It's Vegas, baby!

Everyone got healthy at our house just in time for fall break week.  We had all been cooped up for the whole month and needed to get out of the house and just get away for awhile.  We decided to take a trip to Las Vegas as a family for the week.  Knowing that Vegas is mostly geared towards adults I went online and did some research on things to do in Vegas with kids.  I was surprised how much there was to do and Deke and I put together a list of the main things we wanted to do with the kids while we were there.

We got up early on Monday and made the quick trip up and got checked in.  I had been to Vegas as a kid with my mom and sisters and we had stayed at Circus Circus which I remembered was kid friendly so that was where we decided to stay.  We pretty much dropped our bags in the room and everyone was anxious to head out and start seeing sights.  We started out at Hershey's chocolate world where they have all things chocolate. Hunter found a chocolate statue of liberty, both in miniature and giant form....

Emma picked up a huge block of chocolate and told me "this is the one I want to take home,"

The kids were so excited that upstairs they had an entire area solely devoted to all things Reese's.  They insisted we take pictures for Aunt Brenn since they are her favorite.  Downstairs they had a huge assortment of giant cookies, cakes, and other chocolaty desserts.  That's one thing about Vegas there was something tasty to eat all the time, everywhere.  The thing the kids loved the most was that they pretty much had all of their chocolates in regular sizes but also supersized.  It seemed like every two seconds one of the kids was saying, "Whoa Mom, look at this!" showing us some other giant piece of something.

Outside they also had a giant statue of liberty made completely of jellybeans.  We headed down a ways until we saw the M&M world and went to check out more chocolate...

M&M world of course had anything you could ever want M&M including a huge wall full of them in every color, an area where you could personalize them with a message of your choice, a theater where the kids got to see a cute 3D movie and tons of clothes, toys and other gadgets to look at.

Then we headed through a couple of the hotels just to look around before we went and had dinner at this yummy Mexican grill where Hunter got the biggest plate of nachos that it took him plus all the rest of us helping him out to finish them.

At first I was a little worried about what the kids might be exposed to at nighttime on the strip.  We had talked with the kids about how to handle if they saw something that wasn't appropriate.  It ended up being completely fine.  When we did go out at night we just headed to the specific shows we wanted to see.  It did crack me up though that that evening there was a billboard that had a show girl on it.  Emma yelled, "Inappropriate thing, nobody look!" then turned her head and covered her eyes.  Pretty sure it got the attention of everyone around us.  Hahaha.  Needless to say we had to talk about not yelling it out but if you saw something inappropriate just look at something else.  It was actually really cute.  I told Deke it never ceases to amaze me how naturally innocent and good kids are.  I wish that they would stay that way always, able turn away so quickly from things that aren't appropriate or good for them.  That night we headed over to watch the Volcano show at the Mirage.  As soon as it started the older three were glued, grinning at the shooting flames and bursts of "lava." Hudson however took one look and went into a panic, "No fire!!! No mom, no mom, no!!!" screaming and climbing up me.  Deke and I both tried to talk him through it and calm him down but he wasn't having it.  Even after I stepped back with him he still carried on until the fire was over and the music stopped.  We stayed to see it again so Deke could hold him and I could actually watch.  Sorry little guy we weren't trying to give you a heart attack we thought you would like the fire.    

Between all the lights, shows and activities going on it was really easy to lose track of time in the evenings.  It was well after ten before we even headed back to the hotel for showers.  We ended up staying up late every night seeing different shows.  As we tucked the kids into bed they giggled about having to sleep sideways in the bed so that all three of them would fit.  Hudson protested from the port a crib as to why he couldn't sleep with Hunner, Ave and Em.  They looked so cute all squished in the bed together.  They had a hard time settling down and laid for about thirty minutes quietly talking back and forth about their favorite parts of the day and what they wanted to see tomorrow.  Deke and I fell asleep just listening to them.