Oh Samoa

This little cookie has been my joy as of late. I only bought two boxes, and I'm trying to make them last as long as possible. Let's just say the Girl Scouts knew I'd be needing these right now, thank you!

At Long Last...

This cute brother of mine has finally decided to get married! Jonny and Marissa got engaged last night. Sadly enough I had to find out about this over a facebook status update! What a lame-o brother. But we are so extremely excited for them and can't wait to see this blessed occasion occur! Love you both!

03.03.09

My oldest friend, McKenzie, got hitched yesterday! She married Deven Garner in the Logan, Utah temple and it was beautiful! The weather was gorgeous, just a little windy. The sealing was sweet and done in plenty of time! They specifically picked this date because Kenzie loves math and it was a "square root day." (3x3=9) It was pretty funny because the sealer actually mentioned how smart it was for them to pick that date. I'm sure that made them even more sure they picked the perfect day!

Logan Temple

We had a lot of time to kill before pics so Jordan got creative and we took a picture of a shadow kiss.

The new Mr. and Mrs. coming out of the temple

Deven and McKenzie

The luncheon following the temple was at the Copper Mill restaurant. The last time Jordan and I were in Logan we ran into the photographer from our own wedding and he told us that he had some pictures displayed in this restaurant and that our wedding was one of them. So we had to check that out and when we found our picture on the wall by the little barber shop, we also saw our photographer! It was pretty crazy but fun. So here we are with our wedding pic in the background. Hard to believe that was over two years ago.

The reception took place at a church in Clinton and we got to see so many friends there. I don't get to see these people very often anymore so it was really fun for me.

Me and Kenz

The bride and groom sharing their first dance Eating the cake, they were way too nice to each other!

Everything went really smoothly and the night was perfect. I am so extremely happy for my dear friend and am excited for her to start this new adventure. I have never seen her so happy in all of my life so Congrats you two and best wishes!

Decorations

McKenzie's insanely talented sister-in-law did all of the decorations for the reception. It looked amazing. The neat thing is, Kenzie and Deven get to keep quite a bit of it to decorate their new home. I am jealous, to say the least. We made sure to capture some of the cute displays.

These were just a few, but you really had to be there to appreciate all of the hard work that she put into making it look perfect.

Another getaway...

Jordan, Ryan, Lauren and I headed down for some warmth this past weekend! It actually didn't end up as warm as I'd hoped but it was sure warmer than Provo! We planned to meet up with Jordan's parents and Uncle Mike in Las Vegas, the boys were all headed to the Nascar Race. While that sounded VERY intriguing to us girls, we decided to pass...

On the way down to Vegas we stayed a night with Grandma-ma in sunny St. George. She was at their house alone that week while Grandpa was taking care of some things up North. She was kind enough to put us up and show us a few things around town.

All of us checkin out the view

We were supposed to go do a session at the St. George temple, unfortunately Grandma realized her temple recommend had expired last month. We decided to still stop by and see the temple, Jordan had never seen it up close before, it was beautiful!

Jordan, me, Ryan and Lauren

St. George Temple

Me and Lauren

Lauren, Ryan, Grandma, Jordan and Me

After the temple, we headed to Cafe Rio and then headed to Vegas. Once we met up with the rest of the fam we grabbed some necessary In-n-Out burgers and hung out on the strip. I don't know what was up this weekend, but that place seemed even crazier than usual! So we stuck to the more "clean" fun around town, including M&M World where we saw this car, in honor of the big race!

On Saturday the boys headed here to the track:

They did a lot of this. The race took a lot longer than we anticipated because there were a lot of yellow flags, but they boys really enjoyed themselves. They actually went to the Saturday race, not the big Sunday one. They definitely got some sun, which we sadly don't have pictures of.

While the boys were gone, Lauren, Michelle and I just shopped around and proudly spent hardly any money! I was quite proud of myself. I usually use vacations as an excuse to buy whatever I feel like. But my big treat this time was a little bit of this:

Now, for some background, I was first introduced to this restaurant when I lived in Virginia. A lady in our ward once referred to it as "a celestial experience." Now, we first thought that might be a little over the top, but that was before we had experienced the divinity that is this food. Utah, being the lame state that it is sometimes, does NOT have a Maggiano's. So whenever we are in Vegas I make Jordan take me. It was a huge success this trip, as always!

Us girls also decided to treat ourselves to a show of our own. We tried to get some good discount tickets from one of the kiosks out on the strip but we weren't having much luck. We ended up just heading over to the Ventian where the concierge helped us get some awesome seats to see Phantom of the Opera that night. I have seen Phantom once in NY, but it was a standing ticket and not quite the same. So I was really excited to really experience it the way it should be. The theater was beautiful and the cast was excellent. We were very pleased. I've been singing the songs in my head for days now.

