Remember....Green is the New Black

I should be embarrassed to share this part of my life, but I just find it a little more humorous then I do embarrassing. So here you go, here is my luscious jungly green backyard. Its the greenest that it has ever been, and personally it reminds me of the hills in California....but unfortunately for me, this is considered "bad" and looked "down upon". I just think it looks beautiful...so here is a tribute to our weeds! The picture above is usually all rocks....they have creeped in between and started their own city.

To show how tall they really are...

And yes...they surrounds the WHOLE backyard.

Today I got Berkeley sidewalk chalk for the first time and it was a hit. I found a new fun activity to do together.

Then I just wanted to give you a taste of my interest lately....Guitar Hero. Its not even mine, I have to borrow my brothers, but I greatly enjoy playing and Berkeley enjoys dancing to the songs, so its a win win situation.

Home Grown

So here are almost all my nieces and nephews...and me...Berkeley was crying so I held her. My mom is running for city council again, and she wanted a picture of her grand kids with her awesome yard sign.

So, yes, I went to California again. Its hard to resist when my mom just offers all the time! I have been here a week and of course I have loved every second of it. I got together with my closest friends, went to the temple with my sister and grandma, went to a huge family get together, played Nertz, hung out with my sisters a lot, went to an Easter egg hunt, went shopping...like 5 times, helped my mom put lawn signs out, ate a delicious Irish meal on St. Patricks Day....corned beef, cabbage, and Irish soda bread, went to the park and ate lunch, went to my nephews baseball game, went to a cycling class with my sister that absolutely KILLED my rear end, taught kids at the Boys and Girls club to sing some songs....random, but a great experience, and got TONS of free scrapbook supplies from my sister in law! The weather was gorgeous and we loved being outside.

Here is my sister Whitney and I...do you think we dress alike?? And that is some serious Vintage Jillian in that family picture. Im on the bottom right, and my sister Whitney is the higher girl on the left....I guess you could say we look a little different!

On Saturday we went to the Whittier Easter egg hunt. It was a really cute set up. Berkeley met the Easter bunny for the first time and LOVED him. She was dancing with him forever and kept giving him loves.

Dont mind my boyfriend in the background...There were some seriously strange people there.

The actual hunt...Berkeley got the hang of it really quick, I held the bag and she put the candy in...I'm not going to lie, I may have directed her to my favorites like some starbursts and skittles.We made a good team for finding free candy!

For some reason Berkeley does not realize she has knees here because she obviously is not using them...hence the small hint of butt crack.

A funny story, I left out her easter candy one night on the floor and the next day while I was in the shower my mom and dad had already left and my sister was getting ready, so she was hanging out by herself. She goes into my sisters room with a half eaten reces...foil and all! My sister said that there were bite marks in the foil, so she ate all the foil. OOPS... bad mom!

My Bucket List

I saw on my nieces blog that she made a list of things she wants to do before she dies....so here it goes!

• Go skydiving
• Take a month or even longer and tour Europe
• Go on and African safari
• Go scuba diving....Im kind of scared to try because I have serious issues trying to equalize...I know, Im retarted.
• Design and decorate a WHOLE entire house that is not mine, and have the person absolutely love it.
• Be in a photo shoot....I want my hair, makeup, and clothes done by people who I know how to do an amazing job, then have a photographer take so many pictures that some are bound to look amazing.
• Graduate College... my mom might want that one even more then me!
• Save a persons life
• Adopt a child from another country
• See ALL of Central park...I have been there twice and seen like 50 feet of it.
• Live in a big city like Boston, Chicago, or New York
• Be a teacher
• Live in a French Chateau
• Learn another language
• Grow old with my husband
• See the Eiffel Tower

A Nice Little Weekend Getaway

We had such a fun weekend this weekend. We went up to our cabin in the mountains with our friends, Dallas and Krista, and then had my niece and her friend come up to be babysitters. I love going up to the cabin SO much. I would do it every weekend if Todd let me. There wasn't too much snow up there, so we didn't get to go sledding like I had hoped, but we did get to go snowboarding which was BEAUTIFUL! Us girls played many hours of games, we went for a ride outside in the rhino, and went out for dinner. Berkeley and their little boy Krew were BFF's this weekend. There were so cute together. They would follow each other around and get into mischief together. It was a perfect weekend to get away and have fun.

