vegas in review...

good times. been ages since we had been on a vacation with our family. his or mine. can't wait to do it again. my parents already booked a return trip for december. nick doesn't have enough vacation days or we just might have joined them again! thanks to everyone for your tips and advice. it was really appreciated and whatever we didn't get to see or do this time around, has found its way onto our vegas list and hopefully we can get to it another time!

wednesday august 9: an early morning. caught the flight without problems. my lil bro's first plane ride ever. he did great. could tell he was scared tho. didn't eat, pee, drink, move. only played video games. glad we had them to take his mind off of things. i guess my dad really kinda freaked my mom out. kept talking that the plane needed to go faster if he ever wanted to get off of the ground. seriously? shut up silly man!
had some uber annoying kiddos behind us. came thisclose to killing them. grrr. otherwise uneventful flight. gorgeous clear skies. great views of lake mead before we landed.
kev, nick, and myself took off once we got to the hotel. were way hungry. found some giant drinks and burgers at imperial palace.

the burgers started a crazy addiction. we photographed every single meal we ate in some way, shape, or form! so making a mini album out of those! also started a trend that we ate burgers every flippin day of this trip. oy.
did some gambling to pass the time. love the new ticket system. so much easier than dealing with coins!
went to dinner at the top of the eiffel tower. way cool. way yummy. so neat to see the fountains at the bellagio go off during dinner. not gonna bore you with all the food pics. will have to update the gallery when i get my pics and the oomph to do that album.

thursday august 10: jared and melissa's wedding. mom, dad, and kevin were going to attend. it was my chance to check out the world series of poker. headed to the rio. was so worth the trip. we got there early. didn't realize the final table started later. oh well. was nice to walk around without the crowd. got to see all the tables. unreal to think about 8800 and some people playing poker in that room. way neat to watch it on espn and think that we were there. not necessarily at that time but still cool!
saw phil gordon. bout pissed my pants. was too chicken to ask for a photograph. nick yelled at me. said since i was a girl i probably could have gotten one. that and the fact that he seems so incredibly nice! i didn't want to bother him tho! oh well, from now on, i vow to stalk any celebrity i see... maybe!
after that we walked the strip. made it to the wynn. had lunch at red 8. saw it on rachael ray's tasty travels. worth the trip. so yummy!
had some time to see more hotels and hang out by the pool before dinner.
ended up eating a jimmy buffet's margaritaville for jared and melissa's reception. went in place of mom and dad. they ended up with free meals at harrah's so they went there instead! we met up with them to go see the nudie show. it stunk. but it made mom and dad happy. can't complain.

friday august 11: the grand canyon adventure. where do i begin!?
left dad at the hotel. the four of us got up uber early to begin our four hour each way road trip...
drove past the hoover dam. that thing is so damn cool. i'm fascinated each and every time we pass it! stopped for some pics. was windier that heck...
nick cracked up when he saw a ram crossing sign. then i'll be damned there were a bunch of them right next to the road! snapped a pic of the lone one. look very, very closely!









not sure how to move my pics. i suck, sorry!
stopped at jack in the box for burgers! then got to some nasty weather. apparently, arizona decided to have monsoons while we were there. figures. never can go on a meyer family vacation and get away with no rain. it even is called the 'R' word in our family.
crappy times. made it to the giant hole tho! pretty damn cool. wish it wasn't as overcast. sigh. would have loved to see the vibrant colors. oh well, had to buy a book instead! :)



froze our patooties off. ended up experiencing a 50 degree weather change. vegas was 109 and arizona made it as low as 53. yes, the weather change entertained us in the car. you see, we had to find something because the stupid monsoons washed out a road. so we had to take a lovely detour thru flagstaff. added over an hour onto our return time.
drove thru crazy scary rains. my husband is amazing. so thankful we made it back safe and sound. played trivia when i wasn't too scared to read the questions!

were exhausted when we got back. ate at paris. yummy buffet. then we tried to walk the strip at night. wanted to see some free shows. the mirage volcano. snore as usual. but kev wanted to see it. after it was over he said, 'that's it!?' had to laugh. tried to see the sirens at treasure island. was too windy. they cancelled it!

saturday august 12:
walked the strip some more. went to m&m world and the coca cola store. had sodas from around the world.

some were tasty. some not so much. pretty good deal for like $7 bucks. made us all have the burps tho!! totally dug the apple one from china. at least i think that was my favorite. have the papers somewhere!
nick felt the need to feel up green...
wasted 20 minutes waiting for and seeing the 3 d movie there.... at least i got this kick arse picture! thanks babe! ;o)
yeah, we are cool. after that we walked our sorry selves to mandalay bay. jeez, is that a hike. took a cab back... but that's another story!
ate at burger bar. way freaking cool. totally recommend it! saw it on rachael ray's tasty travels too! the boys had the kobe beef burger and i had the black angus. we all split the dessert burger. yummy!
went to downtown vegas that evening. just kinda walked around and chilled. ate some fried oreos. thankfully we did a lot of walking to make up for all those damn calories!
gambled the night away. figured it was our last night. why not. nick lost a boatload on let it ride. but he had a blast. i turned in early to pack. had to rearrange our luggage thanks to the liquid scare. i'm so glad that it didn't happen the day we flew out and that the hotel was nice enough to notify the guests of the changes.

sunday august 13: were up at the crack of dawn. packed and to the airport with no troubles. the biggest pain was southwest's terminal. had to wait almost an hour there. the security guards told us wednesdays and sundays were always like that. note to self: do not fly out of vegas on a sunday or wednesday! after our baggage was checked we headed to security. was a breeze. shocked. thought it would have been a nightmare considering they wanted you there four hours early...
hung out in the terminal for what seemed like ages. papa bear can sleep anywhere...

i had my mandatory trashy airplane reads...
nick was a doll. staked out our 'B' boarding place in line. only bad thing about southwest... no assigned seats. and well, i guess that they don't play movies! boo!
kinda strange on board. the overhead compartments were empty. the pilot said they almost ran out of room for luggage. they had almost 75 more pieces to board than usual. yikes! got this super fun picture right after i got the one of all the empty compartments.

was kind of a crummy flight home. super cloudy. some not nice turbulance...
then we arrived at midway and had some missing luggage. dad's wasn't there. had to fill out all kinds of paperwork. got yelled at for checking into the airport too early. um, hello. the airlines recommended 3-4 hours early. so not our fault that you didn't have someone checking id with the baggage tickets. finally gave up and loaded the shuttle back. while on the shuttle we got a call from southwest. someone else had picked up dad's luggage, they were going to deliver it before 7am.
got home around 10. dad tried to convince us to go out to dinner. i was tired and crabby and hungry. we convinced him to pick up taco bell and to just drop us off!
i got mostly unpacked that night. totally turned out to be a good thing, since that stinking summer cold/flu kicked my butt.

so there you have it. the update. abridged. have tons of pictures. i think over 400 by the time i collected my mom's and my brother's. yeah, you'll never hear me say i've run out of pictures to scrap! ;o)