Trip to Las Vegas/Utah 2022: Part 1

 

At the end of July, Tyler and I left on a week long trip with Kameron. We were headed to Las Vegas and also to Utah to see family and the remaining grandparents. We had an absolute blast! It was really fun to get Kameron all to ourselves for a week!

Day 1:

We flew into Salt Lake early in the morning, grabbed our rental car, and headed down to St. George. We made a quick pit stop at Tru Religion in Orem for breakfast. It was so good! I am so glad that Naomi and Kevin took us here the last time we were in town. Kameron hadn't been there before so we wanted him to try it. Our breakfasts were delicious!

We then continued on to St. George to visit Tyler's cousin, Kim, her son Jackson, and other family members. Jackson was recently called to serve in the same mission as Kameron. The Minnesota Minneapolis Mission. Jackson was doing home MTC and he and Kameron wanted to get together and talk mission stuff. It was so good for both of them!

We had such a great visit! Jackson was able to ask Kam all kinds of questions about the mission, the mission president, work, areas, and the people. It was fun for Kameron to be able to share all of his knowledge. We were able to answer questions for Kim too. Tyler's Aunt Marilyn and Uncle Lew came over. It was so good to see them. They moved down to St. George from Alpine a few years ago and we miss seeing them whenever we are in SLC. 

Tyler's Uncle Lew is hilarious and his Aunt Marilyn is the kindest person. She was the nicest family member to me when I joined the family. She brought us a big box of eclairs from her favorite French bakery. They were amazing. Tyler's cousin Angie and her family used to live in Spokane a few years ago and we loved seeing Lew and Marilyn whenever they came to town. (Angie and her family now live in Twin Falls, Idaho.) We loved visiting with them. They are some of my favorite members of Tyler's family! We also got to see Kim's son, Markus and his wife, and meet their new baby. So fun!

I've never spent any time in St. George so it was fun to explore the area. The iconic St. George Temple is currently being remodeled. It is pretty even under construction. 

This magic is also in St. George! Who knew?! 

I thought it was only in SLC!! We got to introduce Kameron to the fabulousness that is Nielsen's Frozen Custard. It truly is the best and and we've even eaten frozen custard in the frozen custard capital of the world...Wisconsin. Nielsen's still reigns supreme! Kameron's favorite treat is ice cream so he was in heaven!!

My favorite is the caramel swirl! 

There is a second temple being built in St. George. It is called the Red Cliffs Utah Temple. It really was stunning to see too! 

We got the grand tour of St. George. Kameron really loved it. He is all about the warm weather. We also checked out the campus of Utah Tech where one of Ailey's good friends will be attending. We had such a great day! The weather was cool and a little bit rainy. It was so nice. We stayed in a beautiful hotel with a gorgeous view of the desert. It was wonderful and only about 5 minutes from Kim's house. We also managed to squeeze in burgers from In-N-Out. So good! We had such a fun time in St. George and it was wonderful to spend time with some of Tyler's extended family.

Day 2:

That morning we enjoyed breakfast from Aunt Marilyn's favorite French bakery. Delicious! We decided the night before that we wanted to go see Kanab, Utah. Tyler's grandparents ran a little hotel there in the 1970s and 1980s. It is a cute funky little town. It's about an hour and a half from St. George.

The red rock is pretty amazing to see. I always forget that most of our kids haven't seen it. Only Ailey, on our trip to Texas, has been in red rock country as we drove through Moab and went to Arches National Park. She was blown away!! This was Kameron's first time and he was too. It really is so unique and awe-inspiring to Pacific Northwest kids. We took a million pictures!

We found the old motel that Tyler's grandparents used to run. He has so many good memories here. I was excited to FINALLY see this place that I have heard everyone talk about for 27+ years!! So many good times were had in this little town for Tyler, his siblings, and cousins.

It was kind of sad for Tyler to see that they had filled in the pool and turned the little motel into some janky apartments. But it was still fun to see.

Kanab is known for being the "Gateway to Zion" but if you go a different way you aren't too far from the Grand Canyon. Neither Kameron nor I had ever been to the Grand Canyon before so we decided to make a detour and go see it. I am SO GLAD that we did! The North Rim of the Grand Canyon was only an hour and 15 minutes away.

