January's Baptism!!!

Going out east is always fun. My parents, Marg, and I went out for a very special reason. My niece, January, got baptized. Here we are making silly faces after the ceremony.

I am so proud of her!
We also went out to meet my niece, Phoebe. She is six months old and I finally got to see her. Isn't she so cute???



I got to see all of my nieces and nephews in action, like playing basketball or playing scout games or drawing with chalk. So much fun spending time with them.

The Sunday we were there we went to a concert for Memorial Day at Wolf Trap (a national park dedicated to the preforming arts). The President's own Marching Band played an amazing concert and then we watched fireworks in the rain. Best firework show I have ever seen. Here are some of us in our seats.

My parents, Marg, and I also went to DC and went through the White House and the Holocaust Museum. The White House is beautiful inside and filled with so much history. It was so awesome! Got some souvenirs of course.
It was a great trip and I was sad when it was over! Can't wait to visit again...

Midway, Provo, & SLC

We went to Utah, celebrated Christmas with Alex and Tori and Jeff, visited Salt Lake, and just hung out in Midway. It was relaxing. I love our place in Midway (landscape pics are of Midway)! We saw the Christmas lights in SLC and went to the Church History Museum as well. It was a good trip!

Margi was mad that it wasn't a real tree. Silly.

Last Post of 2011! A Good Year!

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

Just want to reflect on this last year! I made a lot of new discoveries about life and myself. I made new friends and connected with old ones. It was a good year!

NOW TIME FOR HILAREE'S TOP 10 FOR 2011!!!! (blue are links)

10. Blog! -Metro Mondays

9. Westwood 50 years

8. Community Nursing: This was an awesome class and it started me thinking about do public or global health a little later in life.

7. Shoulder Surgery again: I had surgery in 2008 because of a torn rotator cuff. It tore again in May and I have been grinding down the bone over time. It dislocated at the end of the spring semester this year and had surgery a week later. Kept me from doing much this summer.

6. September 11th 10 years

5. Girls Camp

4. Heart Surgery: In my adult health clinicals I was able to be in the OR during an open heart surgery and it was amazing. When I was in 9th grade, my English teacher told a story about when he saw open heart surgery and that it was a very intense experience. It's true. It was awesome and I won't ever forget it!

3. General Conference

2. Trip Out East

1. 3 new baby girls (I love my nieces...and nephews!)

Kayli Mae

Alexandra Kensington

Phoebe Ariona (I actually haven't met her yet, but I already love her and think she is super cute!)

It was a great year overall and I am really looking forward to 2012!!!

CHRISTMAS TIME IS HERE AGAIN!!!

It's December and It's the month of Christmas. I plan on posting a lot because I love this time of the year! I'm going to talk about everything Christmas! Traditions are a big part of Christmas for a lot of people and I have a few of my own. One of my favorite traditions is that I read "A Christmas Carol" by Dickens every year. Best story ever!

This Sunday it was the great Christmas Devotional. The leaders of my church always make a Christmas address to help us remember the meaning of Christmas and remind us of Christ's example. It was a great devotional and it's online!

Three great guys and each of their messages were wonderful. I love President Monson's and my favorite was that he talked about "A Christmas Carol" which I love. For those of you who saw it, you might notice that my quote in the side bar was the one he used! Made me happy! :)

Merry Christmas!!!

I'm a Mormon!

I really love my profile and this site. Check out my profile! This site is so cool!

I am a Mormon and I love being one. I like this site because it shares a bit about me and why I am a Mormon. It makes me happy!

Last Weekend! Posting Now!

So I am finally posting about my trip up to Utah. I went last week to visit my sister and to go to General Conference! We were in like the 13th row! So close, it was awesome. We got there late, but we made it! Here's our view! Apparently, if you arrive late, you get great seats! :)

We roamed Salt Lake for a bit after the session and before we went to lunch. There are so many beautiful flowers around Temple Square! I love the colors!

We went to the Lion House and the Joseph Smith building that use to be a hotel and look at all the cool famous people that stayed there! (I spy Jimmy Stewart and Elvis! :) Two favorites of mine!)

We stayed at my parents house in Midway and it has the best views and it was especially beautiful because the leaves were changing colors. (I love Fall and Fall colors!)

I also spent a lot of time with my two youngest, cutest nieces. Here is chubby Kayli!

