Vegas {again}

well, we did it again. 

2 years ago we drove more than 22 hours to Las Vegas to see my favorite band play on their very own holiday. 

Last week, we did it again. well, all of it except for driving 22 hours (thank goodness). This time, we hopped a plane and made it there in just under 3 hours. (best idea EVER!)

We stayed at the Tropicana this time, and it did not disappoint!  I read a lot of reviews online before we booked, and heard nothing but great things about the newly remodeled hotel, and they were all right.  Last time we stayed at Excalibur, which was nice enough (and we got a KILLER deal) but this year with no amazing deals to sway us, I was happy we chose a little nicer and much newer hotel.

 

As usual, I wasted no time in starting to take pictures once we got checked into our room.

Ash & Zach made the trek to Vegas with us (while the 3 other guys who went with us last time all bailed…LAME!). 

They stayed at Hooters (which was also actually a pretty nice hotel!), and once they got checked in they came to visit our room, and again I wasted no time in getting the first (of many) Brooke & Ash photos.

 

And by the way, yes, I did chop my hair off!  Thank you for noticing. :)

We also wasted no time in finding a 311 Day sign to take yet another Brooke & Ash photo. (with the point & shoot camera I got for free on Black Friday…I can see why it was free :) but hey, it’s waterproof!)

Speaking of 311 Day…this year was unlike past 311 Days.  Rather than one marathon concert, this year we got 2.  One the day before, and one on 311 Day.  And since 311 Day fell on a Sunday, we ended up with a perfect weekend trip. 

We got in on Friday evening, which meant we had a whole night to kill before the fun began on Saturday.  We decided to spend that evening in downtown Las Vegas, on Freemont street.

I can’t believe we missed this gem the last time we came to Vegas!  We had so much fun downtown.  If you are planning to go to Vegas anytime soon, I highly recommend you spend at least one evening on Freemont Street.  You will not regret it!

We even got to see the “World’s Largest Golden Nugget” at…you guessed it…the Golden Nugget. :)

I won’t lie, I was expecting it to be a little bigger… but what do I know.

There were some crazy characters hanging out in the street that night…

   

(That is NOT the Buzz I remember from the movie!)

Ash & I may or may not have shared a giant margarita.

Ok, we did.  And it was SO yummy.  I will go ahead and end the night 1 pictures here…you don’t want to see the rest. A giant margarita and a late night in Vegas… that’s all you need to know. :)

Day 2 started out just a little rough for me.  Let’s just say I wouldn’t recommend eating a slice of cheese pizza when you are on a dairy free diet, and then drinking several beers when you are also on a gluten-free diet.  Oh, and then drinking a giant margarita.  Not a good combo!

But, being the trooper that I am, I pulled through.  I mean, I was in VEGAS after all!

On day 2 we decided to explore the North end of The Strip (which we barely saw the last time we were there). 

We took a cab to the Stratosphere in the morning, and spent the entire day walking our way back to the South end of The Strip. 

(I need to pause for a moment to discuss the cab drivers in Vegas.  These people are INSANE.  I have never held on so tight in a vehicle in my life.  Are cabs like this everywhere?  I don’t take a lot of cabs here in good ol’ KS, so maybe I’m just inexperienced.  Or maybe Vegas cabbies are just CRAZY!) 

So we started at the Stratosphere.  The menfolk wanted to be all brave and ride the rides up at the top, so we ventured inside.  On our way to the ticket counter for the rides, we were distracted by the “Sky Jump”.  Sounded interesting. 

Interesting it was!  Turns out, it’s just what the name says.  People actually PAY MONEY to be hoisted up to the very top of the Stratosphere, and then freefall FACE DOWN to a platform.  I am beginning to think Vegas is just full of crazy people.

See the little blue square at the top of the Stratosphere in this picture?  Yeah, that’s what people JUMP OFF OF.

We actually watched someone take the plunge…NO THANK YOU!  My hands were sweaty and my heart was racing…and all I did was watch. 

After we talked the boys out of that $109 death wish (yes, they charge you 109 DOLLARS TO JUMP OFF A BUILDING.  Have I mentioned that people in Vegas are crazy?), we then realized that the line for the other rides was ridiculously long, so we decided to quit while we were ahead and move on.