On our way there we stopped to look at a viewpoint of the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument with its lovely yellow, pink, red, and white giant "steps" and the infamous Mollies Nipple Peak in the distance.  Yes, I unfortunately loudly asked what the name of that peak was in a group of other tourists. Yikes. Tyler and Kameron about died laughing.

Mollies Nipple in case you were wondering. :)

It was so crazy as we left the red rock landscape and drove into pine forests on our way to the Grand Canyon. We kept saying, "How is this Arizona?!" I guess I always thought that the Grand Canyon was surrounded on every side by desert. Coming in from that direction it felt like we were in Washington. Pine trees everywhere. Beautiful.

I couldn't believe my eyes when I finally saw it. Wow. I literally don't have words for the beauty and majesty of the Grand Canyon. It is jaw-dropping and awe-inspiring. I was literally moved to tears by the beauty. I was actually crying. I have been many places and seen stunning natural beauty but nothing has moved me like the Grand Canyon did. Pictures don't even do it the tiniest bit of justice.

Check out this guy on this overhang. A park worker told us that just two weeks prior someone fell to their death off of that very spot.

I hope he got his Instagram shot. Meanwhile I was hyperventilating for him...and also for this kid....who decided he wanted to go off trail and climb up a giant rock. It wasn't anything like the guy above but it also caused me some serious anxiety.

Check out this other guy trying to scramble up and Kam's literally just wearing Vans. Zero traction. I yelled at Kam to "Be careful!!"  and to "Come down!!" Only the rando listened to me...not my own child.

Real Life

 21 is precious. 

It's so annoying to have mothers who worry about your safety. LOL

We walked all over and up and down paths with sheer drop offs on both sides. Most without handrails. Ailey would've laid down and refused to budge. Even I was struggling. 

My anxiety was full throttle with one kid that is apparently a mountain goat and then also worrying about Tyler's blood sugar. It was incredibly hot and the combo of exercise and heat makes his blood sugar plummet. I kept envisioning one of them careening off the edge. 

Finally we decided to go back up to the Lodge and look around. It was really cool!

On our drive to the Grand Canyon I was regaling Tyler and Kam with the tale of Brighty of the Grand Canyon one of my favorite books from elementary school. 

I can't remember if we read it in 3rd grade or 4th grade...probably 4th grade because it was a Mr. Whiting type book. He was my very favorite teacher and read us all kinds of Western books. Anyway...imagine how loud I gasped with DELIGHT when I unexpectedly came upon this:

A memorial to Brighty himself!! Every trip I take seems to always include something literary!! Ha ha!

Side Note: Kameron has informed me that I loudly gasp A LOT. (Who knew?!) Apparently it is annoying and potentially dangerous as I often (allegedly) do it while someone else is driving. He now frequently sends me videos and memes about "loud gaspers". Good grief. Supposedly it "freaks people out." What would we do if our children didn't point out all the weird things we do? Oh well. I guess this is a step above last summer (the summer from hell) when Tyler told me that I needed to "Stop with the loud sighs. It's making people uncomfortable." This was when I was stressed to the max and would (allegedly) loudly and seemingly annoyedly sigh while in lines and behind people at the store and in all kinds of public places. So yeah...I guess I've toned that down but upped the ol' gasping. LOL.

I may have also gasped at how cute these little cabins are!

After our adventure we stopped at a little convenience store just outside of the Grand Canyon and...gasp of all gasps...Kameron ran into someone that he knew from high school and from our stake who now happens to work at the Jacob Lake Resort. Talk about a small world! 

Then we drove on to Las Vegas. We stopped for gas as we approached Vegas and saw a movie being filmed in the desert. Then we drove directly to Kam's favorite fast food place for dinner...Raising Cane's. They have them in Minnesota but not in Washington. He was SUPER excited for us to try it. 

Then we went to my dad's house. We visited with him and ate dessert. This was a good opportunity for Kameron to start to get to know him. The last time that my father saw Kameron was on his blessing day...so... quite a few years ago. We stayed for about an hour and a half and then headed to our hotel on the Strip. This was also Kameron's first trip to Las Vegas.  He had a lot of firsts today...the Grand Canyon, meeting a grandfather, and the Strip. Craziness. We stayed at the Venetian and loved it! It pretty much blew Kameron's mind. We had a gorgeous suite!