And meet Alex (I did on the trip!) and she is so cute!

So much fun in Utah!

Just because!! HP7p2

I just wanted to share this since I've seen the last Harry Potter movie. I made this with Ashlee for Girls Camp 2011! We had fun working with the Dales, Sabrina, and Garrett. I did use some of the real shots from the original trailer to add pizzazz. (The original trailer is awesome!) I think our Harry Potter and Voldemort were better and our Ron and Hermoine were funnier! I had a lot of fun making this and thought I would share.

Trip East, Part 2: Niagara Falls to New York City

The trip has been wonderful thus far! Before leaving Palmyra, my family visited the historic Book of Mormon publishing site. It was really wonderful to see the original building (they have some of the original bricks) and how the book was made. I saw a real first edition. They also had some original churchy paintings that I love, like the one of Jesus when he visits the Americas (it's in the BOM)! Palmyra was wonderful. We traveled to Niagara next to get a bit wet! It was beautiful there!!! The falls are loud and large and we rode on the Maid of the Mist (a boat) to get closer look. It was fun to be on the boat and see the falls with my nieces and nephews. They got so excited when we got wet. We got a bit of water on us at first when we past the America falls but we were not close enough to get soaked. We then sailed to the horseshoe falls where we got really wet. It was a lot of fun! And to get even more wet we climbed up next to the falls and all the heavy mists that come off the falls got us and we were finally soaked! Our little ponchos failed us!

Lots and lots of fun in Niagara! And to make the experience of upstate New York even better, we went to Buffalo and had legit Buffalo Wings that were super tasty! I ate 15 and some celery. Very very yummy!

My parents, Margi, and I then split off from the group and went to

NYC for some fun and to do my favorite thing, SHOPPING!!! New York City is a favorite of mine, but we did a lot of walking and my feet got tired! We did ride the subways which is always a nice break from walking, but it made me miss my wonderful light rail back in Mesa!

I ended up getting some fun things while I was there. Some cute new clothes and accessories, including my new favorite pair of sunglasses. We also visited my great aunt. It was fun visiting with her and her husband.

New York is fabulous and I love the picture I got there of this old guy. "The city that never sleeps?" :) Still more fun to come!

Trip East, Part 1: Phoenix to Palmyra

My Family (mom, dad, margi, and I) set off for another grand road trip cross country about a week ago. (explains the lack of blogging, sorry) We traveled very quickly across New Mexico, Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Tennessee, into Virginia. It took us 2 and a half days to get to Virginia and that includes the night we slept in Nashville. It was a lot of driving and it included a near death experience, which is another story. This was the fastest road trip I've been on, but then it slowed down a bit. We picked up my niece and spent the night in Maryland, then we drove up to New York with my family that lives by DC. So, lots of driving. We ended up in Palmyra for the Hill Cumorah Pageant. Before the pageant we went to lake Ontario and had a bit of beach fun. It was hard to enjoy it because it is an extremely smelly lake, but we tried to make the best of it! The pageant was awesome! It's about the Book of Mormon and the Restoration of the Church of Christ. We also saw a bunch of the awesome church sites in that area. We went to the Smith farm in Palmyra (after seeing the Palmyra Temple that's next to it!) and stood in the room in which the angel Moroni appeared to the boy Joseph. Very cool! We also walked through the near by Sacred Grove where the same boy saw God the Father and the Son Jesus Christ. It was peaceful and comforting to stand in the same woods where God and Christ had appeared. The trees and scenery were beautiful! The other site we went to was an hour away in Fayette. It was the Whitmer farm where the church was organized in 1830. Very awesome! We saw all these sites in one day and to finish it off we climbed to the top of the Hill Cumorah, the hill where the Gold plates were found by Joseph Smith Jr. We saw the behind the scenes for the pageant and the statue of the angel Moroni. So far this trip has been a blast and I have loved hanging out with my older siblings and all my nieces and nephews. They are so cute and we have had so much fun playing with them and watching movies. (except that they all keep asking me when I am going to get married :( no good!)

We celebrated Margi's Birthday in Palmyra and had ice cream.

She's getting old! 20 years old and the baby of the family.

More about the awesome fun will be posted! Keep an eye out for it!!!

P.S. It's my nephews B-day today! Happy Birthday Tai! (He's the little boy in the picture!)