37

That is how old I am today. I have never really been one to dread birthdays or getting another year older, but for some reason this birthday has been bugging me. I thought maybe it was turning 37 (which is so ever closer to 40), but I am not even scared for 40 so kept pondering...I think I am feeling "old" because Rylee will be turning 15 in 10 days. She keeps talking about getting her driver's permit and that she only has 1 year left til she can date....yep I think that is the reason I am not liking 37. I think in 3 years when I turn 40 it is going to be worse because Rylee will be almost 18 and my boys almost 16. Where has the time gone......

The Pinball Hall of Fame

The last few times we went to Vegas Mike wanted to find this place, but we never seemed to have time. So this time we made sure to go and it was so much fun! There is a big warehouse full of pinball and video games from all eras dating back to 1948...so cool! It doesn't cost anything to get in, you just pay to play. And all the games take actual quarters, no tokens. The games either cost .25, .50, or .75 cents to play, so we gave each of the kids $5 worth of quarters and let them go.


Here is Mike helping Wyatt play a game.


I think Rylee enjoyed actually playing the games more than everyone with the exception of Mike.


Jenna was concentrating hard playing the first Mario Brothers video game. I remember when it first came out and we all thought it had the neatest graffics and stuff.


Mike had so much fun playing all the old pinball machines. We really need to find someone in Utah who can fix ours.


A couple "old" games from my era:

Bass Pro Shop

Every time we go to visit Sara we visit the Bass Pro Shop. The boys had never been so it was fun to take them to see all the "trophy" animals and the big fish tanks. This location has a casino on the other side and they have a big salt water tank where you can sometimes see a mermaid. We have missed her every time until this trip. She was really cool!



All the kiddos by the salt water tank, Cole didn't want his picture taken anymore.


They all wanted one of these big fish pillows. I told them they would have to be happy with a picture.


Rylee was able to cross another item off her bucket list: doing the splits up an escalator. The first time she tried her phone fell into a display of bears, luckily she was able to get it out.

Wild Burros

After we went mini golfing we headed to a little town called Blue Diamond. We went to see if we could see any of the wild burros that roam around town. We didn't find any on the way into town. We played at the park there for a bit before heading home. We drove through town once more in hopes of seeing the burros and we were successful in finding some.

Here are some of the ones we saw, the little ones were so cute:


Sara took this picture from her car. This burro headed over to our car and kept sticking it's head in my window. My window was locked so I could not roll it up and Mike wouldn't roll it up for me. I was freaked out and laughing so hard I was crying. I don't remember laughing that hard in a long time. It finally left me alone and walked around to the other side of the car and stuck his head in the kids window. They loved it! They were petting him and then one of the babies.


Noah was riding with Sara and this one came right up to his window.


At one point we couldn't leave because there was a burro in front of Sara's car, one on the side of her car, one between our cars, and one next to our car. The kids really enjoyed all the excitement!

Mini Golf

We went mini golfing, which was a blast!

Here is Wyatt taking his turn:


Here is Ry "teeing off"


Sara, Jenna, and Rylee (writing my name for me) writing on the Hole-in-1-Club wall. Sara got the first hole in one while holding Audrey. Then I got one and even Jenna got one.


All the kiddos:

A Quick Working Trip

A couple days after Christmas we loaded up the new van for a quick road trip to Vegas. We went to visit my sister, Sara, and her cute family. The main reason for the trip was for Mike to tile their kitchen floor and backsplash, but it was a good excuse to spend some time with family. It was fun to have a DVD player in the van, the kids didn't bug us much the entire drive down (which was I really appreciated since I had worked the 2 nights before and needed sleep). We didn't do anything extra special but had a great time! We went mini golfing, wild burro hunting, Bass Pro Shop shopping, pinball/video game playing, and frozen yogurt eating. We played outside: kickball, riding scooters, and just walking around enjoying the warm weather. We played inside: lots of Wii, the game of Life, Legos, making bracelets, and just hanging out. Since the kitchen was torn up we ate what could be made in the crock pot or microwave most the time. It was a fun trip (especially when you consider we had 4 adults and 7 kiddos living in a 3 bedroom condo with a torn up kitchen). Thanks Binghams!!!

We stopped at Jack in the Box on the way down for tacos...yum!

Mike hard at work:

Mike teaching Wyatt how to use the ruby cutter, he loved it!

Me with my adorable niece, Audrey...love and miss this sweet girl:

Audrey with "Uncle Ike":