We walked all around the Venetian. This was our first time staying there and this is the hotel that I want to stay at every time. The last time we were in town we stayed at the Paris with the girls and they loved it but they would've loved this hotel even more. My friend Annie stayed at the Venetian recently and highly recommended it. She was totally right.

 

Then we headed out on the Strip to see the sights. Kameron was in a daze. It was hilarious. We kept saying, "Are you alright?!" We stopped for a midnight snack at Ghirardelli's for ice cream sundaes to hopefully give him some pep. Let's just say his senses were in overload. Ha ha! 

We had fun walking around and sightseeing. We headed back to our hotel at around 2am. What an incredible day!! So many things to see and do! It was great!

Part 2 to be continued....

Las Vegas 2021

 Day One:

We left Spokane and it felt glorious! It felt great to be back in an airport and heading out! This trip was a bit of a combo of a delayed Spring Break trip, an early anniversary trip, and an opportunity for Ailey and Bryn to meet their grandfather. For the girls it definitely was a trip of "firsts" having also never been to Las Vegas. Tyler and I had our honeymoon there and we have been back a couple of times since then. This was a whole new experience for Ailey and Bryn. LOL.

After our arrival in Las Vegas we grabbed our rental car and headed over to my Dad's house. He lives in Henderson. We had a really nice night as he and the girls got to know each other. 

The girls really liked him and took to him instantly. They thought he was very funny and a lot of fun to be around. They thought that he looks a lot like my sister Stacey and her son Dane. My mom always said that Stacey looks like my Grandma McKinnon and the Andreasen side of our family and I guess she was right! 

We had dinner out on his patio. The weather was perfection. My dad facetimed with Reilly and Hunter who were house/dog sitting for us. We were surrounded by hummingbirds which was an incredible experience. There were SO MANY! They were flying all around us. They were sipping from his feeder and then sitting on branches in the trees around us. I've never seen that before and I have never had an experience quite like we did that night! Ailey and Bryn kept holding out their hands and hoping one would land on them. It was pretty magical! 

Later that night we checked into our hotel. We stayed at the Paris Hotel on the Strip. The girls LOVED it! We had a room with a fantastic view of the Eiffel Tower and the pool. Ailey takes French so she especially enjoyed all the French motifs. We did some late night exploring and got late night desserts! So fun! Las Vegas and all it's lights were like nothing that the girls had ever seen before.

Day Two:

The next morning we had crepes for breakfast from a little café and headed out for a day on the Strip. My dad has had his fill of the Strip so we planned this day to explore on our own. This was a very eye opening experience for these two little innocent lambs. LOL. It wasn't quite as crazy as usual since the first two days that we were there Las Vegas hadn't opened back up all the way yet. Everything was still at 50% which made a big difference. But it also made it hard to get reservations at restaurants, there were waiting lists for the pool (which could also only be 50%), no shows were happening etc. But we still had a really fun day and we walked the girls legs off! We tracked our steps and we hit 10 miles!!

The girls were curious to see all of the different themed hotels and wanted to see the sights, shops, and restaurants in each of them so we walked up and down the Strip. 

It was a beautiful day but it was also the hottest day of our trip! 97 degrees. The girls were oohhing and ahhing over all of the palm trees! They are beautiful. I think we hit every candy store and gelato shop on the Strip. Their favorite hotels were the Paris, New York, New York, The Venetian, and the Belaggio. Apparently they like a good theme!

The girls wanted New York style pizza at New York, New York. They loved it!

We went to the Hershey Store and bought candy and souvenirs. They loved the Statue of Liberty made of chocolate and the one made of Twizzlers.

We went to check out the roller coaster but it wasn't going yet. :(

My brother told us to see the MGM Park Hotel which Tyler and I both really liked. We loved their restaurants and Eataly eatery and shops. It totally reminded me of my mom and the kind of things she liked. I am sure that's why Kirk liked it too. Very cool!

Amazing gelato! The first of several!

The girls had a whole itinerary of places that they wanted to see and we hit them all. We went to the I Love Sugar store. They loved the giant gummy bears and Tootsie Pops bigger than their heads! We bought more candy! It kept them walking. LOL.

 

Video:

https://youtu.be/PT1poSH9F20

We rode the High Roller Ferris Wheel!

