The best Summer vacation of 2015! (Part 1-day 1 & 2)

We decided that we really needed a real vacation as a family. Koby is almost 18 and will be off on his own adventures and I am not sure how willing he will be to join in on our family vacations in the future-we can hope that he will though. Anyway, we decided it was time for us to finally get to California to visit my sister and her family. They have lived in Wrightwood, CA for a long time and we haven't been to visit yet. So that was an important part of our trip-especially to the girls who have been missing their cousins like crazy. We left on Sunday August 2nd after church. Koby had decided that he couldn't miss another week of work (Trek was the previous week) so he agreed that he could work a few days and then fly out to Las Vegas to meet us. So we left him home-ALONE! Just a glimpse of the future I guess. Koby being adult enough to be alone for a few days, able to fly on his own, etc. I am not sure I like that! Although I am sure I texted him enough times that he felt like I was still at home with him. Ha-ha. Anyway, the girls, Steve and I took off and boy were we excited! We decided to make our first pit stop in St. George, which would be about 4 hours into our drive. We stopped at a park and ate the picnic dinner that we had packed. Then we took a little detour over to the St. George LDS temple for a quick look around and to snap some pictures. It was so pretty and so peaceful that it was hard to climb back into the car.

The girls did a great job with all of the driving time we had! I had bought several activities they could use in the car: coloring books, stickers, books, etc. We also brought DVD players, MP3 players and kindles. They didn't fight, whine or ask how much longer. I think it also helped that we packed snacks and a cooler of yummy treats. We arrived in Las Vegas around 8pm and got checked into our hotel. We got to stay at the Excalibur and the girls LOVED that we were staying in a castle. It ended up being a pretty nice hotel and we enjoyed our stay there.

We got to spend all of Monday and most of Tuesday in Vegas sight seeing and we had a great time. On Monday morning after breakfast we headed down the strip. NY-NY & Statue of Liberty:

Hershey World:

We even thought of Koby while we were sight seeing:

Hard Rock Cafe:

This was Steve's favorite place on the strip. Paris/Eiffel Tower:

We also visited a couple of gift shops, Coca-Cola world and several other must-see items but didn't get pictures. (It's possible that it was getting way too hot for Steve and the girls to be willing to pose anymore!) We ended up walking about 15 miles over the two days we spent in Vegas but boy was it fun! We were able to sneak in a few minutes at the pool too. That evening we got to see the volcano explode at the Mirage and see the fountains at the Belagio-both were incredible but the volcano did scare Maylee.

I felt like I could just stand and stare at the fountains for hours-if only there weren't so many people standing and staring at the same time! Plus it was time to get the kids back to our room and off to dreamland!