Las Vegas, Nevada

What is it they say about hindsight being 20/20?

Yeah, I can't believe we took our kids to Las Vegas. Tom and I have been to Vegas a few times but to visit and see it through my "mommy eyes" was a completely different experience. LOL

Sometimes, my Pollyanna view of the world ambushes my common sense. We were telling the kids about the lights, the shows and the amusement park at the KOA at Circus Circus, where we stayed.

I had forgotten about the billboards of scantily clad women that they drive around the city on the back of trucks. And I didn't think about the statues of naked men and women in Caesar's Palace. Then there's the drinking, the smoking and the gambling. You get the idea. Duh.

Thankfully, Andrew was there to point out my complete lapse in parental judgement. "Mommy, did you see that lady's butt on that billboard over there?" And he was more than willing to point out things to Kaitlyn so she wouldn't miss anything. "Hey Kaitlyn, look at that statue...(of the naked Roman soldier)."

Well, I guess I'm out of the running for Mother of the Year again (still).

So what did we do? The first day, we went to the Adventure Dome at Circus Circus (aka, the Torture Dome). The kids had fun riding the rides and playing the games, I guess that's all that matters.

Kait & Andrew on the bumper cars for the millionth time.

We also visited the Pawn Stars pawn shop. In case you've never heard of it, Pawn Stars is a show on the History channel about the weird stuff that comes into a Las Vegas pawn shop.

I was really hoping we could see the Old Man or, better yet, my favorite employee, Chumley but none of the regular characters were working that day. The best I could do to get a Chumley fix is this burnt piece of toast that is actually for sale at the store:

Burnt toast that looks like Chumley.

We actually had to wait in line outside of the store to get in and it was packed full of people. The line was even longer when we left.

The crowd inside the pawn shop.

The pawn shop looked smaller and darker than it does on TV but I think it's just because of the crowd and the lack of extra TV lighting. It was fun to see all of the stuff for sale and the merchandise they have for the show is unbelievable, shirts, hats, mugs, and magnets. It goes on and on. I wanted to buy Adam and Don something but the line was way to long for that. Sorry guys!

We also drug the kids to Hoover Dam. They couldn't understand why we even went there. I tried to explain the whole architectural marvel thing but they couldn't have cared less. Finally I said, "We spent the entire day yesterday doing what you wanted and now we are going to do something daddy wants to do." They understood that logic. Alas, they were completely unimpressed.

See Hoover Dam. Check.

One night, we hopped on a double decker bus and went to see the sights on the strip. We watched the pirate show at Treasure Island. We stopped at the fountains at the Bellagio. The kids liked the Eiffel Tower at the Paris casino and the Luxor casino's pyramid.

It was great people watching. We saw lots of strange things/people on the street. We grabbed dinner at Margaritaville and some weird guy on stilts made balloon animal hats for the kids and me too. How fun. We actually walked around Vegas wearing these hats but surprisingly no one seemed to notice.

A teddy bear, a fire breathing dragon and a horse.