El Matador Beach

Introducing Los Angeles County's most beautiful public beach: El Matador in Malibu.

Seriously. Are you dying? This was the absolute best place to spend our last Saturday in California. Just so, so gorgeous! You can't help but love Malibu. We left our nice camera home and just brought our little waterproof point-and-shoot so we could do nothing but play. And play we did! I've mentioned it before, but it deserves repeating: my baby absolutely loves the beach. Jake spent forever just wandering around on the sand, walking out to the waves, running back in, and squealing as the cool water crashed around his feet. I finally uploaded a video so you can get a taste of his beach-lovingness. It's sort of my favorite thing ever.

Cars Land

Moving and checking out of our home was sort of a nightmare -- a story for another day, I'm sure -- and it is oh-so good to be on the other side of it. We passed our final inspection on a Thursday, left all of our things in our TLF (temporary housing) at Edwards, and drove down the freeway for a much-needed long recovery weekend. And what better place to recuperate than the happiest place on earth? You should be exactly 0% surprised that we headed straight to Disneyland first thing Friday morning. We were super excited to check out California Adventure's newly renovated entrance and brand-new Cars Land, and we were even more excited that Nicole and Jordan got to come with us!

Not only was it fun to share the magic with Coley and Jordan, but it was really nice for me and Matt to get to ride a few big kid rides together. We've only been able to go on three dates since Jake was born, so even 20 minute spurts of couple time throughout the day was a great luxury. Muchas gracias to the siblings, and to Disney for inventing rider swaps.

As for California Adventure, I'm loving the new direction they've taken with the entrance and Buena Vista Street. The park has a much better identity now, and the scenery and atmosphere are lovely. And Cars Land? Perfection. Not that Cars the movie exactly deserves an entire land, but the land itself is pretty amazing. As usual, Disney nailed the theming. You really feel like you walked straight into Radiator Springs! It's hard to remember that Lightning McQueen and the gang are cartoon vehicles when they -- and their little town -- are just so convincingly real. I'm fairly positive that Cars Land is every little boy's dream come true.

 Cars Land:

The Rest:

Jake doesn't think he needs to hold our hands ever. I'm beginning to understand the monkey leash parents a bit more.

He was so proud of himself for being able to cross the trolley tracks and just kept going back and forth over them. It's the little things...

Dinner at the Blue Bayou! Always so fun.

And what's a trip to Disney without visiting Mickey? Jakey sort of loves the mouse and couldn't bear to wait his turn to say hi, as you can see in the video below. So glad the teenage girls in front of us understood.

Jake's Nursery

Jake's nursery was my very favorite room in our home.

My goal with the nursery was to create a calm, clean, preppy feel while incorporating sports in a non-cheesy way. We went with crisp blue and white bedding and accents, and anchored the room with dark wood pieces for a more masculine aesthetic. To bring sports into the room, we painted our own modern football and basketball canvases, set up the sports mobile we were gifted, placed a football pillow on the glider, and brought in a white football and small helmet from one of Matt's college bowl games. Perhaps my favorite sporty addition was the felt and twine sports pennant that my friend Kaley and I made and hung across the curtains. It seemed to add the perfect whimsical touch to my baby's room.

So, without further adieu, my Jake's preppy, sporty nursery:

That room is full of so many happy memories. Before Jake was even born, I would catch Matt sitting in the glider at night. I was guilty of doing the same -- just sitting in the nursery, dreaming of the baby that would soon call it home. And then we brought Jake home and cuddled our sweet boy in that same place. We rocked him to sleep, read books, sang songs, hugged his big bear, played peek-a-boo with his curtains (Jakey started that all on his own), and laughed and laughed and laughed. It was the happiest of places.

And look how much he grew in that room! From a few days old (above) to 11-months on his last night before the movers came (below).

Time goes by too fast.