Spending the day on the strip

We decided to spend the entire second day taking the kids through the different hotels.  Everyone was really excited to go to Carlo's Bakery so we started out at the Venetian which hands down ended up being everyone's favorite hotel of all.  We walked all the shops, watched the gondola's row by, and watched a couple of shows.

The kids loved the fact that the ceiling inside was painted like the sky.  I loved all the music playing and the sounds of the gondolier's singing as they rowed.

They had an area with some cool floral displays....

We went and saw one of "Joe's" Vegas restaurants.  We love Joe Bastianich from MasterChef.

We headed to Houdini's magic shop and watched the magicians perform some tricks for us, the kids loved this shop.  Hunter was really into the magic acts and ended up choosing a magic CD as one of his souvenirs.  When we got back home he watched the DVD over and over again until he had mastered most of the tricks.

Next we went over to Cesar's Palace.  There were tons of shops to walk through over there.  We spent another hour or so walking the shops and then went and saw the Atlantis show and the aquariums.  The older kids loved the show, Hudson flipped out when the giant dragon started rising up out of the floor.  I think all the music and loud noise was reminding him of the volcano show from the night before.

After a stop over to Serendipity for a frozen hot chocolate we headed to the Bellagio.

They have a big conservatory over there that is themed around whatever season it is.  Fall is my favorite season and I was so excited to see the whole thing decorated with all sorts of fall foliage.  It was so beautiful.  While you walk around there are different musicians performing and we were able to hear a wonderful violinist play as we walked.

Hudson really liked all the different animals they had made of flowers and the girls LOVED the conservatory of course because of all the flowers everywhere.

They had gigantic live pumpkins on display that were around 800-1000 lbs. it was crazy to see.  It was so beautiful.

It was so much fun.  So much to do and see, we walked through hotels all day.  We would drive to one hotel and park then spend a couple hours walking through it before heading to the next one.  The kids started making a game out of counting how many parking garages we parked in.

After dinner we headed over to the Bellagio to watch the fountain show.  This was the one show that Hudson actually didn't flip out about.   The fountains go off every fifteen minutes so we watched it twice.

On our way to the Luxor we were walking through one of the hotels and Emma said, "Mom look at the wall of diamonds" and pointed up.  You can only imaging how excited both the girls got when we saw a "diamond" car five minutes later.

Before we headed back to the hotel we walked through the Luxor and checked out the Sphinx then took all those tired little kiddos back to watch a movie.

Carlo's Bakery

As we drove into Vegas we decided to drive down the strip from one side to the other before we checked into our hotel.  As we passed the Venetian we saw a huge billboard advertising Carlo's Bakery with a picture of Buddy on it.  The kids all started flipping out, "Mom, there is a Carlo's Bakery in Vegas?!?" I hadn't heard anything about it so I started looking it up on my phone and sure enough in April of this year they just opened one in Las Vegas.  The kids had always talked about going to New Jersey and visiting Carlo's when we move to the East coast.  Now we could try it out much sooner than we had ever expected!!  We decided to wait until Tues. morning and head over after breakfast for some pastries.  

When we got there we all sat by the windows and watched them busy at work decorating cupcakes and cakes.  We love Cake Boss at our house.  We have watched every season and the girls play bakery all the time.  Avery had a Cake Boss party this year for her birthday.  The kids sat for a long time just watching and talking about the different techniques they were using to decorate.  By that point everyone was ready to do some tasting so we got in line and started debating over which delicious confection we should try first.

The kids were pointing every which way to look at this and this one had strawberries and oh look at that one, of course each one wanted to try something different.  We decided that visiting the bakery would become a daily thing so we started with something traditional and went with cannoli's and a couple of lobster tails.  The kids were so excited when they handed us the bag with the official Carlo's box.  Everyone wanted a picture with it...