Circus Circus was one of my favorite places we stopped that day.  And not because there were creepy clowns everywhere (there were!)  I enjoyed it because it was the only place I had any luck gambling.  I sat down at a nickel slot and put in $1, and walked away with $40!  Sure, $40 isn’t much, and it was gone probably 2 hours later, but still.  I won something!  I was excited, ok?!

Now I can’t remember what casinoit was, but we wandered inside and found an extravagant butterfly statue and a waterfall!  Did somebody say: Photo Op?"

  

And of course I took a picture of the 5 o’clock Somewhere sign…

So eventually we made it back to Hooters & Tropicana from The Stratosphere.  Yes, we walked entirely from one end of the strip to another (that was about 4 miles...)  We took a little pit stop in our hotel rooms to rest and recover from our tiring day.  We met up for dinner, and then it was time for the concert.  I wasn’t feeling so hot when it was time to leave and go to the concert, and believe it or not I almost didn’t go.  But then I reminded myself there was no way I was missing this, so off I went.  It was a great show – they played 40 songs, and were on stage for 3+ hours.  I didn’t take too many pictures at the first concert (I think I took 3), mostly because I felt like I was going to pass out at any given moment.  But I made it through, and I’m so glad I did.  311 puts on an amazing show, and they never disappoint.

We all slept in just a little bit longer on Sunday morning…surprise surprise.  Once we did get up and moving, we met up for lunch and then were off to explore the North end of the strip (which meant a lot less walking… hallelujah.)

Last time we went up inside the Eiffel Tower at Paris, but this year we just admired it from the street.

there were trucks driving up and down the street 24/7 with giant billboards on them.  We were pretty excited to see one advertising 311 day. :)

We went into quite a few more casinos as the afternoon went on, and proceeded to gamble away our money.  But hey, we got free drinks in the process, so that made it all worth it. :)  We considered riding the roller coaster at New York New York, but we ran out of time.  We had another concert to go to!

It was so neat to go back to the same venue, sit in the same seats, and watch a brand new 311 show with all of the same people.  The second concert was full of energy (as was I, now that I was finally feeling better), and once again they played for more than 3 hours, and 39 songs. 

As you can imagine, the foot-long margaritas with an extra shot on top really helped me get to feeling better :)

This guy was a true fan.  He was awesome.

And we have the one and only group shot from our trip.  As you can see, the foot-long margaritas are almost gone…

The pictures only got worse from here.  So I will spare you once again. :)

We had an absolute blast at this concert.  I am still not sure how any of us successfully walked back to our hotel rooms that night…our bodies (namely our feet) took a beating over those 2 days!  But it was allll worth it.

It took us even longer the next morning to get up and moving, but we could have cared less.  The only thing on our agenda for Monday was to pack our bags, check out of our hotel, and get to the airport.  We had until around 6pm to get there, so needless to say we took our time. :)

Since we spent a lot of time in the hotel room that day, I satisfied my itch to take pictures by getting a few shots out the window of our view.

Tropicana had a super awesome pool and outdoor set up that was right below our window.  Unfortunately the pool was closed while we were there, and of course the day we were leaving they started filling it up.  How convenient of them!

Looking the other direction we could see Excalibur, which is where we stayed last year.

Hi, Excalibur!  Nice to see you again.

After taking this picture (which I actually took on Saturday, in an attempt to distract myself from feeling like I was either going to get sick or pass out), my camera accidently switched focus to the screen on our window for the next shot, but I think it looks pretty cool.

I love these little happy accidents. :)

And last but not least, here’s little ol’ me, looking like a tourist outside our hotel.

Well, kudos if you have made it all the way through this post!  I considered breaking it up like I did last time, but why not just give it to ya all at once. :)  Once again, we had an absolute blast in Vegas, and I can’t wait to go back.  I love that my favorite band loves their fans so much…it’s pretty awesome! 

We shall see where 311 Day 2014 ends up being…and if I will be able to talk my husband into going :)

we did it again…

yep.  we ventured to Las Vegas once again, to celebrate the holiday of all holidays…311 day.

I’m still working on getting through all of my pictures, but I promise to have a good ol’ recap posted soon. 

In the meantime, feel free to go back and read my posts from the last time we went to 311 day in Vegas in 2010 (click for part 1, part 2, part 3).  I just did, and wow…what an adventure that was. 

