Another edition of the Hyde’sHappenings, just a random post of
what’s up in our life recently.
I’ve had a pretty bad cold all week long. It really had me down at the beginning of
this week and I’m still fighting it but on the uphill swing of it {I
think}. Aaron and Annie got a touch of
it but luckily they seem to be avoiding the worst of it so far. I’ve had to cancel plans all week, no fun at
all!
We have family pictures this weekend, in which I think I
will be able to manage thru by then.
Technically it’s Claire’s 6 month pictures, although she just turned 5
months a few days ago and we are counting to get some family ones for this year’s
Christmas card. Getting both girls to
cooperate for pictures is pretty much hellish.
We always, always get good pictures so I don’t know why I go into these
worried but I do.
Annie has been a bit of a handful lately; she always is but
lots of tantrums over everything! I don’t
know if we are just hitting the mid terrible 2s or what. I was recommended to try the method 1-2-3
Magic by Dr. Phelan, I have them on hold at the Library. Guess what our Friday night will
involve? Watching the 1-2-3 Magic DVD on
positive disciplining, yippee! {Insert sarcasm}
Last weekend we had our first annual neighborhood block
party and it was great! We met so many
awesome neighbors, many in which have young kids, lots of girls both Annie and
Claire’s age. Everyone is so nice; I
feel like we get along with many of them.
We are looking into starting a Bunco club. I know nothing about Bunco but I do like the idea
of getting together with the ladies in my neighborhood, drinking wine and having
the convenience of walking home after.
My Grandma wants to take the girl’s Christmas shopping in
the coming weeks. My gosh, I haven’t
given Christmas much thought at all! I need
to start compiling some lists but it’s tough because Annie interests changes so
often. This week it’s Daniel Tiger, next
week it’s back to Mickey Mouse. She’s
kinda over Dora. I have no idea what she’ll
be into come Christmas.
But I do know what I’m into.
Athleta. We got a store here in
Des Moines back in June and I have a shopping addiction there. Have you ever tried their swimsuits? They are the best, and the perfect amount of
coverage for this mid-30’s body. I like
their apparel better than Lululemon and it fits me better too. I just wish it wasn’t so expensive! I’m sitting here decked out in a new Athleta
outfit and I must say I’m in love with their clothes! A friend of mine just tried Fabletics and was
really happy with her first purchase so I need to check them out. I was wearing a strappy Athleta top and
running errands the other day, I must admit I felt a bit like Christina El
Moussa all day, I’m loving the trendy loungewear movement.
I might have bought tickets to see the Rockettes this year. At ‘thee one and only’ Radio City Music Hall
in NYC. During the holiday season. Pretty pumped about it.
Aaron has several work trips coming up in October where I’ll
be ‘single parenting’ for a few days here and there. It’s something I dread. Being outnumbered kids to adult is terrifying
to me. And the thought of getting myself
ready and 2 other very dependent kids ready and out the door during the week is
a serious task. On the flip side, it sounds
like a good excuse to treat myself to a Starbucks breakfast every morning between
daycare drop off and work #winningwhenican.
Claire is so close to rolling over! I can’t believe she just turned 5 months old,
time is really flying with her. She is
such a happy baby and so easy going. She
really loves watching her sister. Annie
is so good with Claire still. I thought
for sure Annie would be sick of her after a few weeks of joining our family but
not the case at all! Annie absolutely
adores Claire and it’s the best thing ever.
And
that’s about it, life has been pretty low-key around here and that’s just fine
by me!
Earlier in the summer, Aaron and I decided we needed a
vacation but Claire is still so tiny that we proposed to a few friends going on
separate friend’s trips so one of us would be able to stay behind with the
girls. We didn’t leave Annie until she
was 6 months old and it’s a little tough to leave behind a 4 month baby who isn’t quite
sleeping thru the nights yet so it seemed like the responsible, logical thing
to do for this summer.
Aaron’s weekend was up first. Him and a few buddies went up to Missoula
Montana for fly fishing and white water rafting while I single-handedly
parented the girls back home. Let me
tell you… it wasn’t easy. The one other
time Aaron left me for a work trip this year, Annie got sick. This time Claire was sick. It’s like there is a parenting curse when the
other parent leaves that the kids gets sick. Claire had her first diaper rash and a bad
case of diarrhea that she spent most of the weekend with a diaper off and paper
towels under her because it was that bad where I was changing her every 10
minutes. Between her and Annie, I felt
like all I did was constantly clean up poop.
