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.
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| 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.
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| I was not mad at all about these mimosas though! |
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| My lemon crepes were fried like a funnel cake, it was just weird |
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| 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.
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| 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.
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| At the Chandelier Bar that we originally intended to visit but only stopped for a photo op |
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| 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.
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