Vegas & Hoover Dam

We decided to leave Utah a day earlier than originally planned so we decided to stop in Las Vegas on the way home. We found a room at the Circus Circus hotel and casino for only $60 for both nights. It made me nervous that it was so cheap because I was afraid we would show up and it would be all trashy and gross. Much to my excitement and relief it was a decent room. It was clean and big and had a nice bathroom. It really was a steal. We got there in the late afternoon and then spent the rest of the night (until almost midnight) down in the casino area.

They hotel has a whole area that's like a carnival/arcade. We took the kids around and let them play games and win some prizes. I am probably silly because I would only let them play games that could win them cute stuffed animals. I hate some of the cheap ugly stuff they will give away as prizes. They did win some cute stuff and then our hungry selves sat down for a pizza dinner. We spent the whole night wandering and checking out the carnival area. The cool thing is they have a place set up for performances and they have some sort of circus performer doing stuff like every half hour. We watched a couple of those and they were pretty cool. Really, the trapeze artists performing in the belly of this hotel was really the coolest to me. We ended up back in the room totally tired and ready for bed.

The next day we did some wandering and drove the strip. Any of the pictures I've posted of hotels and stuff on the strip were all taken from the car. It was a little much to walk with the kids but it was still cool to just drive up it. We spent a couple hours at some outlet mall not too far from the hotel. Oh how I wish I could have had they money to get the way discounted Coach purse. Oh well! We still had fun window shopping. We didn't really do anything big while in Vegas but we had a good time. We made a REALLY quick stop at the Hoover Dam on the way home too. It was too hot and too busy to stop and walk around but we did snap a couple pictures. That counts right?! We at least got a picture of the kids with the dam behind it. That's enough for us.

We don't often take trips or do things like this just the four of us so it was really nice. I love getting to do fun, out of the ordinary things with my little family of four. I am grateful too that we have the opportunities we have to travel and do fun things as a family. I know I am blessed to have these chances to make memories with my family. All in all the Utah/Las Vegas trip was really great.

Time for a Rewind

I finally got a power cord for my laptop so it is in use again. I have a little bit of catching up to do so that's what the next couple posts will be. I can't believe I didn't even get our Utah trip post done. We were there for about a week and we had a great time. The kids loved spending time with Grandma and Grandpa McKinlay. It was so fun that this time around they were both so much bigger and so much more excited about the time there. We did all the 4th of July stuff I already blogged about and other than that we just hung out and enjoyed each others company. We really did have a great visit and I am glad the kids had a chance to have a week to get to know their G&G Kinney better. Hopefully we will get to see them again soon.
The above picture has it's title for a reason. It was a little drizzly out when we walked to the park so the slides were wet. We convinced Noah to go down the big twisty slide and were so excited that he was going to do it on his own. He went down fine until he got to the bottom where the water had pooled. I guess the wet slide all the way down and the water at the bottom kind of turned the slide into a slip-n-slide. Noah flew off the end, turned somehow, and then landed on his tummy. He was not thrilled. We tried to get him to go down again and tried to convince him we would catch him. The only way he would go down again was with Mommy (that was a site in itself).