I decided beforehand to go to my parents that Saturday morning and
leading up to the weekend I almost cancelled thinking this is just going to be
too much work to take them back there, it was the first time traveling with Claire and doing it on my own seemed daunting but we did end up going and it worked out
for the better as Annie stayed busy playing with her cousin Eli and it allowed me
to focus on taking care of Claire.
Aaron’s flight ended up being delayed 2 hours and by end of the day
Sunday, I was wiped out and so ready for him to return home. I was glad he had his guys trip and had a
weekend to himself but I was super glad that mine was next after that brutal
weekend with the girls.
So my friend Nikki and I decided to choose Vegas for our
girl’s weekend. Nikki’s husband is
Aaron’s best friend whom he grew up with, they live 5 minutes from us and our
kids are the same age, hence we’ve been thru 2 pregnancies together at the same
time, she’s a pretty close friend of mine here in Des Moines since most of my
best of friends live miles away. I refer to her as ‘my in-town best friend.’
I love that Nikki and her husband Mark are always up for travel
adventures with us.
Prior to leaving, Nikki and I joked {but in seriousness}
that we hope we can stay up past 9 pm and actually have the energy to have fun
once we get to Vegas. #momminainteasy.
We left DSM Friday at 6:30 pm and landed in Vegas, gaining 2 hours from the
time zone change. We got settled into the MGM Grand and then hit the strip in search of dinner. Considering we were starving and had no
dinner reservations I mentioned that I wanted to try Diablo’s Cantina and knew
it was a close walk. We split the best
chicken nachos I think I’ve ever had, grabbed some margaritas and hit the
strip. We walked down to the Bellagio to
watch the fountains and did some gambling that entailed a lot of yawning at
that point so we decided to head back for the night. We both lost money in the slots, which I’m not
a fan of the slot machines to begin with and never have been. I find them boring, the only thing slots are good for is free drinks.
Why I'm smiling as I'm about to lose $20 in the slot machine is beyond me, worthless slots!
Saturday morning we woke up ready to take on the day. I had plans for us to eat at Mon Ami Gabi for
breakfast. We had perfect strip patio
seating right across from the Bellagio.
Whenever I try to be adventurous in ordering something different it
backfires 88% of the time. Hence my
lemon crepes were a total disappointment.
I had food envy as Nikki’s plate was delicious.
I was not mad at all about these mimosas though!
My lemon crepes were fried like a funnel cake, it was just weird
Nikki's food was amazing! Total food envy
After breakfast, we lost more money to the Roulette table
and then got ready to head to the pool, which from past trips has been my
favorite part of visiting Vegas. We got
down there mid-morning and started off the pool day with some drinks. I didn’t pay much attention to how the
bartender poured our first drinks but they were good and went down fast. These were big drinks in their souvenir
cups. We went back up to get refills and
watched the bar tender pour roughly 20 oz of Tito’s vodka in my cup and
splashed it with about 4 oz of OJ. No
wonder we were drunk by 1 pm. At that
point I knew we needed to drink lots of water as the Vegas sun was kicking in
and was in full force.
In the past, I’ve
never gone to Wet Republic, which is a pool day club that is on the backside of
the MGM Grand pool. It’s rated one of
the best pool clubs in Vegas, I’ve always been curious about it. It reminds me of in the movie “Couples
Retreat” where they see the island off in the distance and it looks like so
much fun but feels off limits. We’ll
after 2 strong drinks each, we decided we needed to go check it out. So I went up to the bouncer, assuming he would
tell me it would cost a fortune to get in and I would need to stand in a long
line, I didn’t have high hopes but what do ya know… he told me we could get in
free and sent us to the ‘fast line’.
Score! Afrojack was DJ’ing that
day at Wet Republic, which I thought was super cool. While I was waiting in line, I found out that
Tiesto was DJ’ing that night at the Hakkasan night club at MGM, Nikki had no
idea who he was but I was like “Nikki, I want to see Tiesto tonight!!” And yet again, I got us on the VIP list to
get us in that night. It was way easier
than I ever expected it would be, all you have to do is look for the club
promoter that walks around the pool and ask.
As soon as we got into Wet Republic, it was craziness,
pretty much everything I envisioned it to be all these years only seeing it
from the other side of a concrete wall but being able to hear the party from the
other side. I had switched to water prior to going inside
and I had tried to push water on Nikki too because our morning drinks had hit
us way too hard and next thing I know Nikki falls over and bumps her head and
we got ushered out no later than 30 minutes of getting into Wet Republic. Because Nikki bumped her head, they sent her
to the medical trailer and would not let me go in with her. I’m sitting outside this medical trailer and
the bouncer comes out saying he is sending her to the hospital. I was like “freaking seriously?!” And he
would not let me go with her so I had to then run up to the room, get out of my
swimsuit and catch a cab to the hospital.
