Conference Weekend

We always love General Conference weekend. It's so nice to have a relaxing weekend at home and be so uplifted at the same time! This General Conference is only halfway through and I already feel like I've learned so much and heard exactly the counsel that I need for my life right at this very moment. I'm so grateful that we have prophets and apostles to guide us today. You can catch up or watch with us tomorrow by clicking here. I promise you won't regret it!

This weekend is even better because we have Carolyn and Emery staying with us. Jake and Emmy are loving having a little buddy 24/7! Today, they hung out during brunch, watched conference together, and shared their first kiss.

The cell phone almost captured the moment!

Jakey is apparently quite taken with older women.

And General Conference. He likes that, too.

Griffith Observatory

I've been waiting forever for the perfect weather conditions to grace a smog- and commitment-free Saturday in LA so we could head to the Griffith Observatory. Last weekend, I gave in to the realization that I could potentially wait forever for such an occurrence. We woke up on a mostly-cloudy Saturday morning, packed the diaper bag, and drove to Griffith Park -- smog and all! And you know what, it was still worth the drive.

There's something about city skylines that makes my heart happy, and the Los Angeles skyline is my favorite of all. I especially love the view from the 5, right before we turn onto the 60. We usually hit that spot at twilight and I never fail to tell Matt just how much I love this city. It's just so beautiful! It was fun to see the skyline from a higher vantage point at the observatory. Griffith Park also offers great photo ops with the Hollywood sign, for the record. In addition to the lovely views, the observatory itself is camera-ready with interesting architectural details. Inside is pretty cool, too, with an awesome planetarium, lots of interesting learning stations, and mega-powered telescopes. We want to go back to check that fancy glass out at night sometime this summer.

Weekend

Happy Monday, everyone!
Nicole and Jordan are in town so we just had a fun weekend in LA with the Rozsas. Aunt Coley watched Jake late Friday night so Matt and I could sneak away to the Hunger Games movie. We are happy to be on the Hunger Games bandwagon, and I actually found myself wishing you could hire a babysitter from 11 p.m. - 3 a.m. so we could have gone to the midnight movie. You saw it, right? We thought it was a great book movie overall and loved the casting (even Peeta, surprisingly) and how much detail they were able to include, but I think an extra ten minutes of relationship development could have gone a long way. And really, what's another ten minutes when a movie is already nearly 2.5 hours long? But yes, loved seeing everything come to life in the movie.

On Saturday, we visited the Griffith Observatory (more on that later) and watched basketball before heading to Laguna Beach to take Coley and Jordan's engagement pictures.

Just as we were wrapping up, a man next to us dropped to his knee and proposed! Naturally, we took stalker pictures for them and then got their e-mail addresses.

That night, we ate a delicious Mexican dinner at El Cholo.

On Sunday, we went to church, took Sunday naps, played games and just hung out. Jakey also learned how to eat play the ukulele.

Oh! And one more thing -- a little teaser:

Love those two.

Transportation

The men in my life have had a busy week experimenting with new forms of transportation.

Matt learned how to fly a glider at work. Yes, he has a pretty rockin' job.

And Jake is on the verge of discovering a whole new world! He went from regular ol' scooting to army crawling...

... to getting up on all fours and lunging forward! Jake combines all of those moves with rolls and turns, and can get across the entire living room -- or simply to his goal (toy/parent/anything that looks like it might be fun to chew on) -- in no time at all. It's so much fun spending my days on the ground playing with him and showering him with kisses and praise. As you can see, Jake is quite pleased with himself as well.

It's so crazy that crawling is on the immediate horizon. My little 6-month-old is growing up so fast!

Happy

It's no secret that Matt and I love Disneyland, so it should come as no surprise that I've dreamed of taking my own little family there for a very long time. I'm pleased to announce that as of March 10th, my life is now complete! I'm even more pleased to announce that my happy baby loves the Happiest Place on Earth.

We had the best day! Just when we thought Disneyland couldn't get any better, our baby took it to a whole new level. Jake got a kick out of all the people and characters and lights and colors (so exciting!), and we had so much fun watching him. Matt and I are so excited to take him again and again and again and again... you get the idea.

I've been horrible at sharing videos of Jake, which is really a shame. So I'll do better starting now -- here's a little glimpse at Jake's first Disneyland day.

And because Disney babies are adorable, I couldn't help but include a few pictures too. (I know, I know.)

Meeting Mickey!

Disneyland is so pretty right now!

Jake's a trooper in line.

Tigger is my favorite.

Playing by the castle.

Classic family pictures, of course.

Jakey is quite generous with kisses these days.

He loves hanging out with his Daddy.

Jake also loves eating things, like photo passes and stuffed Mickeys. And real Mickeys.

