3/29 - We had planned for many months to take several of the girls to see Disney's Frozen on Ice. We met up at Taco Joint in Richardson, had some late lunch/dinner, had some cupcakes for Reese's birthday and then headed to American Airlines Center to see Frozen on Ice. We had 8 girls and 7 moms so we had a good time. Girls got to eat popcorn basically for dinner. The show was great. They had Minnie, Mickey, Goofy and several other Disney characters do introduction then they told the Frozen story with the characters. It was done really well.
3/28 - With all the weather today was the first day of sports. Landon had baseball at 8am after late night at scouts. The boys played pretty good and won 9 to 5. Landon got an out throwing from short to first. He got a hit, but also struck out with his friend Maxum pitching.
Then we headed to soccer. We tied 3 to 3 but it was a great game. We have a few new players and boys played really well for first game. Landon had some good drives in the game.
That night Greg went to FC Dallas game. Kids and I went to pick up Moo Yah, and ate outside a Rocket Park then played at the park. They had me going to the top and going down the slides with them which is always fun. Then we got home to get kids to bed.
3/27 - Landon had his big cub scout event of Blue and Gold where they bridge to the next rank. Landon was a Bear and now he is a Webelo. We got to eat, have lots of desserts that families made, watched the boys cross over the bridge, we also had a slide show with fun pictures from the pack. Kasey even made the slideshow and was super excited. Greg is taking over a chair position so he had to speak and help out with everything.
3/24 - 3/27 - I headed to Boston for business trip. We had some meetings. Got to see areas that still had a ton of snow. We got to our hotel and 4 fire trucks at the hotel and everyone was outside with towels and sheets on them. We had to get to business meeting so thought we would come back later. Once we did they had to move us to different hotel for a night because there was a water main break on top floor that affected several floors. Both hotels I got to be in upper floor with nice view. We had several good Italian meals, got to have Canolis from Mikes a few times. Nico's was amazing food and wine.
3/21 - With rain there were no games this weekend. We did a little shopping looking for possible birthday presents for Landon and getting a birthday present. That night Landon had a friend birthday party playing lazertag. We took Kasey to Bavarian Grill or as the kids call it Train place because it has a train running around the top. Yummy German food, some beer and we even had some black forest cake and cobbler.
3/20 - Kasey had a friends birthday party so we got to take Landon to dinner just the 3 of us. We went to Mi Cocina and then went to Braums for some dessert.
Landon sent Greg a text. Took a picture of him sticking his tongue out, it used emojis for see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil. They he said I am the King (emoji), I love dog (emoji) I have to go to the bathroom (emoji).
Silly boy
3/19 - luckily the original open house was postponed because of weather. It was rescheduled to tonight so I got to go. Bad traffic heading home but got there. Kasey took us through her room. They had a book they had written and had a QR code that went to audio of Kasey reading the book. They had several books they created pages for like what they would look like when they were 100, or what they would buy with $100. We also got to see her notebooks they work on in school. She writes a lot about Patch and family. They also had something where they drew and wrote something the first week of school and then an example from March. First week she had a scribble drawing and 1 word. March she had picture and several sentences.
Landon we got to see his Greek mask he made in AIM and the Greek city they have created. Landon's picture was sleeping on a bed in one of the buildings they made (all out of white paper). In his class we had to find the drawing they did of the family. Kasey found it. Landon had some great art work, some good stories he wrote about his elephant, about harry potter and a few other things. So fun to see how things develop over time.
3/12 – We had until about noon. Greg set and alarm for 7 so we could sort of start getting back into normal time. Kasey asked why isn’t Daddy sleeping in? We all got up and slowly got showers and got ready. Little later we headed down to Carnegie Deli for some yummy breakfast. Another very expensive breakfast, but it was good. We went back to the room, finished packing and just vegged out in the room til time to head to the airport.
We got to airport, checked in, got some sandwiches, fruit smoothies and a few other things for the afternoon and got ready to head home.
Kids favorite part of vacation
Kasey’s favorites
Michael and Melodi’s – playing on trampoline, eating pizza, spending time with Jewlia and Dillon, and going to the park especially the slides coming down the hill
Grand Canyon – ride on bus to see parts of grand canyon, hotel was pretty, liked Colorado river and Grand Canyon, liked the snow a lot
Las Vegas – Going to Eiffel Tower, Going to Secret Garden and getting Cuttie the cheetah, spending time with family in nice hotel. Getting Ariel the balloon from Dick’s Last Resort in Excalibur. Eating breakfast at Serendipity. Going on Gondola ride in Venetian where our driver sang Let it Go.