Vegas is always full of eventful stories, right?!
At the hospital they took me back to this waiting area where
they basically hold all the drunk people.
At this point, I was completely sobered up. This waiting room was full of drunk people,
it felt like something straight out of a psychiatric ward. There are beds lined up right next to
each other and the girl next to Nikki looked dead and the guy across from her
was so drunk he was scaring me. By the
time I got there, Nikki already was given a CAT scan, which seemed a little
overboard so once all the results came back, she was free to go. What.A.Day!
We decided we could not handle any more that day so we went back to
the hotel room and went to bed at 7:30 pm for the night. I woke up once at 1:30 and fell quickly back
to sleep. We literally blew an entire
night in Vegas because we hit the pool too hard that day and slept 12 hours
that night. What a way to spend a short
weekend in Vegas huh?!
We had dinner reservations Saturday night that we missed at
Rose.Rabit.Lie. which I’m still bummed that we missed, I’ve heard great things
about that place. And we missed seeing
Tiesto that night too. Next time Vegas…
The next morning, we pretty much vowed we would not drink
any more on this trip and we didn’t. Not
one drop. We headed over to NYNY for breakfast
and it was so good! I ordered my usual
eggs/potatoes/toast, not straying from what I normally like to eat and I loved
every bite of it. It was a redemption
breakfast from the day before.
I've always loved NYNY's Vegas Casino, such a cool building
We hit the pool for day 2 but let me tell you, I had positive
hopes that we could have just as much fun at the pool with only drinking bottled
water. I was wrong. It’s not that we didn’t have fun but I’d lie
if I didn’t tell you the pool is totally different when drinking. The sun was strong and I was slathering
myself in sunblock every 20 minutes.
When we left the pool I saw the club promoter again and ran over and
found out Calvin Harris was playing at Hakkasan that night. Calvin Harris is on my bucket list to see DJ live
so I was adamant that we needed to get on the list and told Nikki we HAVE to make it tonight. I got us on the list again and told Nikki,
even if it’s for 30 minutes, I want to make this happen.
We got ready for dinner and headed over to the Cosmopolitan
Hotel. I watched Nikki play black jack
on the automated tables and watched her win and do so well that I was ready to
give it a try myself but we headed up to dinner first. We went to China Poblano, a Chinese and
Mexican restaurant in one, my kinda place!
We ordered the guacamole to share and we were disappointed in the fact
that they gave us corn tortilla shells to eat our gauc with. It was weird and we didn’t like it. I ordered veggie fried rice and it was
delicious! Nikki ordered a variety of
tacos and didn’t care for hers as much.
What we did order there was coffee and it was the best dang coffee
ever! We were chugging it down while
raving about how it was the best dang coffee ever and how we could come back there
just for their coffee.
At the Chandelier Bar that we originally intended to visit but only stopped for a photo op
China Poblano veggie rice
We then headed over
to Caesar’s Palace and both got on the automated black jack table. I was up for a change after only losing so
far in the trip. I could have played
that all night but we had tickets to the show Absinthe at Caesar’s Palace so I
cashed out and we headed over to the show.
We had great seats, it’s an intimate setting so there really
aren’t bad seats as the show is under a big tent outside of Caesar’s and it’s a
small venue. When the show started off,
it started with some racist jokes, I don’t get offended easily by much but I
was thinking oh gosh this could get uncomfortable I hope it’s not like this all
thru the show. It wasn’t. BUT it was very much a “R” rated show, and
not for the easily offended. The
acrobatics was absolutely amazing. I
pretty much sat there with my jaw on the floor the entire time. It was the best show I’ve ever seen and the
talent is indescribable. We watched one
guy stack 10+ wobbly chairs on top of each other as he climbed them
effortlessly and balance on them upside down.
We saw amazing tap dancers, tight rope walking/balancing, we saw roller
skaters (my favorite) on a tiny platform where this guy was swinging a girl at
high speeds inches above the ground over the crowd and much more. For as tired as I was before the show
started, that woke me right up and kept my attention the entire time. Best part of the trip for sure was
Absinthe! I’d go back and see it again and
highly recommend it.
