Vegas!

This last weekend we had the chance to use some free hotel nights we earned before they expire, and since we can't really afford to jet set anywhere for just the weekend, we decided to drive up to Las Vegas.  Mara had never been there, and I have some fuzzy recollections of being there, but nothing I can clearly remember...:)
We drove up Friday night (through some cool Joshua Tree preserves), and got to our hotel around 8 or so.  Low and behold it was right next to the Hofbräuhaus Las Vegas!  There were plenty of pretzels & Oktoberfestbierin our future...:)
We were about a mile from the strip (which was nice with a 2.5yr old!).  The walk was nice to stretch our legs and take in the city from afar.  We walked up and down the strip over the next several hours.  Rohan was enthralled with everything!  He was so tired, but had his eyes peeled open the entire time, not wanting to miss a thing.  Walking with a stroller through the Las Vegas strip was a challange, but we are professionals, so it worked out just fine.  We made a trip to the Bellagio fountains thinking Rohan would like it.  The second the water cannons went off he curled up on Mom's shoulder and could barely look.  After the show was done he snapped up and said "Where'd the water go?".  He made it seem the whole time like he didn't like it.  He did like it when we saw it later, from across the street and the cannon noise wasn't so loud and echoing off the hotel.  We capped the night off with some wine back at the hotel, and nice way to start our Vegas trip.
Saturday we spent most of the day outside since it was gorgeous!  Mid-80s and mostly sunny, you can't beat that!  We hit up 2 parks in the morning.  The first had some baseball fields that Rohan ran around on, and the second had a playground and some other fun stuff. The second one had the finish of the ~200 mile Ragnar Relay Series (looking to do one in Colorado next July if anyone wants to join us!), and what turned out to be Rohan's favorite pastime...leaves.  There were several leaf piles that we scraped into one and let him run and jump into.  A couple of kids joined in too, and there was about an hour of leafing.  Afterwards we checked out some of the vendor booths at the Ragnar and came across the Rage Mud Run booth that had kiddie pools of mud for people to play in...Rohan had a blast...:)
After that busy morning we met up with Mara's cousin Steve & his wife Erin who live in Vegas.  It was really nice to catch up with them.  We might even be able to get them to do the Tough Mudder with us...:)  We hit up their favorite Thai place (and ours now), called Archi's Thai Cafe.  Rohan showed off his ability to scarf down everything in site!  He cleaned up our soup, pad thai, tofu, and some of Erin's pinapple fried rice.  No idea where he put it all!
After lunch Steve made some calls and made Rohan's year...he called up a fire station.  Steve is a fireman...and also Rohan's new idol.  We went to Station 47 where Steve, and the station Captain, gave us a VIP tour of the ladder truck and rescue vehicle.  Rohan even got to drink water from a REAL firetruck, something he is still talking about!  It was from a water cooler on the truck, not the tanker...:)  The Captain also showed Rohan their Desert Turtles they have, and we may end up getting Rohan one...maybe...  Rohan came away with a new fireman's hat and some wooden trucks from the Captain as well...what a great time!  Thanks again for making that happen Steve!  Rohan lasted about a block before passing out HARD for the drive back to the hotel...the picture says it all.
After all that, we still found a chance to check out a rock gym, Red Rock Climbing Center, which was nice, and a lot of fun to check out.  They had some really interesting routes and wall features that we didn't have at AZR.  It was also a great way to almost completely wear us out...and it was only 4:30...

I needed my Bavarian Pretzel fix so we swung by the Hofbräuhaus for pretzels the size of toilet seats, some Käsespätzle, Münchner Weisswürste, and of course a liter of Oktoberfestbierin. It all really brought us back to what a GREAT, GREAT, GREAT time we had in Germany last xmas! (did I mention it was great?)  Rohan, once again, showed his ability to eat everything in site, and even got compliments from the waitress about his pretzel eating ability...:) We saw some sweet Lederhosen for Rohan that we might have to get him for the next Oktoberfest...:)  After the pretzel gorge we met up with Steve & Erin at Treasure Island for their pirate show.  It was the same deal as the Bellagio, where Rohan wouldn't leave Mara's shoulder, but as soon as it was done he was asking where they went...:)

On Sunday we hit up one more park before heading back to Phoenix.  We had such a good time, and would love to go back for some real outdoor climbing, and maybe hit up The Strip sans-kids.
Oh, we also started our first (of I'm sure, many) painting projects.  We are livening up our laundry room with a deep red color.  It's a small job, that will help us get our painting prowess back for some bigger jobs we have planned.

Playing in the leaves: