Rachel

I hear trumpets sounding off!

Rachel Shaw has come to town!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Now how lucky am I?! I get a double dose of Rachel in the same year! I guess I have Mr. Tanner to thank this time. She asked if I would rather have her come right after he was born so she could be more helpful with him, or come a couple months later. I chose a couple months later so the kids would be in school and we could have more fun! Never could have guessed that everything with Joshua would happen right before. I told her to still come though since his funeral wouldn't be until the next week. I had been feeling so down and wondered if I'd even be good company. Thankfully, her visit was just the distraction I needed and wonderful therapy.

She flew in on a Thursday morning and got to accompany us to Olive's dance class. Then we dropped Olive off at Shelley's house (and had ourselves a little visit there) before grabbing lunch at Crackers and Company. From there we got our pedi on at Elite Nails. I wish we had a picture of the guy doing mine. He was a younger Asian fellow with sass. After he had massaged my feet he asked me if I felt good. I nodded and said, "Yes, I feel good". He raised his eyebrows and with a seductive look said, "Yeah you do." 

Oh my!

A Swig run was a must!!

Pink toes and pink cookies. This was a good start to her trip!

When Trav got home that night we all went out to Smashburger for dinner then we went and played Bunco with my Relief Society for an activity night. We won a cute bowl and bag of M&M's! A perfect road trip snack!

Being that I still had a newborn and was especially exhausted, we didn't stay up too late. We knew we needed energy in our reservoirs for the next day! VEGAS DAY!!!

I slept it while she exercised. (Bonus points for Rach.) Then we packed and dropped Tanner and Olive off at my Mom's house at noon. We switched cars with Travis, grabbed lunch at Ned's Crazy Sub and were on the road!!! Yes, in Ol' Dirtay. This beloved car has been the setting for many a Steph/Rach conversation as it was our only car in dental school. While I was just hoping it didn't break down on us, it really was appropriate that Ol' Dirtay was along for this trip! 

So raise your hand if you thought Las Vegas was only four hours from Mesa. 

*this is me holding up my hand*

Yeah, it's more like 5. 

5 1/2 or 6 for us once we hit traffic. Oy! Not that it's too big a deal. We just had a grand time talking! Had a bit of a stressful time trying to find our hotel's parking lot though! We stayed at the Linc which is right on the strip but the parking isn't in front, like with most of the hotels. So I have exited one hotel going the wrong way and got someone else super annoyed at me leaving another hotel parking lot. Geez louiz people! Simmer! 

Finally, thanks to a kind customer service lady on the phone, we found it!!! Only it was FLOODED. I guess it had rained right before we got there and the parking garage was literally gushing water. They had it all roped off. Grrrr. So. Did another U turn, flagged down a worker, and found a different lot to park in. Dragged our luggage a rather long distance, got checked in, went up to the like the billionth floor, down three long hallways and there it was! Our hotel room!! 

At least it was a nice hotel room. 

I thought we had left Mesa with time to spare but now we were in a crunch to get ready for the concert! 

We clean up pretty nice, if I do say so myself! 

Watch out Vegas. Two of your most clothed Mamas are hitting the town!

In a panic, we asked for directions in the casino and this dough head lady recommended we get on the subway to get to Planet Hollywood faster. So off we huff to buy tickets, get on the subway, ride it down a stop, get off and get our bearings to walk to Planet Hollywood. I thought it was strange that we still seemed to have to walk pretty far. At this point we knew we didn't have enough time to sit down for dinner so we shared a bagel from Starbucks and got in line for ....

BRITNEY!!!!!

" Baby, baby, how was I supposed to knowwwww, that somethin' wasn't right, yeahhh "

Words can not do justice to how much friggin' FUN this concert was!!!! Oh my gosh. We were dying!!!! Singing along, screaming, dancing. It was like we were 16 year olds ditching homeroom to sneak into a club instead of 34 year old's in mom jeans, wearing mascara for the first time that week. It was basically a dance concert which was a blast to watch. We loved every set, every leather leotard, every throwback picture to her glory days plastered on the big screens! Ok, maybe not the 15 ish minutes in the middle where it got a little... ohhh... S&M?? I guess that's the vibe of her NEW stuff. Ick. We just sat down for those songs and were entertained by the three men in front of us who... shall we just say, play for the other team. ;) I've never seen grown men groove quite like that, haha. Thankfully, she got back to her good stuff and we were back on our feet screaming and dancing again. I was so sad when it was over. I'm going to go on record as saying it was the best concert I've ever been to. Would do it again in a heartbeat. 
"Hit me baby, one more time!!" 