After the show, we walked back to MGM Grand and the streets
are always full of crazy stuff to see but we saw something that had me a little
shook up. We were walking up to a crosswalk
and a car was stopped on the street and had a huge dent on the side of it and
there was a guy yelling loudly in this girl’s face outside of the car. It appeared maybe husband/wife or
boyfriend/girlfriend? They were arguing
and this all happened so fast that I just stood there in shock as well as many
people around us but he went over and kicked in the side of the car and the
girl was yelling are you serious? And
then he walked back over to her and started punching her in the face. Like I said it happened so quickly and a
bouncer Cosmopolitan ran over and quickly broke it up, the guy took off running
down the strip and it appeared as if the girl was okay or at least
coherent. I was shaking after witnessing
that. I’ve never seen anything like that
and it saddened me and I still wonder about that girl and if that guy was ever
arrested.
Vegas is not a place for children. There are prostitutes everywhere and
prostitution is not something not hidden in the shadows, they are out on the
streets in broad daylight and they are very obvious to recognize. There are street performers not dressed in
much, Nikki and I used the joke from the moving The Hangover and would say
“that’s somebody’s daughter Nikki...”
Having daughters' ourselves, there is a lot of seriousness though to that 'joke.' There are lots of drunk people walking
around. The crowds are thick. I was amazed by how many young children I saw
on the strip and especially late at night.
May I repeat… Vegas is NOT the place you visit with your kids!!
That night we were too tired to see Calvin Harris, as much
as I would have loved to, I knew we were just too tired to make it. And as Nikki referred to him Michael Harris
(she has no appreciation or awareness of who’s hot in music)…sorry Calvin!
The next morning, we packed up and headed to the
airport. What we learned is that we
can’t hang like we thought we could, us moms just don’t have it in us anymore
to party and when we do try to, we just end up in the hospital. I can now say I’ve been to the Vegas
hospital, hope that’s my one and only time when in Vegas. Oh and by the way, that day I lost my
swimsuit cover up and my credit card. It
must be a requirement to lose a credit card while in Vegas because 2 out of 3
times I’ve been, someone in our group has done so.
We were ready to get home and see our babies and get back to
our mom life back in Iowa. Vegas 2016,
done and in the books for the year! And
maybe the next girl’s trip will entail a destination a little more low-key,
something that is a little more our pace nowadays.
A few weekends ago, my friend Jackee and I attended the
Belong Tour in Lincoln, NE. Months prior,
I stumbled across this event as I’m a huge Jen Hatmaker and Shawna Niequist fan
and I think one of them posted something on Instagram about it that took me to
the event's page. Jen Hatmaker’s book For
The Love may be one of my all-time favorites. I also love her mother’s devotional Out of the
Spin Cycle and she has a new book coming out next year {YAYness!}. Shawna’s books Cold Tangerines and Bittersweet
are similar to Jen’s writing style and her new book Present Over Perfect is
on the New York Times Bestseller for the 4th week in a row now, it
was just released over the summer and I can’t wait to read it.
So what is the Belong Tour?
It’s more than just seeing Jen and Shawna speak live, in short this is
an excerpt from their website http://www.belongtour.com/:
BELONG is a Friday
night – Saturday live event bringing women together in arenas across the
country. Thousands of women will gather to hear remarkable communicators Jen
Hatmaker, Shauna Niequist, Nichole Nordeman, Sharon Irving, Angela Davis, Patsy
Clairmont hone in on how to live a fun, faith-filled, purposeful life.
There will be plenty of personal stories, music, laughter and maybe
even some tears in this open space where women can connect to one another, to
see and know each other, and carry each other’s burdens.
I knew that my friend
Jackee was a big Jen Hatmaker fan as well so sounded like the perfect girl’s weekend
trip and was so glad she was down for it!
On Friday, we stopped along the way at the NEX Outlets in
Omaha. I had been telling Jackee my ‘mom
game’ is way too strong and I needed some new clothes that didn’t scream ‘PTA
ready.’ The weekend prior, I had gone to
the Steven Tyler concert with another mom friend of mine and before she picked
me up, I had gone thru 10+ outfit changes and felt like all I have for clothes
anymore is wedding attire or mom attire, nothing in-between! When my friend picked me up for that concert I
was like dang you look smoking hot! She
had a super cute outfit, hair extensions in, fake lashes and heels. Here I was in my semi-mom outfit, hair that
hadn’t been washed in 2 days and flats.
My mom-game was way too strong! So all weekend Jackee and I joked about how
she needs to help me find some clothes that weren’t totally mom’d out. We had fun at the outlet and both ended up
with some good buys. It’s funny how we both have the same style, when we would
walk in a store, we would both wander off but end up in the dressing rooms with
the same stuff, even ended up buying the same shorts that weekend. #twinning.
Dinner in Lincoln
After the outlet, we got into downtown Lincoln which I
thought was a cute-sy college town. Grabbed
dinner and headed into our first night at the Belong Tour. I felt like the first night was a little
like a ‘meet and greet’ of all the speakers.