We grundgingly headed back home on Sunday. It was a pretty quick getaway but we all throughly enjoyed ourselves. It's been a little rough getting back into the daily grind, but I guess that's just the way vacations go.

My idea of a perfect date...

Happy Valentine's Day

I've noticed a lot of people posting about their Valentine's dates, so I thought I'd go along with the trend. We decided (I guess it was more I decided) that we'd do a daytime date instead of the traditional evening date. I hate waiting around at restaurants forever and having to go to movies that are sold out. I have been wanting to see "He's Just Not That Into You" forever! It opened the day before my birthday and I thought that would be the perfect opportunity to go see it, but alas, we were doing wedding festivities for my birthday instead. So I made Jordan promise me we could see it for Valentine's. He held true to his word and we made it to the first matinee showing on Saturday morning. How's that for ambitious? It was nice to have a small crowd in the theater and get the early-bird special. So I had really high expectations for this film and I was so pleased! It wasn't exactly what I expected, but I loved it! So did Jordan, which is pretty impressive. The cast was perfect and there is a lot of truth to be held with what they show about relationships, I even learned a few things. Make sure you make time to see this one, and coerce your hubby to watch too.

After the movie we headed over to Magleby's Fresh for lunch. Jordan actually used to work there, so we don't end up choosing it for our dates too often. There weren't many people there either, so it was a nice, quiet lunch. Their food is always divine, but they've also remodeled since we were last there and it looks really good! I wish we could've made it to breakfast for their awesome french toast, but we'll have to save that for another day.

We finished up the day at home in pj's watching movies, staying out of the cold and snow. It was such a perfect day and I'm glad we switched it up from previous years. At the end of the day, I was so happy that I was with Jordan and that I was not one of the girls in the movie waiting to see if he'd call me after our date. I'm just so lucky he's still into me!

Arizona Love

Jordan and I got to go down to Arizona last week for his sister Ciara's wedding. We were so excited to take some time off from the day-to-day norm. And needless to say, we were stoked for the sunshine! I got to fly down a few days early to help out with some of the wedding stuff and Jordan drove down later. The first couple of days were just finishing up last minute things and getting everything all set to go. I loved soaking up the sun even though I only got to do it in between the running of tons of errands. The day before the wedding me, Ciara and Chelsea all got pedicures, which is turning into a bit of a tradition with weddings for us. I don't remember the last time I got this done but it was fabulous!

At the nail salon

All our toes after we were done!

Later that day, we got to go pick up Jordan's brother Jamison from the airport. He was returning from his mission to Japan, just in time for the wedding. We made some signs for him on the way to the airport and while we had some time to kill. It felt like we waited forever for him!

Chelsea with her sign

Me and Jord waiting

Elder Hill! Finally here! They lost his luggage in between L.A. and Phoenix, go figure. So we were at the airport for quite awhile getting that all figured out, they ended up sending it to the house the next morning.

At long last, the day of the wedding came! We were praying really hard all week for the weather to hold up. It was sunny all week, but all day Saturday was really cloudy and threatened rain. The reception was outdoor so we were really counting on good weather, there was no backup plan! Our prayers were answered, the rain held out until right after the reception ended, then it was a complete downpour! We had to clean everything up in the rain and it was so cold and miserable. But they had lots of friends who helped us out till the bitter end. The pictures all turned out great because of the cloud coverage.

The newlyweds! Mr. and Mrs. Kent Darracq

Me and Chels killing time at the temple

Ciara with a couple of people from her mission. The one on the left was a senior missionary and the one on the right was one of her converts, he flew all the way from Boston just for her!

Ciara and all of the bridesmaids at the reception center

I was doing a full on squat in this picture, my legs were completely shaking by the time it was acutally taken. I hope my face wasn't revealing the truth!

One of our last pics, we were a little tired of smiling

All in all, it went pretty well! There were a few hiccups though. The temple took a little longer than it was supposed to which made everyone late to the luncheon, reception, and pictures. One bad thing was Jordan's grandma fell on some cement steps right when we lit sparklers to give them a fun farewell to their honeymoon. She eneded up having to go to the hospital that night but all is well now. I ended up involved in a little prank with Jordan, his uncles and some cousins. I was asked to take Ciara's luggage up to their room for her and I got accompanied by everyone and they "short sheeted" the bed. I had no idea what that was but it was pretty funny. I made sure they didn't do any major pranks though, I didn't want their wedding night totally ruined and those uncles can get pretty crazy! :) Everything else was great though! It was fun to meet some more people that Jord knew growing up and really fun visiting with family that we don't get to see much. We had to drive home Sunday morning, that drive is definitely not my favorite but we survived! This work week has already felt excruciatingly long because of my break, but it was well-worth it! Congrats Ciara and Kent and we love you all Hill family!