RECENTLY ON LAUREN ASHLEY HANSEN:

Wishing You a Safe & Happy 4th of July!

Happy 4th of July Weekend! I hope you all have a wonderful and safe long weekend with family and friends! If you were following along last year, you might remember that our 4th of July did not go nearly as planned. My husband is a police officer and me and the boys were riding in his squad, leading the parade. While en route, we hear “shots fired! shots fired” over the radio. My personal initial thought was people were hearing fireworks? I mean, it WAS a parade. Parade-goers were cheering. Kids were grabbing candy. Soon enough, the intersection we had JUST passed came over the radio with multiple down. So many police were only on bike/feet on the route. Knowing Trevor was probably the closest officer in a squad, I grabbed the boys and hopped out of car, Trevor threw the stroller out from the back, and took off behind us. At this point, I’m assuming it was a single incident, maybe gang related? The city he works for is VERY nice, safe, definitely not a place you think a shooting would happen. Within seconds he called me telling me to run to the fire station, get off the parade route, get somewhere because “multiple were down, shooter location was unknown”. I had no idea where to go. I hid with the boys between two school buses as the high school band was quickly loaded. There was a dad and his daughter running up the lawn behind me. I called out asking if they lived there, and if so, could we come inside? Little did we know we were going to be there for almost 6 hours. They were so kind and accommodating. We’ve kept in touch ever since and I’ll never forget them! My heart goes out to everyone affected that day and after – those who lost their lives, who lost loved ones, who were injured, those who witnessed, those who responded. It’s still an extremely tragic, terrifying, and confusing day to look back on. I can surely say the 4th will never be the same. <3

Switching gears, our sweet Beckham turns 2 on July 5th. Our little firecracker baby isn’t such a baby anymore. We had a dinosaur-themed birthday party with so many family and friends, lots of cake, and the BEST tacos ever 🙂

On a lighter note, I’m sharing a few of my favorite items from the week and what I’ve been loving/have my eye on lately. I’ve really been loving these amazing Amazon finds (below). There are SO many great sales going on this weekend – I’m sharing my top sales over here on my Shop LTK page!