Our Christmas Card

We were slacking on the Thank You cards from our wedding gifts and were quickly approaching our 6 month deadline...so we thought a Christmas/thank you card combo was the best way to go. It didn't seem to make much sense to send our two cards within a month of each other. I should of got some that didn't have the "thank you" in the inside for people that didn't get us a gift but are always on our Christmas card list...oh well. I wish I could post the inside of the card ...but its not cooperating at the moment. Lol.

Holly On Top Holiday 5x7 folded card

Turn your photo into this year's holiday party invitations.

View the entire collection of cards.

Also if I posted this on my blog, I get a $25 gift card for Shutterfly! OK!! I buy all my cards and calendars from there every year so it rocks!

Hope everyone has a Merry Christmas! We have our Christmas on Christmas Eve, and I get to go to work on Christmas Day. I do get a yummy dinner at my sisters house after work though so its alright:)

Vegas 2010 Take TWO

Well of course my week leading up to Vegas completely sucked ~So why wouldn't it continue.....

I had a nasty stretch of work days ending with a evening shift on Wednesday, leaving me basically Thursday to get our stuff packed of course most of it wasn't washed either, pack C for his couple overnights, get the dogs taken care of, and bring the baby girl puppies to their weekend home, plus try to sleep before the airport. So after feeling like an overwhelmed crazy chicken running around all day long, at 11pm I decide to check my email. Thank god!! Delta has emailed me that our flight we are going to the airport for in 4 hours has been cancelled. They rescheduled us for a 3pm departure arriving in LV at 7pm. The flight we were scheduled to be on originally had us arriving at 8:30am, leaving us all day Friday for whatever. Called Delta and after what seemed like a hour on the phone everything seems longer when I am pissed, we got on a 7am flight out from Hibbing, MN. Yes, Hibbing, the town of nothing! It beat driving to the cities so we took it. We finished packing etc, put the clothes on that we were wearing to the airport and got to take a 1.5 hour nap. Set my alarm for 3:20 and my sister comes knocking on the door at 2:50 (thought she was coming at 3:30) so there goes my extra half hour. We left the house about 3:45am, saw a crazy amount of deer on our way, but made it in just over a hour. The GPS told us closer to 2 hours lol we never saw speed limit signs so apparently we were way off our guesstimated speed limit. The airport was big enough for one terminal, one baggage claim (still had the mini looking garage doors that they just put the luggage on from the other side), and one ticket counter. Don't forget the dead animals all over the walls.....The baggage claim, ticket counter and terminal waiting room all in that one pic. The carpet was the waiting area. Our favorite part was the free parking 30 feet from the door! So crazy....but so cool. We also got to walk onto the runway to get on the plane.....

Our plane from Hibbing to Mlps was 10 rows with one side of the plane being single seats. Also had propellers....Scary small! Smallest plane we'd ever been on. Then the plane from Mlps to LV was huge! 50+ rows and the wing was as big as our first plane. We got seating in a emergency exit row, I had the window and it was the coldest airplane ride ever! Comfy though with the extra leg room but flip flops were not a good idea for this flight.

We get there about 10:30am, the weather is great and we got our room right away. Usually 3pm is check in time so that was cool. We played some slots, walked around the PH, checked out their mall ~found a cell phone cover I wanted but for $50 I could get two of the same thing at home but passed. Around 5pm we were running on empty, 1.5 hours of sleep and a crappy little nap on the plane were catching up. So a actual nap was needed. We were supposed to meet people for dinner AND meet someone else for a drink later. So 7:30 was our nap deadline...when that time came DD had a different idea. After a half hour of trying to get him up and he was talking to me while sleeping and made absolutely no sense I gave up, went back to sleep myself. Longest nap ever.

Saturday, pretty mellow day. Did the pool thing, gambled some more, walked the strip a little, went to our free buffet at PH for dinner, then went to Peepshow at PH. Peepshow was a little disappointing, it was based on nursery rhymes as Holly Madison played Little Bo Peep looking for a guy. It was a cute idea for a show, but Holly who is playing such a big part she was never really on stage. For a topless show, I would of expected cuter girls....and all but a couple were flat chested who wants that? maybe to make Holly look even bigger? Lol. Anyway, glad that show was free. We had killer seats and there were a couple hot guys in it so I can't complain too much:)

We went to the Flamingo for Blackjack after, they have a fun Party pit. Lost some money there on cards but it was fun. They have really good bloody marys, and of course they're free so bring it on! Got to meet a Duluth friend there, that just happen to be in Vegas the same weekend. Needless to say I was pretty buzzed when we left there. Only night I can say that about.
Sunday, my roller coaster day! Woke up to clouds and not much for sun. We moved over to Monte Carlo today, which we both loved it there! Will totally stay there again. People there were super nice especially when you compare to PH staff, we could actually win on the machines there, all over much better experience then PH. The only thing PH has on them at this point is PH pillows rock! I stole one in May Monte standard room pillows sucked. Hope for their Hotel32 (top floor)they are better.

We went to NY NY to gamble there and did awesome! I played a few different slots and cashed out ahead every one. THEN I played a new goldfish game, put in $20 and cashed out $601 ~~super sweet! I hadn't ever seen this one, but got the bonus multiple times and was playing $5 a spin after I had my first bonus....they were still showing up all the time, along with a bonus inside the bonus game. DD was frustrated that his goldfish we're not being as nice lol. I was a nice girl and shared some winnings and bought us a yard drink:) "Tickled Pink" frozen pink lemonade with absolute citron...OMG delicious!!

