Las Vegas With the Ladies!!

My good friend Sandy moved to Colorado last year and we've missed hanging out:(  We finally found a weekend that worked for everyone and decided to meet in Las Vegas!

My trip kicked off around 4:30pm on Saturday when Phil dropped me off at good ol Sky Harbor...only to find out 30 minutes later that I'd be grounded an extra hour and a half due to missing flight attendants?!?!?!  I was the last one to arrive, so we kicked off dinner at P.F. Changs...YUMMMM!  It's been years since I've eaten there and I'm always leery of trying new restaurants...you know me and my vegetarian + bacon lifestyle;)  I have to say the Tofu Rice meal was EXCELLENT...and I'm not even a fan of Tofu!

As you can tell...we had lots of fun taking pictures!

After dinner we headed to Planet Hollywood to catch a hypnotist.  While we were waiting I caught sight of these GARGANTUAN hand prints and had to take a pic:) 

While we were waiting for the earlier show to get out, we were stuck in the bar area and I noticed these "sweet" little rooms!  Ha Ha! I had to take a pic and show Phil...of course you'll all be very glad to know there was no dancing on my trip:)

After a very eventful night...literally a fight broke out next door in the middle of the night and we thought the people fighting were going to crash through our door any minute...somehow we all did manage to fall asleep, and then we awoke to this beautiful view!  Breakfast at IHOP...

Shopping at H&M...I must have missed the memo about NOT smiling...;)

Kim, Sandy, and I.

Trying on horrible shades...

I'm actually thinking when you guys are like 60...you guys could totally rock these!!!! 

We had soo much fun and adventures to match! 

Sandy was a doll and taught us all how to play Roulette!  I am now a huge fan, it was incredibly fun! Oh the weekend literally flew by!  I flew home on Monday afternoon to a happy husband and 6 kids!  I can't wait to go out on a Ladies Getaway again!  Maybe we can go someplace tropical next!!!!

Girls Night Out!

It's been a while since the "ladies" have all gotten together:(  We had like 5 out of the 7 of us having a birthday within the month, so we decided it was an EXCELLENT excuse to get together again!  We've missed Maylene living close and are glad when new friends get to join in on the fun too.  Sorry to all the others that couldn't make it, we will definitely plan another!

We went to the "fan favorite" of the group...Oreganos!  It was a little warm, and we only had to wait about  an hour for a table...and it flew by!  Note: Always go to a packed restaruant when you're meeting up with friends you haven't seen in a while!  It's sooo good to catch up without shoving food in your mouths at the same time, which we also do, but it's still nice to get some convo in first;) 

We always tend to get a little silly and have THE BEST conversations, definitely a well needed break!

My flash on my phone for some reason flashes twice...so it tricks you!  You see the first flash...assume it's done, and go back to your usual pose when BAM it catches you for real this time!  I haven't been on the receiving end of it yet...(notice no self portraits as my FB profile) so that will explain some of these really hottt shots!  Ha Ha!  The first couple were so funny, we decided we were going to keep taking crazy shots.

Cynthia

Maylene

Amy

Melanie

Shavonne

Charilla

Thanks Ladies it was sooooo much fun!!!!!!!  Can't you tell by my scary expression?????  Bet you all would be scared to run into me after watching Eclipse,  I give a whole new meaning to "pale face"...hahaha!

New Moon with the Girls!

So chances are, unless of course you've been living under a rock for the last year or so...you've heard of the "Twilight Series" by Stephenie Meyer. Of course, being a girl, I'm totally into it! Phil bought me the first book in the series about 2 years ago. I finished the first 3 books in about a month...then had to wait with what seemed like the rest of the world for the 4th and final book to be released...Breaking Dawn! It seems like forever ago now! Geez!

So now that the second book of the series, New Moon has been released in theaters, of course I had to go and see it! I personally am not one of those that bought tickets weeks in advance. Nor did I spend hours waiting in line to see the midnight showing Friday morning, or spend gobs of money to meet the Twilight and New Moon casts. I haven't been dreaming about it. (I'm not knocking the people who did...because I know and love several people who have done all of the above!) It's just not my style, but I did make plans a couple of days ago to see it on opening night! Yes, that's an improvement from last years, "Day after the Premier... Afternoon showing"!

Brooklyn, Paris, and I went with a friend of mine, Amy and her daughter, Madison. We thought it would be fun for us all to have a little girl time with the saga! (Not to burst Phil's bubble...I'm still dragging him to the theater, I'm just going to wait a week or two...until the hype dies down!)

It was fun, we decided to go to the 6:15pm showing so we could grab a little grub while standing or sitting in line. We got there around 4:45pm and were about 40th in line or so. Not too bad. We called and ordered Islands to go and Amy was sweet enough to go and grab it while we held our places in line. Unfortunately, we only had about 10 minutes to scarf down our food! It was soooo yummy though! We snuck the fries and ranch in...via my huge diaper bag and continued to snack once we got into the theater...we're such rebels! Ha!

We actually got perfect seats all together, 2nd row from the back! So we were very pleased:) Aside from the childish acts of shushing during the beginning of the film...girls SCREAMING every time Jacob took his shirt off, (which is a ton, btw) and all those screams were usually followed by some guy yelling..."He's gay!" Oh there's always a Jealous Loser around! Seriously! I have to admit...I felt like I was in a 9th grade auditorium watching a high school play sometimes!

Anyway, without giving too much away...I totally liked the film! I thought it stuck pretty closely to the book, and I have to admit...Jacob is pretty hot in the film! Hee Hee! SO I don't care what "Rotten Tomatoes" says!

