arrived in Las Vegas at 9 am on Friday--let the party begin!
caught up with Sharon over lunch at Gordon Biersch and dinner at P. F. Chang's
walked around the Bellagio
woke up and got ready for the wedding without kids under foot
went to Emily and Matt's hotel room and took a few pictures of them
found out that people could watch the wedding live online, so we let Barb and the kids know
some people rode in their limo and we drove to the chapel, which was very pretty
the ceremony was short and sweet (about 10 minutes), and Zach and Gabe saw the whole thing :) Barb texted that they were saying hi to us on the computer screen--too cute!
no outside photography allowed at the chapel; Emily and Matt had a little photo shoot after the ceremony
we did our group shot in front of the Bellagio
people left to change clothes; Frank and I walked around the Mirage taking photos (I don't know that we'd ever spent much time there), spent some $ playing a Ghostbusters slot machine
dined at BB King's Blues Club, enjoyed the food, beer, music, conversation during breaks in the music, and a little dancing
Sunday brunch at the Wynn buffet; the food was so good that I guess it distracted me from taking any photos
we hung out with Brian and Sharon until dinner
ate at the Grotto in the Golden Nugget, met up with others to experience Fremont street, spent a little more $ playing Texas Tea (one of my favorites) and Godzilla slots; the visual and sound effects on the games have really changed since we were last there!
we had breakfast at our Summerlin McDonald's/Starbucks and Frank got his favorite McSkillet burrito (a regional item!); my cashier at Starbucks was a girl I remembered from her working both there and at Jo-Ann Fabrics for a bit, how funny is that?
we hadn't been down to the south end of the strip yet, so we walked and photographed and reminisced...
we caught our flight home.
We can't wait to go back.
More Vegas photos coming soon...hopefully sooner than a month from now :)
We're home. We traveled to St. Louis, Las Vegas, and back again, and we had a blast. But September seemed way too busy. We are looking forward to a quiet October (ha ha), with a birthday, an anniversary, a couple of houseguests, Halloween, and our fence install starting, if we're lucky. Zach still loves school, and Gabe is getting used to the quieter days and occasional trips to Target. Work is going well for Frank, and I'm taking advantage of a little more free time during the day. Things are good.
We made it through the first week. Zach has loved going to school so far, even though he's pretty exhausted by the time he gets home. He's been jumping out of bed so excited to get dressed and leave with Daddy. Gabe wasn't so happy on the first morning, yelling/crying "I want to go to school!" He had a lot of questions the first couple of days about when he'll get to go...poor guy. But he and I are adjusting to our new routine of a quieter house, no one to fight for control of the TV, and needing someone (Mommy) to play with. Here's a glimpse of the first morning:
Picture taking has almost completely ground to a halt, and other projects (wedding gift, etc) which are on a deadline have precedence. It's a nice change, but I had to cringe when I realized that I only took 34 photos during all last month. That's a record for me since about 2005, I think! Oh well. We are looking forward to some upcoming trips, and Zach wants to talk about traveling and birthday parties every single day. Pre-k starts in a few weeks, and I am really looking forward to it being someone else's job to entertain Zach four days a week. :)
Frank and I have nearly finished watching season 2 of Downton Abbey, and it's really as good as everyone says. I am looking forward to the start of fall television, though.
I'm also working on more photo books of our travels, and seeing how little the boys were, and thinking "OMG, how did we ever manage that trip?" We really have done a lot, and accomplished a lot, so I thought it would be fun to see what we were up to a year ago, two years ago, etc. At least to remind me, when lately the days all seem to run together, that we are, most definitely, not standing still.
Mid-August, 2008. We had just moved into our Belgian house.
Mid-August, 2009. Sightseeing in Brussels with Abby.
Mid-August, 2010. We viewed the Grand Place flower carpet with Abby and Loic.
Wow, my Brussels photo book is going to have to be 100 pages long...
This week seemed absolutely brutal, with Frank and I extremely tired, and loud, crabby kids. Either too hot outside or storming, so nothing to do but stay in. Lots of laundry. Had to move everything from our inside freezer to the one in the garage, and have to keep manually defrosting it to keep the fridge cold enough until we get it fixed next week. I'm sure I could list some other things if I really thought about it.
