Vegas, Baby!

I have been away for quite a while and I apologize for that...no good reason, really, just busy and unmotivated. Anyway, I'm back...at least for today!

Last night I was supposed to teach a class in Relief Society about Blogs. How ironic since I have been such a slacker lately but since I have been so behind, I figured now is as good a time as ever to start posting again...so here goes:

September has been a crazy month, to say the least! Swiss Days came and went, we headed off to a family reunion in Southern Utah so made a detour to Las Vegas, and my sweet little Tage had surgery. We survived it all and are back, doing well and so far, we're all healthy!

Let me start by saying that today is my amazing husband's birthday! He is 56...FIFTY SIX...Five/Six!! and he looks GREAT!! I'm not too sure what we're going to do today, he just wanted to play it by ear...but it will be a great day because he's a great man and deserves the very best. I am so blessed to have him in my life and my children have benefited more than I could have ever imagined. He is a good man who loves me and honors me as his wife. We just celebrated 6 wonderful years of marriage and I look forward to an eternity of happiness and joy with him! Happy Birthday, Brad!!

Natalie, Brad & Me...

The whole gang...

We went to Las Vegas with Brad's cousin Doug Pope and his adorable family. Vegas has become a regular haunt these days...it's only about a 5 hour drive which makes it very accessable. Aja, Natalie and 3 of my Littles came with us and we had a BLAST! We stayed at the Marriott Residence Inn where we got 2 suites which worked out so well for each family because we were able to hang out together or go our separate ways...it didn't matter, we had SO much fun together. Of course, we HAD to see the Cirque du Soliel show, Beatles LOVE at the Mirage...it's become our favorite ritual or "right of passage" in Vegas! This was our 15th time and it NEVER gets old. (I know, it's ridiculous, but we love it and it's cheaper than gambling!) 

Diane, Erica, Melissa, Me, Sara, Nat, Aja & of course, Alakina!

Brad, Errol, Preston & Doug...

But before the show, we had dinner at "Cravings" which is a HUGE buffet at the Mirage. Dinner was wonderful, as always, and the company was so much fun. We had 12 in our party so dinner conversation was never lacking! Then we headed over to the theater for the best part of the night...

The Pope family had never seen LOVE before, they loved it and it was awesome to watch them rock to it. Alakina has been wanting to see it since she was 2! Yes, really, since she was 2 years old she has been singing Beatles songs and has talked about Beatles LOVE...so at the last minute, Aja bought her a ticket even though she's only 4 years old (she was supposed to be 5...oops!) she loved it and made it through about 3/4's of the show before finally falling asleep. We went to the 9:30 show which was just a bit too late for her...next time we'll make sure we hit the 7:00 show.

Aja, Sara, Nat & Ali...

Brad & Errol Flynn (Yes, that's his real name...)

After the show, we went back to the hotel and played "Balderdash". This is one of our favorite games...you pick a card and there are 5 categories: Word, Initials, Movie, Person & Laws. One person chooses one of the categories and reads, for example, a word...it's always a word that no one has ever heard of, then each person makes up and writes down a definition for the word, passes it to the person reading the card (who wrote down the REAL definition) and each is read aloud. The objective is to try to guess the correct answer. Of course, the definitions are usually outrageous and hilarious (especially late at night and as the night wears on). We laughed until we cried as some of the answers were read...Hilarious game, I HIGHLY recommend it!

All in all it was a GREAT trip and we have all decided that it will become a yearly thing.

After a late Vegas night...

Finally, Baby Tage was scheduled to have 2 surgical proceedures done yesterday. He has a cleft in his throat which has been hindering his ability to eat anything other than very smooth baby food...he's almost 11 months old and should be eating chunky food by now. This has also made his sleep apnea worse. Also, he was supposed to have some biopsies done on his stomach. So he went into surgery and had the cleft opened but his oxygen kept dropping dangerously low during the proceedure that they decided not to do the biopsies. It was pretty scary, but he was little trooper and after a hard day, he was doing pretty well last night. He is seriously the happiest baby and SO adorable!.

Isn't he about the cutest little thing??

So that's about it for now. I will try to do better about posting. I guess I just need to get my life organized better and remember to take time to breathe!