Everything tasted so fresh and delicious.  The cannoli's were good but hands down everyone's favorite was the lobster tails.  A flaky, sweet, sort of croissant with the most amazing french cream filled to the brim inside.  Honestly that cream was amazing!!  I wished I could try a little bit of everything they had it all looked so gooooood. Watching the kids faces as they devoured everything smiling huge made my day.  We made Carlo's a stop everyday to sit and watch the bakers at work and do more tasting.  The whole fam agreed that the surprise of getting to go to Carlo's was on everyone's top five favorite parts of the trip.  Can't wait to get out East to check out the original store in Hoboken.  The girls insist that they need to go there and meet Buddy so they can tell him what designs they want on their next birthday cake :) :) Until then, thanks Buddy for opening up another bakery while we're stuck here on the west coast, these cute Burch kids definitely appreciate it!

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.

Me Hudson.

Oh this boy.  He is sooooo much fun.   He LOVES his momma.  Randomly during the day he will say, "Who loves mom?" and then raise his hand and say, "I do!!!!"  Just like Emma he trails behind me all day long and heaven forbid if I leave him for even five minutes to do something like use the bathroom he goes to pieces.  Deke will be gone all day and Hudson will run over, give him a hug and then after a couple of minutes look at him, start wiggling down and say "I want mom."  In the afternoons or evening when he is getting sleepy he will go find a blanket and come stand at my feet.  "Hold me mom, hold me" he will ask me until I bend down and pick him up for a snuggle.  It is the sweetest thing ever.  He is busy and curious these days.  He loves to color and as I came out of the bathroom the other day he said, "look mom, I color!" to which he displayed his masterpiece of orange crayon all over the wall.  In the mornings I will hear the girls shrieking and him giggling with glee.  He gets the spray bottle that we use for hair and uses it as a water gun of sorts to douse everything in sight including the big sisters who run and scream which only makes it into a fun game for him.  One morning as everyone was getting ready for work/school I walked through the living room to find him finishing off the back of the couch.  It was completely soaked and apparently he had been left alone long enough to have sprayed the sliding glass doors down as well.  He has learned how to climb up on everything including Deke and I's bed and will sometimes climb up on it and grin at me, egging me on to come chase him.  He is definitely having some "I am going to be 2 soon moments," The other day at the Y he wasn't sharing some cars with a friend of his so I walked over and had him give a car to the little boy reminding him that he needed to share.  He furrowed his eyebrows and scowled at me, "I not like that mom" he said.  To which he had to sit in time out.  Something he has had to do a couple of times in the past two months.  Other than an occasional grumpy moment though he continues to be a happy, easy going, little guy.  He is always making silly faces, doing things to make everyone laugh or trying to play.  Sometimes at work he will come up and pinch my rear then step back and say, "Come get me mom!!" and then take off running.  I feel like he does so much every day that is so cute I wish I could remember it all.  Here are just a few things about Hudson right now...
* Still drags blankets around and holds onto the corners

* calls us all "friend" when he is playing
* favorites to play is playing kitchen, animals and making us all dinner
* words he uses often (Awefome (awesome), okay, Hunner, Ave, Emma, Hudson Coo Burch,
gimpy (binky), sah-ree (sorry), be nice, gabel (bagel), when he says chips it comes out like a certain swear word
* every morning when when drop the older kids off at school he calls out " 3 a clock, Hunner and Avery, 3 a clock!"
* he loves dragons right now and any monster, or large animal he calls a rar rar.
* He absolutely loves going to nursery and every week goes in smiling and waving bye
* In the afternoons he asks to go on a walk so he can take his little push car and fill the inside of the seat with "yocks" (rocks)
* His favorite song is three little monkeys, loves pretending to go on bear hunts and like all the other burch babies thus far could sit and read books with mom all day long
* Favorite foods are avacados, bananas, pancakes and chicken nuggets but the boy eats anything and everything
One thing that he does that I think is so adorable is that he refers to himself as Me Hudson.  Ex. " I want dad to sleep Me Hudson", "Emma go down slide Me Hudson" "Mom hold Me Hudson."  Oh my sweet sweet baby boy you make my days so full and wonderfully busy. Try to limit the climbing to safe heights, keep on spraying those sisters they actually love it and don't even think about trying anymore artistic expression on my walls.  Cute kid.  Mom loves you Hudson :) :)