Family Trip to Vegas

We spent this past week in Las Vegas. It has become my home away from home. This was the second time I've been there in the last three months. This time it was a family vacation. We flew out last Monday night on a direct Allegiant flight. Amelia was super excited to ride on an airplane. She is a pro at spotting them flying in the sky and always makes sure to point them out. She loved seeing them up close at the airport.

Amelia has always been an awesome traveler, and this was no exception. Within 5 minutes of taking off she was asleep and she was out the entire way. She did wake up crying when we started to land. I think the pressure in her ears scared her. She cried and whined for about 5 minutes then was back asleep.

She slept all the way through the airport, then finally woke up at baggage claim. She was excited to see her stroller and carseat again. She was pretty upset when we had to check them in. We got to skip the entire taxi line and jump right in a cab and be on our way. We took our carseat just for the ride to and from the airport, and we are glad we did. It was a bit of a pain to carry through the airport, but we didn't have to go far with it. We weren't required to have it. The cab driver said most people just hold their kids in the car. We all know how risk-averse I am, so it was worth it to have the peace of mind. You never know when you could have a car accident.

Aside... I am so risk-averse that this is my second consecutive trip to Las Vegas where I didn't gamble a single cent. The closest I got to gambling was trying to win a stuffed animal for Amelia out of the claw machine at Denney's. (I didn't get it.) There is no way we were riding in a taxi without a car seat. We thought maybe there were certain taxis that had car seats in them. Then I thought about my daughter sitting in a communal taxi cab carseat and that was out of the question. We were taking our own even though we only used for about 30 minutes the entire week.

We made it to our condo about 11:00pm Vegas time. My Mom, Dad, Sister, Niece, and Nephew had come in the day before, so they were waiting for us. Amelia had been pretty sleepy, but when we got into the condo she was wired. She ran around with her cousins for an hour or so, but then we made her go to sleep.

We had a busy week of playing at the pool and going all over Vegas. We went to see Mystére, visited the shark reef at Mandalay Bay, made a trip to Fremont Street, and ate out several times. There was lots of riding in shuttle busses and waiting around, and Amelia did great through all of it. I am always amazed at how good she does when we are carting her around all over the place and getting her out of her routine.

We flew back Friday afternoon. We left Vegas at 4pm, and got back to Arkansas around 9. That time difference is killer. It is nice to have a weekend to recover from our trip. I was able to get all the yard work done yesterday and today we'll catch up on laundry. Yesterday was hot, but not miserable. Perfect day to go get a snow cone.

I haven't gone through our pictures from Vegas yet, but here are a few Instagram shots from my phone. 

New York New York on our way back
from the shark reef at Mandalay Bay.

The iconic cowboy down from the
Golden Nugget on Fremont street

The cowboy's girlfriend. 

I won't smile, but I will point at you daddy. 

Good to be home

Over the past couple weeks the Bidwell family has been traveling all over the place. A couple weeks ago we all headed to the airport together. I was getting on a flight to Las Vegas and the girls were flying up to Indiana. I had a quick business trip then I was back home for a couple days. I re-packed and made the 12 hour drive to Indiana solo to be reunited with my family. I spent a few days back on the farm. We had a wedding on Saturday, then we were headed back south on Sunday.

It was tough to enjoy my time in Vegas because I knew my daughter was spending quality time with Grandma and Grandpa, and I wasn't there with them. It was also tough when my wife called or texted that Amelia was saying daddy when she was trying to put her to sleep. It also didn't help that it was 40 degrees in Vegas and we were out playing golf. Overall it was a fun trip, but I was ready for it to be over so I could head up north.

This was the first time Amelia has been to Indiana since Christmas. She has grown a ton since then and is showing way more of her personality. I'm so glad my parents got to spend some time with her and see what a smart and fun kid she is. I think she had a great time seeing her cousins too.