Landon’s favorites
Michael and Melodi’s - Spending time with Dillon, playing on trampoline with Dillon and Kasey, Playing Harry Potter Kinect with Dillon, Jewlia and Kasey, going to the huge park
Grand Canyon – watching the scenery, walking on trails at Grand Canyon
Las Vegas – Going to see Dolphins and Tigers, get Lighting the cheetah, going to see Blue Man Group show with Daddy, eating breakfast at Serendipity
3/11 – We didn’t set an alarm, but we all kind of woke up about 8am. We decided to get up and get going. We all got showers and decided to walk down to Ceasars Palace and have breakfast at Seredipity. Greg laughed at me when I commented that it was really expensive. Cheaper meals for Breakfast were $17. Whatever we were on vacation. We had a good big breakfast. Then we walked down to Paris. Kids really wanted to go up in Eiffel Tower so we did. Greg and I had not done that before in Vegas. We got tablets to go up there that show you what it would look like if you were at the top of the real Eiffel tower. You could click on different things and learn more about them. There were also slits in the floor that were just big enough to put your phone camera on so we got some pictures looking straight down from the top. It was pretty cool up there. We could see where we were the night before, and where our hotel was.
After that we took a taxi down to the Venetian. We walked around some and kids and I booked a gondola ride, and Greg went to check out the Sports book and grab a drink. We had to wait some so we got a few small chocolates from Ghirardelli where we were. Once we got on the gondola the lady driver we had was talking to us. She sang 3 songs to us – That’s Amore, Let it Go (poor Landon) and another song I wasn’t familiar with. She was nice and a great singer. Greg found us on the side and took a few pictures of us.
Then we walked back to the Sports book so Landon could see it, but we got kicked out because kids couldn’t be in there. We walked across the street to Mirage. Greg walked around some and kids and I went to the Siegfried and Roy’s secret Garden. They had several dolphins they were training, and then in the back they had leopard, 2 big lighter lions, 3 lion cubs that were almost 11 months old. They also had some white striped tigers and snow white tigers. It was fun to watch the young lions play. The tigers were tearing apart a few boxes. The Lions were hanging out together. One of the trainers was out there taking questions. He said some of the animals used to be in the shows, but several of them were to young. I guess they have about 60 animals that they rotate into the garden through the day for them to have a change in scenery and for people to see.
We watched the dolphins some more which is always fun, and then we walked back to our room to change. We had reservations at 5:30 at Olived which is right on the water at the Bellagio. Apparently to get on the patio you have to be there by 4:30. We got there about 5 and couldn’t get on the patio. We still walked outside to watch the water shows which is fun. I got to see my favorite to the Bellagio song. The kids enjoyed it to. It was probably to fancy of a restaurant for them but we had some good Italian and even got some dessert. After dinner we walked into Bellagio a little, and then headed outside to see one more show. We got to see it from the strip which was fun. We sat kids on thick fence and held onto them to watch. Then we started walking back. We had about 12 minutes until the Volcano erupted. We made it just in time. Kasey was on Greg’s shoulders and someone let Landon up front so he could see. It was better from the front time to see it. After that we headed upstairs to our room. Kids were tired.
3/10 – We got up about 7 again. We got ready, had breakfast, packed up and headed out. We headed to the Grand Canyon. We drove for a while and parked then decided to take a bus down a little ways. We went to a few stops to see the beautify Canyon. It changed everytime you looked at it. Just beautiful and many colors, some with trees and snow, some red rock, some Green. We saw the Colorado river some at Hopi Point. We hiked less than ½ mile from Hopi point to the stop before that to catch the bus back to near our car. We had to head out to get to Vegas so we could get there in time for dinner and shows.
We got into town, got gas, returned the car in the parking garage of the Mirage and checked in. Kids were excited to be big hotel with so much going on. There were 2 backetball tournaments in town so many people had on their school shirts.