This trip was equally awesome, and I can’t wait to tell you aaaaaaalllllllll about it. :)  so stay tuned! (I promise I won’t wait another month and a half before posting again… pinky swear.)

a daisy

I found this post hiding in my drafts folder recently... back in the spring, after getting all of my flowers planted I decided to take a few shots of my one daisy that was actually growing. (I plant these things every. stinkin. year. but they never do very well...probably because they need a lot more sunshine then our tree-covered backyard can give them.  Oh well, I still like them...while they last.)
Anyway, I thought some sunny springtime photos would be nice as we start off February... just to remind us that we are only a couple months away from the joy that is sunshine and warmth, and fresh blooming flowers. :)







One of these is actually the background on my phone right now...it makes a pretty good wallpaper I must say!  I don't think I'll ever get sick of looking at, or taking pictures of daisies.  They are by far my favorite flower, and I just think you can't go wrong shooting them!  Especially when you get some nice water droplets on the petals.  :)
I'm thinking one of these might make a good canvas to hang in my office which I'm currently redoing...

another (year) bites the dust

I have always been a photo album nerd.  I have tons of them.  Just a few months ago I was at my mom’s house, and I found a cabinet full of all the albums I made growing up…there are at least 20 of them.  I used to have a disposable camera on me at all times, and all the prints I got would always go straight into an album. 

Even once the digital world came around, I was still always diligent about ordering prints and filing them away in an album every year. I have a shelf with at least 5 albums on it now, which just covers the past couple years, and a box somewhere with I couldn’t even tell you how many more albums inside.  Not to mention the separate albums I have from vacations, our wedding, our honeymoon…  See what I mean? Photo album nerd.

Anyway, over the past year or so I have gotten bad about ordering prints.  (I think part of that is because the number of photos I take has significantly increased…)  And any of the prints I did order, well, those have started to accumulate into quite a large pile.  So, after seeing the idea on several other blogs and on Pinterest, I finally figured out how to solve my problem.

A yearly photo book!  I already upload my pictures to Shutterfly on a (somewhat) regular basis, so all I had to do was drop them into one of their templates, tweak a few things, add some text, and viola!  Not to mention they were having a sale, so the whole thing only ended up costing around $20.

I basically just went in chronological order, and made a page (or in some cases a couple pages) for each event, adding a little text here and there.  Here are a few of the pages (most of which you will recognize, because I’ve blogged the pictures already):

 

This was one (of 6!) pages from our vacation to Texas in July.  Highlighting our crazy zip lining adventure, as well as the 4th of July.

This is my concert page… in July we saw 311 (if you do not know by now that this is my favorite band, you must not pay much attention…) and I also saw the New Kids on the Block and the Backstreet Boys with my mom and cousins.  It was a boy band dream, let me tell you.

 

And as you can imagine, miss Lexi makes a few appearances in the book. :)  The session we did in August was one of my favorites, so I had a hard time picking just a couple of pictures to include…

These pictures are from a Royals game we went to with our friends Ash & Zach (who you may have seen before on here…) and also the Chiefs home opener game on 9-11.

And of course I had to do a spread for Halloween.  I don’t think I ever blogged these pictures (they aren’t my best work…what can I say…party + point & shoot - does not equal high quality photos!), but as you can see we had some interesting characters attend the party we went to.  Snooki and The Situation even made an appearance!

 

And then on the back cover I had to put a few “family photos”.  Of course we don’t have one with all 5 of us together (I don’t think that will ever happen…) but at least when I look back through this album I’ll be able to see how cute all of our furbabies were in 2011!

I am now planning on keeping this tradition up and making a new book each year in January.  Although I still have an entire shoebox of pictures from 2010, and even some from 2009…I have yet to decide if I will just ditch the prints and make a 2010 photo book or if I’ll actually fill up one last album (or two.  or three.  I have a lot of prints in that box…)

I’ve already looked through this book at least 10 times.  And I will probably look through it another 10 times before I move it off the coffee table and onto the shelf with all of the other photo albums.  I just love it, what can I say!  Did I mention I was a photo album nerd?

Lexi ~ 2 years

ok, so technically she is 2 years + 1.5 months.  close enough.

on an unseasonably warm day last week, we finally squeezed in Lexi’s 2 year session.  Amazingly, we were able to run around outside, without coats, and we had lovely sunshine to work with.  Not your typical January in Kansas, that’s for sure.