Life Lately

Life has been very good and simple lately. Nothing monumental or out of the ordinary has been going on, but it still has been very fun. I went to Utah last week to visit my 2 sister in laws with Todds mom. It was fun to go back to my old stomping grounds, and it was even better to spend quality time with family. And the best is to come home after being away and seeing my hubby and sleep in my bed. Before I left for Utah Todd and I spoke in church for the first time. It went really well and I will say I did not get nervous at all, and wrote the talk the night before....oops! We have heard back from a couple of law schools, and so far no plans of where we are going to go yet. Its a constant waiting game, and every day I get excited to get the mail. Still, it is not a reality that I will be moving. It seems like something so far away that I dont think its real. Berkeley has really been growing up so much. She is started to say animal sounds like elephant, dog, cow, and lion. She is at such a fun stage and is constantly entertaining us. I couldn't ask for a sweeter daughter. I have been taking 2 classes at ASU online. An art class and a music class, and am proud to say that halfway through the semester I have an A in one of the classes. Even though its school its really fun to learn new things and invigorate my mind a little. Other than that I have been hanging out with good friends on a daily basis and love the friendships I have. I love that Berkeley has little friends too that she is familiar with as well. Being a stay at home mom sometimes feels like Im a teenager again. I hang out with friends, go out to lunch, shop, workout, and play with my favorite people every day! I am really blessed.

My Little Stinker

Today Berkeley seems to be putting me on some kind of scavenger hunt. It began when I was getting ready to put her down for a nap when I could not find her blankee. She SURVIVES on this blankee, so if it was gone, its like life of death. So I finally found it in this peculiar place....

Then after her nap she had mutilated her bow, so I was looking around her crib to try to find the other parts....instead, I found lost socks that were stuck behind her crib that have been MIA for MONTHS now, and an old sippy cup, with milk in it, that also had been missing for months......I dont know how or when she managed to get that cup so deep into her clothes under the crib.

My little stinker......

My Void is Now Filled

I was browsing through my blog today and realized that there were no pictures of Berkeley for a while....so I had to fill my void. We have lots of random pointless photo sessions in our house!

Latest Faves

Since my girls trip a couple weeks ago I have totally had the scrapbooking bug, so here are my latest faves.....

Another Weekend Away

From Left to Right....sis-in-law heather, sis-in-law robin, sis danielle, sis ashley, ME!!!!!, cousin jeny, sis whitney, and sis-in-law dori.

These are the infamous Sprinkles cupcakes. They are somewhat a fad over there. We waited in line for about 20 minutes and they were $4 a cupcake! What a bargain......sheesh! I give the presentation a 10 and the actual cupcakes an 8. I was glad we experienced what all the hype was about.

A little bit of the scrapbooking mess.

We were all feeling the color green that night!

I was fortunate enough to go to Newport Beach this weekend for a girls trip with my family. There were 8 of us girls total. It was my 3 sisters, 3 sister-in-laws and a cousin. We stayed in a time share condo that was on a huge hill over looking the ocean. It was quite beautiful. The festivites included lots of delicious meals, running on the beach, scrapbooking, LOTS of talking, shopping at fashion island and south coast plaza, pedicures, waiting in a long line for Sprinkles cupcakes, swimming, and sleeping on a couch bed. The weather was absolutely beautiful! It was about 80 degrees each day! Thank you Todd for being a trooper and watching my sick baby, and thank you Lori as well! I had a really great time and it was so nice to go on my first vacation baby free!

Some Left Over Randoms

Just some of the pictures from my visit to California. They include a day at the museum, a day snowboarding where I look like a boy, a fan I found inside my moms car....who has that stuff in their car?, a photo shoot picture that my sister took, and Berkeley playing piano.