We thought Ailey, with her fear of heights, might freak out but she really wanted to ride it so we did. Since it is more contained and not *open air* she did fine as long as neither we nor she stood near the doors. We were super proud of her!

That whole area is pretty fun.

See those cables? Next time we are ziplining!! We had dinner at a great restaurant near the HIGH ROLLER and then we kept on going!

Everybody liked The Venetian!

We loved their gelato! Passionfruit was my very favorite! So good!

The girls were troopers! They had a ball!

We also loved the Bellagio. That was one of the places that my mom and I stayed at (with baby Reilly) once on a trip to Las Vegas. The conservatory is so pretty!

Video:

The girls wanted to see the Triple Chocolate Fountain which was also a hit!

Then it was onto the Fountain Water Show at the Bellagio! Beautiful!

It was actually so fun and cool to watch it at night!

Then it was back to our hotel and our favorite little patisserie for our nightly desserts that we took back to our room.

I lived out my Charlie and the Chocolate Factory fantasy by eating my dessert and the chocolate teacup that it came in! It was such a fun and wild day!

Day Three:

The next morning we were up early. The weather was a little overcast and much cooler. We went and picked up my Dad. He had planned a day trip for us and had a killer itinerary! We loved it!

Our first stop was to a get breakfast at a little place called The Cracked Egg in Henderson. I had raspberry and cream cheese stuffed French Toast. Delicious!

My dad wanted to take us out of the city and show us the desert. We were all for it! We drove out to Lake Mead and then onto Hoover Dam. Very cool!

Tyler and I went to Hoover Dam one day while we were on our honeymoon...26 years ago. I had a weird panic attack/terrible bout of vertigo while we were there then. It was something that I have never had before or since. It was so bizarre. It threw me into a weird fear of heights that lasted for about 5 years before it wore off. It was super strange. I was wondering if I would feel all weird out there once again. 

Nope...not this time.

Tyler was extremely stoked to check out Hoover Dam since dam inspections have been a huge part of his career and he is EXTREMELY knowledgeable about dams... like... don't bring them up... knowledgeable. :) He has been taking our family to look at dams for years so I feel pretty knowledgeable myself. LOL. He was in his element checking everything out and texting pictures to his coworkers. Unfortunately the actual tour of the dam was not happening due to COVID so we will be back again. He isn't going to miss out on that! Ha Ha!

I was glad that I had no fear of heights issues...Ailey on the other hand... was NOT A HAPPY CAMPER at Hoover Dam. Poor kid. She despised every minute and stayed FAR from the edge.

We did convince her to get in one quick picture before she ran off. She wouldn't even consider taking the picture in one of the cutouts like the one behind us. We were very proud of her!! Hoover Dam is pretty impressive and looking over the edge isn't for the faint of heart.

Just as we were finishing up at Hoover Dam; Kam sent us a Zoom link to watch his first baptism! Isn't technology awesome? We pulled over and Zoomed into the meeting! So cool.

The girl on the end was the one who got baptized.

After that we continued on to look at an old ghost town that used to be a gold mining town. We talked to the owner of the "town" and he was another character very similar to the Sasquatch researcher whom we met last October. And...just like him...this guy has been featured on a few Travel channel shows... ghost towns of the west type shows. He looked just like Hulk Hogan in his prime. My dad has been there a few times before and knew the guy. He was pretty funny! He told Ailey, Bryn, and I to go look in his freezer. Inside were about 20 frozen rattle snakes. Good thing we aren't afraid of snakes! Several movies have used this location to film and he was telling us all kinds of interesting stories.

 My dad has some back issues so he relaxed with the owner while we tromped around. 

My dad also enjoys prospecting for gold himself out in the desert on the weekends! Yes, he's found some! He showed us several of his favorite places where he has found gold. He also used to bring my grandpa out in the desert to find gold and to see the wild horses. That was on our list too but we didn't see any this time. Sadness. We did see some bighorn sheep though which was pretty cool!

We stopped for lunch in a little tiny town and then continued on our way. My dad took us to see an old ranch that used to be owned by some movie stars back in the 1920s and 1930s.

We had so much fun exploring the desert and seeing all of the Joshua trees!!

I was marco poling and facetiming people saying, "We're in the Mohave Desert!!" My dad was dying laughing! He was like, "You've been in the Mohave Desert since you landed in Vegas!!" Perhaps true... but we were out in the WILDS of the Mohave Desert!!

