Hogle Zoo

My old roommate (and good friend) Laurel came to visit on Friday!  We met up at the zoo and had a great time catching up!  It was an absolutely gorgeous day and I even got my first bit of sunburn for the year!

After the zoo, we spent some time wandering around the new City Creek Center in downtown Salt Lake City.  This outdoor mall is HUGE!  Neither of us were paying much attention as we wandered around and we got lost, repeatedly.  The worst was when it came time to go find our car.  We had somehow managed to go up some fire escape stairs instead of the main escalators and therefore had no idea where our car was at.  After at least 30 minutes of wandering around, we finally managed to find it and get on our way.

Thanks for a great day out Laurel and come back soon.  I miss you!

Cowgirls at Church

I got Leila all dressed up for church yesterday in a cute brown dress and cowboy boots and we couldn't resist taking a picture!

Spur of the Moment Vacay

Due to a chain of events, we ended up in California last week on a quick vacation.  Let's see if I can even recall how it all happened.

Jason had a job interview the week before with Deseret Digital Media--the company behind ksl.com, deseretnews,com, etc.  He had a follow-up interview with the CEO on Tuesday, at the end of which he was offered the job and was set to start March 12!  I can't even tell you how relieved/joyful/grateful we were!  This meant that I would get to put in my notice at work and finally be a stay-at-home mommy!

As we were processing everything, I realized that I had several days of PTO that I'd been saving for a future Disneyland trip that I wouldn't be needing anymore.  Then, we recognized that with Jason starting a new job, vacation time would be hard to come by for a couple months.  So we decided that we should take off and go on one last vacation.

We were torn between going to Arizona or California, but California ended up winning out because Jason's grandpa was in the hospital and we also wanted Grandma Ziebarth to have some Leila time (and it was the cheaper option).  So we packed up and headed out the next morning!

It was a fun trip filled with Disneyland (of course) and family.  Jason's sister, Jessica, even joined us in Disneyland for a day.  Leila stayed with Grandma this time around so we were able to have some time to ourselves.  I had a great time, but was certainly missing my baby girl by the end of each day!

After a rough trip down (due to Leila screaming and crying in her carseat), we opted to split the return trip over two days.  We spent the night in Vegas at the Stratosphere and our hotel room included a trip to the top.  So we took advantage of that before heading out on our last stretch.

Leila still didn't do great in the car and it has made me nervous about going back in a month with my family, but hopefully it is just a stage that she will grow out of fast!  Otherwise, I'm glad we made the trip and even more glad that Jason is once again employed!  Yay!