We had a great time! Thanks Amy and Madison for sharing the laughs!!!

Nana's Here!

Since my mom was here for only a few days, and Madison was doing much better, we decided to have a Girls Night Out...we even invited Brooklyn to tag along! She was so excited to hang out with the "Big Girls" while Phil and Greg scored pizza and the rest of the gang at home!

We found this store, new to us, called "Home Goods" over off of Estrella Pkwy. It's attached to TJ Maxx, but it had lots of super cute things! After we found a few sweet things for ourselves at the "Home Section" we crossed over into the regular TJ Maxx. I'm terrrrrible to shop with! Seriously, especially at stores where you have to "dig around" to find a good deal! I always end up finding the most horrible outfits and items in the whole store! Which ends up in me making jokes, having people around us feeling dumb because they thought it was cute, which in turn makes me move to a new area, where I find more "awesome" things...it's a vicious cycle! Here's our fun at the Sunglass Hut area...oh, these beauties were all "Name Brand", way over priced, (free would have been a stretch), and they all had these HUGE tags that were supposed to deter people from stealing them...as if the styles alone weren't bad enough? WoW!

After shopping, we stopped off at Olive Garden to feel like family...and it worked! Ha! Our poor waiter...who needs kids when you got all of us there? Shavonne knocked over a glass of water in like minutes, which fell all over my mom! Luckily, she was quick and started scooping the water and ice off of her and onto the floor before becoming too soaked! We couldn't stop laughing! Oh I love hanging out with my mom! Sky and Sarah you freaking missed out! Move closer already!! It will be fun to hang out with you both around Christmas again!!! Oh the fun we'll have!! Shavonne got this Pumpkin Dessert...YUM!!! I don't think I would have ordered it...but now that I've tried it, heck yes! It's good!
They have the best Lemon Creme cake ever! I even brought one home for Phil...since he wasn't having quite as much fun as me...I'm sure!

Oreganos!

Maylene, Sandy, Me

Amy, Cynthia, Kim

We decided that since Sandy's moving...we better use it as an excuse to have as many of these outings as possible! WE always love great excuses to hang out!

Pam, Deborah, Maylene

It was great seeing Deborah again and meeting her Sister-In-Law Pam who's moving here from L.A. Kim, Pam, and Deborah are all expecting...and look absolutely FABULOUS! It was a little warm while we were waiting outside...luckily the misters kept the temps out of the 100s.

As usual we had GREAT conversations... a TON of "photo ops"...and DELICIOUS food. I've already blogged a bunch about Oregano's before...so I'll just post some more great pics from one of our last girl's nights that will be including Sandy!

I'm sure she'll be back to visit! Maybe once the babies get a little older...we'll have to switch these to "Girls WEEKENDS out!" Thanks everyone for the GREAT night! We'll MISS you SANDY!!

Some sisterly love!

Sunsplash!

Okay so as you can see I go out on my fair share of "girls night outs" with several of my friends. I don't ever want to grow out of having fun! It's my break away from the kids and the sometimes mundane routine of things. The guys usually get their time away too with Basketball, Golf, Softball, and even Work! (Yes I said WORK! If I could go somewhere and have absolute quiet...or close to it...with the only interruptions coming from other adults or my stomach telling me it's time to take a break...THAT WOULD BE CALLED A VACATION!! I know it can also be very frustrating and tiring, I used to work full time while Phil was going to school and it was hard to leave the kids at home (you feel sad for a bit) and you have a whole new set of trials...but the upside is...you get to have adult conversations, wear cute clothes, and boss people around that actually get paid to listen to you!!! I know Phil loves the cute clothes bit:)

All joking aside, I know that I am really lucky to be able to stay home full time with my kids and I really wouldn't change it for the world...but it is still really nice to get a break once in a while...and to have an AWESOME husband who totally supports me and usually OFFERS to take the kids off my hands while I go have some fun!

Since one of my good friends Sandy is moving to Colorado in a few weeks, we decided that we should do something fun that we haven't done before. SO instead of a Girls Night Out...we did a Girls Day Out at the Sunsplash Water park in Tempe! Since her schedule was filling up so fast, we only had about a day's notice to let everyone know what we had planned. It worked out that only Sandy, Bettijo, and I could make it...but we were still so excited! I haven't been to a water park since I was in college! I think it was 7 peaks in Provo!

We all met at my house around 10 and drove out to Tempe together. The park opened at 11 and it was already 100+ degrees when we arrived! Here's our sweet shot as we were just getting there...

All of us have kids at home...so being somewhere with lots of kids around actually made us appreciate not having them around! We took full advantage of our freedom! We went from slide to slide without having to take a "potty" break or time for a nap! It was soo sweet!

Sandy purchased a waterproof camera so we thought we would take some sweet shots of us at the park...we seriously were having WAY to much fun!!! We ended up staying there until around 5 in the evening...and were all ready to go home and chill (literally) with our families! I'm so glad we went!

Me , Sandy, Bettijo

P.S. Don't judge the photos too harshly...A. it was 118 during the hottest part of the day (hence the sweatiness) B. The underwater camera was NOT digital so it was old school...no retakes!! C. I just had a baby...so we'll pretend that's why I'm so curvy in my suit!!

I love how CLEAR the water is!! Gross!!

This was a water slide "rollercoaster" it actually would shoot you back up hills! So much fun...but serious biff action at the end!

The Lazy River...so relaxing!

This was some freaky "A" ride that I personally passed on...I was the official photographer of this event! Bettijo and Sandy went down this steep hill and then they shot up the other side...looking like they would fly off the other end before slowing back down! They said it was fun...I say it didn't look like it:)