was half a mile at a 12% incline. You had a sense of accomplishment when you were at the top. Going down was much easier.

11 months old

2008-05-22T10:39:00.006-04:00

Helping Mommy unload dishwasher

Sorry it has been so long since I have posted. Ashley has grown a lot since the last time I posted. She is doing all kinds of things now. She is eating regular food now, walking along furniture, and crawling all over the place. We are still waiting for the first step. One day she will surprise us.

Her favorite things to do are riding on daddies shoulders, taking a bath, and standing at the front door watching the cars go by. I forgot one thing she likes to crawl under things.

It is so funny when Courtney comes home from work she gets so excited when she sees him. She has to crawl over to see daddy.

One thing she does not like is grass. If you stand her up in the grass she will pull one leg up or if you sit her in the grass she will not move.

Ashley's hair is finally long enough to put it into puff's

Ashley tormenting the dog. The dogs do really well with her. Every once in a while we have to calm the dogs down. They don't realize that she is little.

I will try to do better at blogging.

First Christmas

2008-01-04T13:58:00.000-05:00

We had a lot of fun with it being Ashley's first Christmas. She got many toy and much needed outfits. By the time Christmas day came around Ashley was tired of opening gifts. Although when she opened gifts the wrapping paper went directly into her mouth.

Finalized!

2007-12-08T11:18:00.000-05:00

Well Ashley is officially a Snyder. Although she has been a Snyder to us since the day we got her. I would say that the court proceedings were the smoothest part of our whole adoption process. We were in the court room for a total of ten minutes. I was teary eyed the through the whole proceedings. The sweetest words I heard from the judge were " adoption granted," and as Courtney would say here come the water works. Yes, me crying tears of joy. There were two other couples finalizing their adoptions also. We all had huge smiles on our faces. We all had early Christmas presents.

Halloween 2007

2007-11-17T16:03:00.000-05:00

I am finally getting to the halloween pictures. As everyone can see she was a hershey kiss. She really did not care for the hat. This year she got toys from pepole instead of candy.

I love this picture she is showing mom her protest.

4 month check up

2007-11-06T13:37:00.000-05:00

Our Computer Genius

Last week Ashley had her four month check. She is now 14 1/2 lbs. and 25 1/2 in. long. She is getting so big. She gained 4 lbs. and grew 4 in. She had a clean bill of health. She had her first cold 2 weeks ago. Happy to say we survived.

Since Ashley is getting bigger I am putting her smaller clothing away. That makes me sad. She is now wearing 3-6 month clothing. Which is right on schedule. To think when she was born preemie clothes where a little big.

Slowly we are starting to introduce rice cereal. She is starting to get the hang of eating off a spoon. The first few times she had the look of what the heck are you giving me.

We got the letter in the mail for our new finalization date. It will be Dec. 6th at 2:45 pm.

Soon to be Ashley Snyder

2007-10-19T11:27:00.000-04:00

Well it has been a long time since I have posted. We should post everyday just to keep up with all of her changes. Ashley is now four months old. We will be going to Indianapolis to finalize our adoption in November. She will then be an official Snyder. She is already a Snyder in our eyes. Ashley is doing all sorts of things now. She talks, screams, and laughs. She is really starting to interact with the puppies alot. Everytime they walk by her she gets so excited. Tunny lets her pet her and pull on her ears. Mackenzie doesn't pay much attention to her yet, but I'm sure that will all change when she is mobile. She loves playing in her exersaucer. This picture is so cute. She played herself to sleep.
Note from Courtney:
Being a daddy is so awesome! I can't believe something so small can produce such large ferocious smells! She has really been the greatest addition to our lives. Honestly, waiting 10 years has helped us to prepare for Ashley. Well, as prepared as we can be! Can you really prepare for parenthood?

Daddy's Big Day

2007-08-02T08:22:00.000-04:00

Ashley and I sent Courtney off for his first day working for the Goshen Fire Dept.
I am sure he will have a great day. It will be a little interesting tonight with him not coming home. Although tomorrow we will get to spend the whole day with him.

Last night was the first night for Ashley to sleep in the big crib. She did pretty good. On Sunday we had a baby open house. It went very well. Ashley was past around to everyone. I think she was a little overstimulated. She was very fussy Sunday night and all day Monday.

Hotel Life

2007-07-07T12:08:00.000-04:00

We are adjusting to parenthood quite well. Hotel life on the other hand not so much. We are very ready to go home. We are hoping to go home on Tuesday or Wednesday. The hotel staff has been great. Which has made our stay doable .

Its amazing how things can change in one day. We are so blessed to have our daughter. The wait was worth it. Its weird to think we are a mommy and a daddy. The amazing thing is how she changes everyday. Thursday she started trying to hold her head up. Sometimes this makes burpping her a little challanging. Ashley also seems to have grown since last Friday. Right now she seems to have her days and nights mixed up. I guess I need to start taking naps.