Las Vegas --Picture Overload.

My hubby joined his Dad, Uncle Nils, brother Derek, sister Darcy, cousin Mike, and his brother-in-law Anthony on a hike down into the Grand Canyon for a couple days.
Meanwhile, Luke & I joined Scott's mom, Brenda, and his sister Alison (married to Anthony who also went on the hike) on a trip to Las Vegas to kill time while we waited for them to be done sweltering in the middle of the Canyon.

[did you understand all that? Boys=Grand Canyon, Girls=Vegas]

The drive was made easier thanks to my new Netbook, that allowed Luke to watch movies at his fussiest moments.

At dinner Sunday night after the long drive and super long check-in.

we ordered a "side" of ONE egg and a "side" of hashbrowns and the kid's plate was bigger than mine!!
Needless to say, everyone in Vegas was drawn to his cuteness.


The view from our hotel window. We stayed at the Flamingo Hotel and we could see the Bellagio (left) and Cesar's Palace (right)

Inside one of the hotels, We decided this would make a fantastic wedding decor idea--huge flower balls hanging from trees with twinkle lights around all the branches!

Ali trying to get lucky with the huge slot machine

Back in the hotel, Luke woke up at exactly 6:34 every morning. he doesn't even wake up at that time at home so it was kind of weird. He spent the mornings eating cereal and watching PBS kids in my bed.

Luke did pretty good taking naps and sleeping in the hotel crib. I guess the 104 degree weather and all the visual stimulation really took a toll on the little guy.

The Aquarium at the Mirage. We couldn't get Luke to look at the camera because he was too busy staring at the fish.

Alison really wanted to go on the roller coaster at New York, New York. Unfortunately Brenda doesn't do roller coasters and I wanted to and would have but being pregnant I had to say no. She would have gone on it by herself but it wasn't open yet that morning.


Tuesday Night Brenda and Alison went to the Donnie & Marie show, Luke and I went down to the flamingo habitat and watched the flamingos and huge Koi fish for a while. Then we came back to the room and he watched Elmo before his bath while I packed my stuff to leave for the next day.

We don't have any pictures of it, but Monday night, Ali and I got to go see Phantom (i've wanted to see this for-ever!). We had tickets for seats in the far back corner, but when we got there they upgraded up to the 3rd row from the stage! It was completly fantastic and we loved it. That was probably my favorite part of the whole trip!

My least favorite part of the trip was that from all the walking on Monday in bad flip-flops, I pulled a weird muscle on my foot and had a really hard time walking around. We spend 2 hours at an outlet mall off the strip trying to find shoes (among some other shopping) that would make it easier to walk. I almost gave up and then we found some in the last store we tried. It made all the difference and I could enjoy the rest of my trip without limping around too much.

The morning we left, outside the Flamingo Hotel
Katie, Alison, Luke

We drove that day to Arizona, to the North Rim Lodge at the Grand Canyon. We met up with all the hikers and had dinner there at the lodge.
I love the Grand Canyon! It was beautiful!
And I can't believe my hubby hiked down and back up and all around it!!

Luke lost a shoe at the grand canyon. It disappeared from the car at some point after we met up with the boys and we never did find it. We had to carry him everywhere for the rest of that day and the next. It was not fun. Oh and I thought our cabin/room at the lodge was nicer than our hotel room at the Flamingo! 10 pts to G.C. for having nice places to stay at the North Rim!

The End. I may or may not get pictures from their hiking up here. I'll let you know where you can see them. I will probably just put up a link to the Smugmug album once we get them all uploaded. He had a really great time on his hike and is really glad he did it.