We got some late night grub at Cheesecake Factory then walked the strip for a bit. 

I had heard about this amazing chocolate fountain at the Bellagio that I was dying to see. After LOTS of walking and wrong directions from casino employees that should know better, we found it. And it was closed for the night. Boo.

Also, while we were walking, I spied our hotel. 

Right across the street from The Planet Hollywood. 

Remember when we were told to get on the subway to get to it faster??

Yeah. We could have just walked out the door and across the street instead. 

BAHHHHHH!!!!! 

We couldn't believe it!! We could have had time to actually eat dinner before the concert! Could have saved our poor feet an extra mile of walking!!!

Stupid lady. She could have just told us she didn't know how to get to the Planet Hollywood instead of sending us on a wild goose chase. 

Oh well. We can laugh about it now.

We kept debating on whether or not to try out a dance club. We just weren't how sure how hard it was to get in. Or how expensive it would be. Is it like in the movies where you stand outside in line in front of a bouncer and need to be on a "list"?? Or need to be hot enough to get inside? Hahaha. We really didn't know. But you could hear the music blasting from the club inside the Bellagio, way out on the strip and it sort of hurt my ears even from that distance. So, we saved our hearing and just went back to the hotel. I think we finally got in bed around 3am! 

I pictured sleeping in until some crazy hour. Pretty sure we were both up by 7am. But that was 4 straight hours of sleep for me and I hadn't had that in many weeks so I was refreshed!

The buffet at the Wynn is supposed to be amaze-balls.

The scenery sure is!

I love fancy food!!

Little crepe burritos filled with dainty creams and delicate sauces, exotic juices, smoked Texan macaroni and cheese, spices I've never heard of before, fruit I can't pronounce. I think I tried one of EVERYTHING. Especially the desserts. I had to be rolled out of there.

We thought it would be fun to do a little shoppin'! 

Barneys is totally in our price range so obviously we started there. 

$2,000 hot pink, baby alpaca fur coat anyone?!

The Venetian was nice! We joked about going on a romantic gondola ride together. 

The High Roller was right behind our hotel. Doing it at night would probably have been cooler but it was still amazing to do during the day. It's the world's tallest ferris wheel and I thought I was going to freak out, but props to me, I held it together beautifully. We almost had the whole pod to ourselves. Just two other men were with us. And since they seemed to play for the other team as well, I decided to use our half hour in the air to pump, lol.

We wanted to get home before it was too late so we left Vegas around 3pm. But before we left I was determined to gamble at least once! The thing is, gambling is confusing!!! We sat down at a slot machine and probably spent 5 minutes just looking it over, trying to figure out how to play. What in the world?? So many buttons and flashing lights. I expected a coin slot and one button. We gave up and almost left when we saw a Britney Spears machine open. It was a sign! I beelined it over and saw an employee cleaning up nearby. Double sign! Kind of giggly (I know how it looked) I asked her if she knew how to gamble. She looked at me cautiously, perhaps wondering if this was all being videotaped, and said yes. Sheepishly, I asked her if she could teach me. I'm certain she thought I was either handicapped or high. But,  she showed me where to put my money and which buttons to push. The whole situation was hysterical. And of course I lost. Two whole dollas down the stinky Vegas drain. I have to say, I don't get how people just sit in front of these things, wasting their hard earned money. It was pretty stupid. Not fun. Not entertaining. Not worth it. 

And on that note, I'll add that after 24 hours in this city, sinning never seemed less appealing. Being around the massive crowds of drunk, smoking, barely clothed people I felt nothing but pity and disgust for all of it. It felt empty, sad and cold. 

Las Vegas, your lights may be flashy, but you have no light.  

We will enjoy your yummy buffets and nostalgic, fun concerts but be grateful for our lives far, far away from your nastiness.

One last meal before we hit the road turned out to be exceptionally tasty. Five stars for Gordon Ramsey's fish and chips!

We hit some crazy monsoon storms on the way home but Ol' Dirtay got us back safely! I think our 10 hours of non-stop talking on those drives is illustrative of how much we love talking to each other.

Sunday morning was the Tucson temple dedication. Travis went with Collin to the 9am session and Rach and I went to the 12pm session. I love that Collin was old enough to attend!

Her flight left just late enough to make it to the beginning of my family's Sunday dinner which was nice! All of us were sad to see her go!! Me especially!!! Waaaaaa! Theres something not right about your soul sister living 1,053 miles away (yep, I looked it up). I guess it just makes our time together that much sweeter.