We got settled into our room changed clothes and headed out. We decided to have a quick dinner in Excalibur hotel which was kind of between where our two shows were. We decided to eat at Dicks Last Resort. Maybe not best but it was pretty quick and easy. We got some cheese sticks and decided we were all pretty hungry. Later a balloon guy came around. He made Kasey a really cool Ariel balloon and made Landon a rocket pack with spirals coming out the bottom. Landon ended up giving his to a younger kid because it was pretty big. Kasey carried hers around all night and got many comments on it. It was really good.
After dinner Kasey and I took the free monorail to Mandalay Bay and we headed to where the show was. We got a few pictures and then got in with one ticket, but the 2nd one wouldn’t come up. We went and printed them and got in just fine. I thought the Michael Jackson show was really good. Great music, dancing, hearing him talk, they even had a hologram of him singing and dancing some. They had one dancer that only had 1 leg which I thought was cool. Kasey was good for about the first half then she was tired and about done. She spilled her drink and then got scared when they did Thriller and the zombies were in the Isles right by us.
Landon loved Blue Man Group and brought back a streamer. Fun music, interaction, and a few things I had shown him on utube. Probably should have sent Kasey to Blue Man Group too, but I think we all had fun.
On our way back kids got to see lights of the strip. They boys stopped and watched the water show at Bellagio. Kasey and I got to see the Volcano at the Mirage from the back. The fire made it really hot right there so Kasey wasn’t to thrilled.
We got kids in bed and Greg and I sat there with our electronics in the dark until we went to bed J
3/9 – We got up about 7 to get all of us showered and out the door. We were headed to Sedona area to a cool Out of Africa animal park that I had found online. It was about a 2 hour drive which the kids love J We got there a little after 11. We headed to the first show called Feature Creature where they introduce you and let you pet a few of the animals. There was a very large black and white lizard, a Cavy – large rodent that can run fast, and a Boa Constrictor. After that we headed down to go on our Safari. We got in an open bus to go into area where the animals roamed freely. We first saw a giraffe. Each of us had a little twig and leaves to feed him. He basically came up to the bus to eat from our hands. He even stuck his head in the bus to eat out of the drivers bucket. Then we drove around and saw an Ostrich that was eating from the driver, and bit her as she stuck her hand in front of it – that’s how they figure out what something is.
We kept driving around and saw several zebras. They had a few that were about a year old that didn’t hang out with the other Zebras anymore. They also had a really young Zebra. There were some bulls and several other cool animals like antelope. It was neat to see them like that.
After that we went up for the Tiger Splash show. They had a tiger in a grass area with a swimming pool. They basically had to tiger starting to chase different blow up toys like it was hunting them. He got in the pool a few times, jumped up pretty high on the fence to get one and then just chased the guys around. It was pretty amusing.
Kasey decided she wanted to feed one of the tigers – through a fence, but she got to feed him 2 pieces of Chicken
Landon decided he wanted to try zip lining. I told him I’d do it with him. They had ¼ mile zipline for $25 each so we went for it. Kasey and Greg walked around the park seeing other animals while we did ziplining. Landon was a little nervous, but I think he started understanding the holster we had on he was a little more comfortable. He decided he didn’t want to push off, but just to jump and go. I decided to push off some. I was backwards and could see him most of the way. It was pretty cool. We could see Greg and Kasey below. I would do it again, and Landon said he would too. We could see the safari area below us as we went over.
After that we decided to drive back. I had heard that Sedona was really nice so we decided to drive back that way to see different scenery. It was beautiful. Lots of red rock areas that were very nice and changed over time. As we got closer to Flastaff there were more pine trees and snow. We stopped at a little rest stop to check it out. Then we decided to take a smaller road 180 back up north. It was beautiful. Ton of Snow and trees and even open areas. We went up just above 8000 feet elevation on that trip then headed back down. Beautiful drive. Greg and I liked it. Landon enjoyed it some, but Kasey could care less.
Since we took the longer drive that was totally worth it, we decided to have dinner again at the hotel. We opted to get both kids in bed at the same time which Landon doesn’t like. Greg and I ended up in the bathroom with a stool and our electronics. We last minute decided to book shows for Vegas the next day. Kasey and I going to see Michael Jackson One and the boys going to Blue Man Group. The Solis’ had just seen it and loved it. I’m hoping Kasey likes the music and dancing since she doesn’t know the music much. I’m excited.