We actually ended up at Wonderscope Children’s Museum – we originally went to Old Shawnee Town…but it was all gated up.  That turned out to be a good thing, though, because the outside of the Wonderscope building is a great place for photos!  They have so many colorful walls, and fun things to play on.

Before we get to the 2 year photos, lets take a quick trip down memory lane…

Here is the little munchkin at only a few weeks old:

And at one year:

And now, at two.  She is growing up so fast, it's unbelievable.  But she just gets cuter by the minute, and thankfully my camera is there to capture it all. :)

        

I had so much fun with this session…nothing like spending an afternoon running around outside with my favorite two year old. :)  Especially when we get blessed with such beautiful winter weather.

And to top it all off, I leave you with a kiss! :)

just a typical Thursday in January…

you know… just hangin’ out at the park… in short sleeves… and sunglasses…

yeah, that’s just a typical Thursday afternoon in January around here (HA!)

ho ho ho-liday wrap up

I have quite a few pictures to share from this lovely holiday season (which, by the way, can you believe it's almost 2012 already?! holy cow!), so I’m going to just put it all together in one big wrap up post.  Kind of like a present…just imagine it all tied up with a bow :)

So lets get this party started!

The holidays start in this house right after Thanksgiving, when the tree goes up.  After a marathon Black Friday, I managed to dig our tree out and get it all set up and decorated.

 

I personally cannot wait for the day when I have a bigger house and the room to set up several trees.  Matt on the other hand is not quite as excited for that…and I just can’t figure out why…

 

Once we (I) got the house all festive, it was time for the annual Family Christmas Cookie Decorating Adventure.

 

My cousins and I had a blast as always, and ended up with a pretty festive selection of cookies:

I of course came home and did some additional cookie baking and decorating of my own.

 

Along with these sugar cookies I also made Caramel Popcorn and my all-time favorite, Chocolate Covered Pretzels.  I swear I took photos of all the goodies I baked, but the popcorn and pretzel photos have disappeared… Just trust me when I tell you that they were pretty and very yummy. :)

Aunt Terri gave each of my cousins and I one of these adorable cookie trays.  When its not covered in cookies it also makes a great decoration in the kitchen. :)

After all of the baking came lots of shopping, wrapping, crafting, more shopping, more wrapping and more crafting all in preparation for the big Christmas weekend.

And then I failed as a photographer because I didn’t take a single photo on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day.  Can you believe that!?!?  I guess I was just too busy enjoying all of the family festivities.  On Christmas Day I was totally bummed thinking that I didn’t have a memory card with me (another major photographer fail, right!)… I later realized that I actually had 2 memory cards with me the whole time.  Awesome.

But we had a wonderful time with family, and were so lucky to be showered with amazing gifts.

 

Yes, that is exactly what you think it is.

I FINALLY GOT A KITCHENAID STAND MIXER!  I put one of these bad boys on our wedding registry (over 2 YEARS ago now!) and I finally got it.  Although I had to spend all day re-arranging my (tiny) kitchen’s countertops to make it fit, it now fits in just perfectly!

I got another great gift that I am super excited to play with…

Can you say A-W-E-S-O-M-E!  Once again this will require some re-arranging to get some use, but I am planning a nice little “craft corner” in our second bedroom/office, so as soon as I can get my butt in there and organize, this puppy will be getting a ton of use!

And thanks to my wonderful husband, I am now the proud owner of a Keurig Coffee Maker!  I also get 2 awesome girls adventures with my BFF (a cake making class and a girls night out) thanks to our guys working together for our gifts this year.  How clever are they!

In my usual fashion, I also want to share one of my favorite gifts I gave this year…

Not the best picture, but it says “THAMES” which is the family name on my mom’s side.  I have seen these letter art pieces floating around for a while, and I decided to try my hand at it.  I love how it came out, and my mom’s side of the family loved them too!  I also made one for a wedding gift recently, and another one for my sister-in-law for Christmas.  Now I want to make one for myself!

So there you have it.  Christmas in a nutshell!  It really was a great holiday season this year, even if it did sneak up on me and go by in the blink of an eye.  Next up is New Years Eve, and then we’re on to 2012!  I am hoping to spend a lot more time on my photography in 2012.   So hopefully that means this ol blog will see a lot more action!  I hope you’ll come along for the ride :)

HAPPY NEW YEAR to everyone, I hope 2012 brings great things to all!