It hasn't been all bad though. Frank found and fixed the squeak on our treadmill that had been bugging me for weeks, and my biggest accomplishment was this:
I think you could say that now, at about 9 months in the house, we've finally unpacked all the boxes. And the whole fence thing is moving along. Now all we have to do is wait for them to tell us whether we can have a 6-foot fence along the back of our yard, or if we have to go with 4-foot. It's happening people, it's really happening. And TGIF.
Last month had a few up and down moments and a lot of is-this-even-blogworthy? moments. And there are photos to prove it. Or give you a better look at the boys if they are too bouncy when we are on Skype (or won't come to the computer at all).
The highlight was helping celebrate Mia's first birthday.
Besides the party, it's just nice to get out of the house and do something different for a couple days. We are so lucky to live close enough to go up there every now and then. Soon I'll drive up there by myself so Jen and I can try to have a little free time.
We dealt with the sadness of losing our first family pet. It's been rough, definitely. Marmalade was getting older, but we didn't expect it to happen so suddenly. Zach was sad when Frank drove him to be cremated, because I told him we had to say goodbye, but other than that the boys haven't asked about him. Chloe seems her normal chatty self, but I've been giving her extra attention just to be sure she's ok.
Here we are back in 1999.
A trip to a Delaware, Ohio, pet store with a friend to pick up something for her hamster led me to the sweetest kitty ever, and it was love at first sight. He will always be missed. This is one of those times I'm so glad that I've taken so many pictures.
One of the things I'm excited about lately is creating photo books. With having so little time to be creative these days, making something quickly on the computer is really appealing (combined with the fact that Shutterfly is always having sales). Before now I've just made them as gifts, but last week
I started what I hope will be a whole series of books about our European travels. I don't know if I should admit this, but you know we watch reality TV; I was totally inspired by watching The Bachelorette. We saw an episode where they were in London, and Frank and I found ourselves saying "Hey, we've been there!" and "Remember how Zach was when we were there?" It brought back some good memories. So, first up, London in April of 2009:
Click here to create your own Shutterfly photo book.
We are slowly making progress on things in the house, emptying more boxes all the time and tweaking this and that. Curtains for our bedroom make it so dark that we wish we could take afternoon naps. Labels on the boys' toy bins make it a bit easier for all of us to tackle cleaning their room. We are still working on the steps to get our fence approved. I'm enjoying the view of sunset from our back windows.
Zach is currently into:
*story time at Barnes & Noble
*Legos (his collection just started with a couple sets given to him at the story time, and also some that were a gift to Frank from RJ back in the day--sorry he took apart your roll-cage car, RJ)
*building things out of megablocks or duplos too, like the Eiffel Tower (Frank and I helped on that one)
*taking care of some plants, even though not a lot is growing
*playing card games, especially Crazy 8's
*watching lots of different shows on Netflix, which he calls "Nit-flex"
*drawing, painting, and writing. When asked about the one below, he said "It's someone we talk to on the 'puter, like Grandpa Larry!"
*being really good during his first dental cleaning
*staying dry most nights (thank goodness)
*fighting with his brother, about anything and everything, even whether or not the thing he just built is a monkey house or a monkey castle.
Gabe is currently into:
*Thomas, more than ever, as in, he watches the same couple of shows over and over again
*playing with his Thomas trains, including new additions Annie and Clarabel
*naps on the couch, after refusing to go upstairs and take one
*tootsie pops after haircuts
*definitely not ice cream (we're not sure what's up with this kid), but he will eat popsicles
*riding the tricycle across the bottom of our driveway, even if he has to share
*staying dry most days (thank goodness)
*fighting with his brother, although he also claims that Zach is his best friend. That was a funny conversation during bathtime the other night. Zach argued that best friends are from different houses and suggested he pick Ben or Maggie instead.
Frank and I are currently into:
*taking turns sleeping in on the weekends
*finishing 4 seasons of Breaking Bad in a matter of weeks and looking forward to the new episodes soon
*meeting the neighbors. We had a good time at a neighborhood pool party yesterday and are glad to have started the process of meeting people.