So fun!!

After that we drove into California for a bit and as we were circling back to Las Vegas, we ran right into these:

The Painted Rocks... a favorite spot of Instagrammers and TikTokers... the girls were THRILLED!! This artwork is actually called Seven Magic Mountains. We saw many photoshoots happening there and a commercial being filmed. Kind of crazy. The wind was gusting and dust was flying everywhere but it was still fun!

The girls TikToked and Instagrammed like pros!

After that we drove to the little town of Good Springs that is just outside of Vegas and my dad showed us where he used to live. He also showed us where the plane carrying Carol Lombard went down on Potosie Mountain and the little bar in Good Springs where Clark Gable drowned his sorrows while he was waiting for her remains to be recovered. Very sad. (My dad is an extremely interesting tour guide.)

We also met some local flavor while there. We met the guy who bought the old house that my dad lived in. This guy's mom was a hippie in the 70s and 80s and spent her life following the Grateful Dead. This guy is a developer for Cartoon Network and is from Good Springs. He "mined a bunch of bitcoin" and bought up most of the little town. He and my dad enjoyed talking about the history of the town and the people they both knew. Again...we are meeting *interesting* people everywhere we go!

My dad showed us some of the casinos where he worked as a black jack dealer and a pit boss for over 40 years. He showed us some of the other places where he lived. Then he wanted to show Tyler the new training center that is being built for the Raiders. Tyler loved it!

After a full day of sight seeing my dad was pretty tired! Lol. We dropped him off at his house and headed back to the Strip. We grabbed dinner from a delicious Asian Fusion restaurant. So good! 

And...we stopped for our nightly dessert from the patisserie of course! Then we all crashed in our hotel room and watched a movie and zonked out for the night! It was a fun jammed packed day!

Day Four:

My dad especially requested that we plan our trip so that we could be there on Sunday and attend church with him. We were very happy to do so! We picked him up early. His church starts at 8:30 am. Rough! We got there early enough so that we could meet lots of people in his ward. It was fun to see how they are doing things COVID style in Vegas! 

He has a really incredible ward that has taken him in and shown him so much love and support! It was so nice to meet a lot of them in person and to thank them. It turns out he is in my college BFF Tiffany's ward! We are super looking forward to coming back and going to church with her too! It really sucked that she was out of town when we were there but she had just gotten the COVID vaccine and had headed to Colorado to see her dad who she hadn't seen in over a year. COVID has been so rough on families. I am kind of glad, in some ways, that we didn't have to go through it with my Mom. I cannot imagine being worried about her all the time and then not being able to see her. I know full well that she would have been in the thick of things and taking all kinds of chances.

Today was a wonderful day for our family!

After church, my dad wanted to show us the Las Vegas Temple. It is so cool and not at all what I expected.

It's white and brown...and has a total tropical vibe. It is really cool! 

While we were on the temple grounds we had a really neat experience. Kameron was given special permission to video chat with his grandfather. We sat in the parking lot and talked to Kam for about an hour. It was a really special time. 

After that we went to lunch at the most fantastic BBQ place called Lucille's. It was SO GOOD! So cute and southern with vintage touches. I felt like I was in Texas again! 

Then we went out to the cemetery to place flowers on my step-mother's grave.

Tony Curtis, the actor, is buried near my step-mother; so my dad showed us his grave too.

Then my Dad took us by the home of Mr. Las Vegas himself...Wayne Newton. Snazzy.

After that we went back to my dad's house to hang out. He showed us several of his photo albums and missionary memorabilia. We talked for several hours. It was really nice.

My dad as a missionary in Argentina. :)

We had fun just relaxing at his home. We stayed there until it started getting late. It was hard to say goodbye. Then we headed back to our hotel. Tyler and the girls grabbed dinner and dessert for all of us  from the hotel and brought it up to our room. We ate a late night dinner before crashing!

Day Five:

We bid a sad goodbye to the palm trees and warm temps and headed to the airport to fly home. We were delayed and had to wait on the tarmac for about an hour while a mechanic came to repair something on the plane. Yikes. We got home safely and came home to a beautifully clean spotless house. Reilly had worked her magic! Love her! We grabbed dinner and enjoyed being home. It was a fantastically fun and memorable trip!!