3/8 – We got up about 8 and of course kids were up already. Greg and I were the last ones up. Melodi made yummy burritos for breakfast. We were all getting showers, packing up. The boys played some more mindcraft and Kasey jumped on the trampoline some more. She loved the trampoline, and Landon really liked playing with Dillon. Kasey had a whole plan how she could stay there and live on the trampoline. Including having a snow machine to keep cool in the summer. And of course they would bring her food to eat.
We headed out about 10:30am and headed to the Hoover Dam. Landon wanted to check it out. We could only do the Power Plant tour because Kasey was to young for the other one. We got to see a video about building of it, then got to tour one of the bypass tunnels 65 floors below ground level, and then we got to see the Nevada power turbines. There were some cool displays that showed how what we saw worked with water and everything else to make electricity. They had a few things for the kids to turn or interact with to make power or create enough energy for say a city demand. Then we walked up on top and saw the overflow area – Huge tunnel – they have only been used twice once to try out and once in 1983 when there was to much water in the lake. We walked along the top of the dam, got to stand in Arizona and Nevada at the same time. We got to see the Solis’ for a few minutes and get a picture with them. They were going on tour and heading to Zion. We had a quick really expensive lunch and then headed to the Grand Canyon.
It was about a 4 hour drive. We got to town just in time to see the Grand Canyon at sunset which was really cool. We took some pictures and walked along for a little while. Then we headed back to the hotel. We decided to just eat there since it was late and we had a long day driving. I took Kasey to bed and Greg and Landon played a game of pool.
Greg and I sat in the corner of the room on our electronics with the lights out so kids could sleep.
3/7 – We slept in some. Of course the kids were up before us playing with their cousins. Melodi made a great breakfast for us and then we all got ready for the day. We decided to head out for a fun park in Las Vegas. Fran got to come with us as well. On the way to the park there were several cop cars pulled over and had two guys on the ground at gun point. We joked asking Michael where he was taking us.
The park was amazing. All kinds of areas. The boys really liked the climbing webs that were all over. There were a few cement slides that all the kids liked. Kasey liked being spit out of the snake – slide shaped like a snake where you came out of its mouth. There were also some cool disk swings and parts that automatically turned you around if you stood or sat in it. Then we went over to a part that was shaped like a huge tree trunk. The kids could climb up stairs, slide down slides etc. Then we went to little kid area, but that didn’t stop the kids from playing in the little kid bouncy things shaped like bee and ladybug. I wasn’t sure they were going to be able to get out J
After that the moms and Kasey sat in a little shade from a tree while the kids and Greg and Michael played a little basketball game. It was a beautiful afternoon about 75 degrees so great day to be outside.
We headed back to the house and had some cheese, meat and crackers for light lunch which was great. The kids played some outside on the trampoline (I even got on the trampoline with her and jumped some. Kasey was making up games to play), and played inside some with Xbox Just Dance and the boys played some mindcraft together. The adults sat outside in the shade talking and having a few drinks. It was just perfect.
For dinner we decided to order in Pizza and wings which were good, and then Michael got fire pit up and going so we could make Smores which you can never be to old for. Kasey had gotten bacon and cheese pizza and Michael let her throw her pizza box in the fire pit. She said she was smelling bacon and started singing It’s all about the bacon, the bacon no Trouble – like the song its all about the Base. It was pretty funny. We got our kids to bed and we all kind of crashed early from the fun day.
3/6 – I had spent the week in Bay area for work, so I had to get up at 3:45am to catch a 6:30am flight to Dallas to meet up with Greg and Kids to head out on our Spring Break vacation. I got in on time and was able to have a quick lunch at Salt Lick. Greg took the kids out of school about 10:30, got Kasey a haircut and headed to the airport. Gramps brought them and traffic was a little crazy so I barely got to say hi. I took my toiletries out, changed them to my vacation suitcase and off we went.
Kasey sat by me on the way out, and Landon sat with Greg. We got a few snacks an water and were on our way. We got to Las Vegas about 3:45pm. We got our rental car and headed to the Hudgeons house. They were making great dinner tacos. We got to eat and hang out for a little while before we got our kids in bed.
3/4 - I was in San Jose for the week for work. I had internal meetings and disty meetings. One was up north close to San Francisco so I was 20 minutes from Andy Chun's German restaurant Schroeders. It was great to see Andy for a quick beer and appetizers then I got to stay for another beer. Great place with beer garden in front and restaurant in the back. It was packed.