You'd be surprised at the number of rides babies can go on.

Watching World of Color!

The last time Matt and I went to Disneyland, I was 39 weeks pregnant. I love comparing that last picture with the last one in this post. Life is so happy with a Jakey in it.

Eleven

I hope you had a fun March Madness/St. Patrick's Day weekend! We laid low over here, just watching basketball games and doing laundry and the like. I'm popping in quick with a few pictures of my little leprechaun and a little game of tag. I've never actually done this before but my little sister Nicole tagged me and I basically do whatever my siblings ask, so here we go!

Eleven random things:

1. My mom went all-out for every little holiday and I can't wait to do the same for my kids. I'm thinking Jake will be old enough to appreciate it next year and am way excited about that. (Not that I want him to grow up or anything...)

2. Speaking of Jake growing up, he's scooting all over the place these days and is quite proud of himself. It's so cute!

3. Yesterday taught me that wrap dresses and 50 mph winds don't mix. Just call me Marilyn.

4. I have mixed feelings about moving to Utah. The last time I moved from California to Utah, I was 15 and I thought my life was ending. Sometimes, I feel like that high school girl again, but then I remember that it worked out great last time and is going to be even better this time. Our next few years at Hill are going to be happy.

5. That said, I already feel like we don't have enough time left here in Southern Cal! I've mapped out 90% of our weekends from now until the end of the summer, and it turns out there simply aren't enough Saturdays in our world.

6. Sometimes, when gas costs $4.59, I want to cry. 

7. My computer has a mere 6 GB of space remaining -- thanks to a small hard drive and lots of pictures -- and is thus on the verge of collapse. I'm trying to go through and cut down on our pictures before I burn them onto DVDs and whatnot, so I gave Matt an assignment to pare down the 937 pictures of his USAFA graduation week. An hour and a half later, his trip down memory lane was complete and there were still 907 pictures remaining. We are picture hoarders.

8. For the past dozen years, I've prided myself in an excellent March Madness bracket. This year, I filled it out in two minutes at the last second and, well, it's rather average. Sad.

9. Two Sundays ago, I took Jake to the mother's lounge, which is adjacent to the women's bathroom, during Sacrament Meeting. He ate and then I rocked him to sleep. Next thing I know, we were both waking up at the end of Sunday School (1.5 hours later). At that point, I vaguely remembered a mom saying, "That's okay, honey. Let her sleep," to her daughter earlier, and realized they'd been talking about me.

10. Every once in a while, I think about signing me and Matt up for a scuba certification class. Then I remember about sharks.

11. I'm convinced there's nothing better than watching your baby grow, explore and discover the world around him.

Nicole's eleven questions:

1. What is your favorite book? My all-time favorite is probably still Pride and Prejudice. You can't help but love Jane Austen and her Lizzy and Darcy.

2. What do you do with your free time? Play with my baby. And if I'm not with my baby, I'm spying on him via his video monitor (best purchase ever) and/or looking at pictures of him. You think I'm kidding, but I'm not.

3. What is your favorite restaurant? We don't eat out very much at all, but I've always loved lunch at Zupas.

4. What is your dream job? Growing up, I dreamed of being a sideline reporter or somehow working in sports, and then being a mom. I lucked out and got my feet wet in college football, Division I athletic marketing, minor league baseball, sports writing, and professional basketball before becoming a mom.

5. If you could go skydiving or bungee jumping, which one would you do? I'd go skydiving again in a heartbeat! The thought of all that blood rushing to your head with bungee jumping just doesn't appeal to me.

6. Would you rather watch a movie or read a book? Read a book, unless it's a really, really good movie and I get to cuddle with Matt.

7. Where do you want to travel next? I'm in the process of convincing Matt to go to New Zealand next year.

8. Would you rather live in the country or the city? I'm a city girl for sure.

9. What color do you usually paint your nails? My toe nails are usually hot pink.

10. What is your favorite candy? Milky Way, I think. I don't eat candy very often.

11. If you could live anywhere, where would it be? Laguna Beach or Malibu or Pasadena or any of those terribly-expensive-for-a-reason SoCal locations.

My eleven questions for you:

I hereby tag all of you! Answer these questions in the comments or your own blog if you feel so inclined.

1. Raise your hand if you're excited for the Hunger Games movie.

2. Favorite vacation ever?

3. Semi-sweet or milk chocolate?

4. What is your favorite ice cream flavor?

5. If you could be on any reality TV show, which would you choose and why?

6. What is the weirdest baby name you've ever heard?

7. What color are your bedroom walls?

8. What's your favorite blog?

9. Perfect temperature?

10. Guilty pleasure?

11. Happiest news of the week?