They each spoke for about 10-15 minutes and it was a good introductory
for the weekend. Nichole Nordeman gave a
short concert, her music is so relaxing, I could listen to her all night! She sang her popular song ‘Slow Down’ which I
think we were all missing our babies at that point.
The next morning, we headed over to the venue and funny
story… I walked in before Jackee and had a bottled water and a coffee in both
hands, my purse had a package of nuts, a Lara Bar, a Fiber One Bar, and Mike and
Ike’s sticking out of the back. Jackee
walks in right behind me and she had a package of M&Ms in her purse and the
guy made her throw them away. She was
mad but I found it highly comical that I got in basically weighed down with
food and she tries to sneak in one thing and got stopped.
The morning started off with Angela Davis, an Olympian and
world champion track runner getting us on our feet for a workout. Jackee and I were like “is she serious right
now?!” She had the entire arena working
out and we were definitely starting to break a sweat. Throughout the event, Angela would get us up
on our feet and got our blood pumping, I didn’t expect I would be doing squats
that weekend.
Patsy Clairmont spoke first, she is the cutest elderly
lady! And so funny! She spoke about relationships, I don’t have
great notes from her piece but she had some good stories about her and her
husband and that lady had style! She had
these pearls on and sparkly TOMS, she was just pretty hip!
Jen Hatmaker spoke next and I really liked how she laid out
her talk. Basically her topic was on finding
“your race” or what your gifts/calling in life is. She made some good points that stuck with me
such as identify the gifts I have not the gifts I want. And
don’t disregard any quality as a ‘throw away’ quality, sometimes our calling
doesn’t have to be this big/huge thing in the eyes of the world. My friend Jackee has her own photography
business, she has already found her gift/calling. For me, I am at ground zero. I know what my strengths are and what I’m
drawn to but I just haven’t pinpointed how it translates into my calling
yet. Jen gave some good tips to help me
do some more thinking on that. Overall Jen
is exactly as I imagined her to be, I feel like we are pretty good friends, she
just doesn’t know it.
Jen Hatmaker
Nichole Nordeman actually gave what seemed like the crowd’s
favorite talk, she gave an analogy of junk in a garage and how we need to open
our ‘garage doors’ so to speak or uncover some not so pretty things in our life
that we need to come clean on. We all
got ‘em, right?! It was a powerful talk
and she spoke directly about what her secrets she had been keeping in her ‘garage’
and I thought it was very brave of her to talk so openly about some painful
things in her life. Definitely made her
very relatable.
Nichole Nordeman
Angela Davis gave a short discussion on spending time in
quietness each day. I definitely need to
work on that with 2 littles, I feel like I run non-stop from 6 am to 10 pm day
in, day out with no time for stillness.
Shawna’s topic is similar to her new book on reclaiming your
essential self. The main talking points
I had down were accepting and giving love, living a life full of love. And when you say ‘yes’ to something, you are
saying ‘no’ to something else, just the overall concept that ‘yes/no’ go
together. And we should say yes to good
work and no to someone else work that only leaves us exhausted. And to
remember that love is never found in the hustle. That last line may be my favorite and so
true, right?!
Shawna Niequist
We were also treated to a special concert by JOHNNYSWIM and
oh my word was that a huge highlight from the weekend for us! The talent is indescribable! They are a married couple with a sweet little
boy and you know how sometimes in a couples’ band, there is one who is clearly
more talented than the other? Not with
these 2, they both are amazing!!! Can I just say they are gorgeous! Like your eyes are drawn to how beautiful they are as a couple. Even Jen Hatmaker told them to go get some flaws because they just seem all around perfect! I
loved hearing their stories between songs and why they wrote each song. Jackee and I were in absolute awe of them, so
much that I went home looked up the closest concert performing to us and we
already have plans to go see them later this year. Here is a video I took from the weekend:
Both Jackee and I thought the event was really good, we both
walked away with lots to talk about on the ride home and feeling refreshed and
inspired. And it was a great bonus to
get to hang out with her, we haven’t done anything fun together in a long
time! We were college roomies, maids of
honors in each other’s weddings and is certainly one of my best friends but
living 2+ hours away from each other, it makes it hard to get together and when
we do it’s normally for her to take pics of my kiddos and we usually have to
catch up during our sessions. So
basically I make her work when we do hang out J. So it was nice to have time where no work was
involved and the men were being super hubbys, taking the kids for the weekend
for us.
JohnnySwim
This was the first ever Belong Tour and we left with the
impression that there will be an annual one in the forthcoming years, I’d
highly recommend it and hope I can make 2017’s!