On the trip back we decided to break up the drive over 2 days for the first time ever. We usually just knock the 12 hours out at once, but that isn't feasible with a 15 month-old. The break was nice. It worked well. Amelia fell asleep in the car a couple hours before we stopped at the hotel. She woke up when we went up to the room and she was wired. She was squealing and going crazy for a good hour before we could get her to calm down. The crib they gave us looked like a cage and she thought it was so funny to stand in there and shake the bars like a little monkey. She is insane. I hope there wasn't anybody in the room next door. After she settled down she did great for her first stay in a hotel.

Anytime we plan to travel with Amelia I always get worried. I think she is going to be uncomfortable, or she is going to get sick. I worry that she will get out of her routine and be grumpy the entire time. I worried that on the flight she would get scared, or throw a fit on the plane. I worried on the drive back that she would scream in her car seat the entire way. The truth is, we have an amazing little baby girl. She is so good. She did great in the planes, she slept great on the trip (it helped that my mom set her up with a super comfy Winnie The Pooh crib in her room). She was so good in the car on the way home. I need to learn I can stop worrying about her. She is amazing. She got carted around all over the place while we were in Indiana and Amelia just went with the flow and loved meeting and hanging out with everybody.

This week so far has been non-stop. I've been trying to play catch up at work so my days have been busy. Amanda is trying to catch up too, so she has been working in the evenings, which means I get to come home and play with baby. Amelia didn't feel good at all on Tuesday. I think she has allergies, and they hit her when we got back to Arkansas. She also is getting more teeth. She slept a ton and had a 101 degree fever most of the afternoon. She was as good as new the next day and we had fun playing outside. I'm ready for a relaxing weekend. I think we all are.

Happy Palm Sunday

Idon't have anything of extreme interest to write about today, but in the spirit of writing consistently I am going to force some mundanity upon you. It is hard to believe April is here already. March felt like it lasted about a week. We have a crazy April on deck and I am looking forward to it. Things are going to be busy and I'm going to blink and it is going to be May.

We had a good weekend at the Bidwell household. Amelia has been teething like a boss so far in the short but exciting teeth-growing segment of her life. She drools like a mad woman, but that is to be expected. Other than that she has been great. Right now she is getting 6 teeth in at once and it has started to get the best of her generally positive life view. She is moody. She can be perfectly happy one minute and then freaking out the next. She will get frustrated cause she wants something a certain way, then you do that thing that certain way that you think she wanted... then the loses it. There are lots of little fits and tantrums. I suppose we had been spoiled with such a perfect little angel baby up to this point. I wasn't prepared for this new little girl that decided to show up at our house several times a day this past week. Maybe I'm just getting a preview for the rest of my life having a daughter. This is surely a cakewalk compared to the teenage years, but I have 13 more years of having my will broken before I have to deal with that.

Friday night per usual I couldn't fall asleep. I finally got to sleep and an hour later the baby woke me up crying. I rushed in there to find her leg wedged in between her recently exposed crib slats. The bumpers went back up on Saturday. I was a little charged up so it took me a bit to get back to sleep. A couple hours later and one dog was jumping up against the bed wanting outside. Done. Back to sleep. Dog 2 growling at something... wanting outside. Done. Asleep. Couple hours pass. Baby is up for the day at 5:30. Now I just sound like I'm complaining.

Even though I didn't get much sleep we had a lot of fun on Saturday. Amelia and I took a long walk around the neighborhood. We played all sorts of dolls and blocks and ball. We sang and danced and all that fun stuff. By the time Amanda got off of work I was ready for bed. But alas, it was only 2pm and we had lot more stuff to do. We took Amelia to get Easter pictures done with real live bunnies! She is insane for animals right now. She loves everything with 4 legs and fur. We knew she would love getting to touch some bunnies. We were right. She did such a great job. I think there are going to be some awesome pictures.

We did more boring stuff the rest of the day and eventually went to sleep. Today was more of the same. It was an awesome time. Sadly I don't even have any good pictures to share. I'll be sure and post a bunny picture when we get them. For now I'll post a couple older pictures I had lying around.