We went to Harrah's to go to The Legends in concert. "Michael Jackson" was one of the performers, and I swear it was him! He was amazing! From the look, to the voice, even dance moves! Serious he deserves his own tribute show.



I was hoping Justin or Britney would of been in this show too, apparently we were the wrong night of the week for them. We got Tim and Faith though, they were good too. Elvis was fun too:) That show was worth the money.  P.S Don't gamble at Harrah's ever again is on my "note to self"!

After the show we went to Toby Keith's I love this bar to get dinner. There was a 10 minute wait so we went to the gift shop connecting the restaurant. We were of course goofing off, trying on cowboys hats, taking pics etc. Well being my "Minnesota nice" problem and Duluth being a pretty trustworthy city, apparently I've grown to think people are just as nice all over. HAHAHA!! I set my purse down by the hats while we were trying them on. Our table was ready so we went and sat down, order our drinks and realized "OMG my purse is still on that shelf!" Literally 5 minutes had went by and it was gone. My immediate thought is "how am I gonna get on the damn plane?!" Not that I would of minded being stuck there a little longer lol but I would of had to fly C out somehow! So as I am walking around the tiny store like a crazy girl in a panic, the girl that worked there knew nothing and had seen nothing. A lady stopped me and asked if I was looking for a purse and said she found one and brought it down to the management desk. HUGE sigh of relief for about 5 seconds, then she says I found it in the bathroom garbage. There was a bathroom about 10 feet from the exit of the gift shop. So back to my FML feeling, but she walked me to where she brought it, come to find out shes from MN! Why couldn't she had found it in the first place!? So I get it back, every single dollar I had is gone. Everything else was there, my ID, my cards, my checkbook, even my camera. So yay for that, but wow what a shitty evening! Thank god for my mom, she gave me some money for the next two days. Good thing I shared my winnings too....I got that back. The rest of the trip I really didn't lose when we played. Here and there but I'd get it back on the next machine. Plus we played blackjack the night before we left and I won all my money back to make it so I went home with $100 more then I went with. But the amount I could of came home with is still bugging me.

Monday our big excitement was the "Minus5" Ice Lounge. A bar set at 23 degrees, and everything in it was made of ice, including the glass you get your drink in. Ice benches to sit on, ice tables, ice centerpieces....so cool. There was lights behind the walls to make it all change color, white, blue, pink etc. It was expensive to get in, they have different packages but the cheapest was $25 which just included your winter gear and one drink. We bought the hats....cause ya know we'll need them at least one more winter!

Overall I will say it was an OK trip. I could of had more sun, to have more pool time. I could of done without the crazy wind ~that caused outside tables and chairs to go blowing onto Las Vegas Blvd. Heavy rod iron ones even, hit some people on the sidewalk on the way onto the strip. Obviously I could of done without the purse incident! But the gambling was good on a plus side! Missed my little man C like crazy. He was mad at me everyday I talked to him wanting to know "why did you leave me in MN?! I wanna be in Vegas baby" yes he really says "Vegas baby" lol. I realized I cannot hang with the Vegas party crowd anymore. Either I am getting old or .....(still trying to figure out something that will fit there). I would much rather go to the "lounge" type bar then a packed dance club these days. That feeling continued in Vegas walking by all the clubs and crazy lines and young peeps screaming, being loud and stupid....ick. Thankful for my home life! I would never be able to hang anymore, or maybe married family life has got the best of me lol. Who knows:) We also realized while we were there, when looking for a house stay away from Las Vegas and focus on suburbs is a MUST! Henderson being first pick!:)

Vegas...Planet Hollywood....FIXED

Dealing with Planet Hollywood for our wedding was a frustrating experience from start to finish....
After looking back when it was all over it was a unsatisfied feeling so we wrote a letter to let the president of planet hollywood know what was going on in their wedding dept. Here is that letter......

I am writing you to tell you about the horrible experience that we have received from your Planet Hollywood Resort located in Las Vegas. We choose to get married at your resort for the great views you were able to offer for a night time outside weddings. We booked our wedding and paid a deposit May of 2009 for our wedding to be held May 14, 2010. The first issue we had is every time we called to ask questions we either had someone new working in the wedding chapel that did not know anything about our wedding day, because they were new and the other people that we had talked with no longer worked there. This was very frustrating, as it seemed like we had to start over every time we wanted to find something out or we would have to call back several times because no one would call us back. The next problem came when 3 weeks from our wedding day we get a phone call to tell us that there was a pool party booked where we are suppose to have our dreamed about outdoor wedding. First of all there is no way that they just found out about this pool party and we booked the location a year prior to this. We were given the option for a refund, but who else would be available for an outdoor wedding on a 3 week notice. Their other solution was to move into the chapel, which we really did not want to do and to compensate us for this they gave a suite for two nights. The room was great and it was a nice gesture, but this was my wedding! We were also promised to have the pictures that we wanted outside with the Paris trademarks and other attractions, which also never happened. We had a DVD made of our ceremony there, along with the video montage. The first coordinator I talked to told me there can be growing up photos, or wedding photos included. I confirmed this with our last (and 3rd coordinator) and said we would like wedding photos. That was not in the DVD and when we called to ask James what happen to it he told us he never received any mention of that being included.


To sum this up, we are very disappointed in the service that we received from your resort and believe that we were over charged and treated unfairly from what our contract stated. We did not have the wedding that we wanted, actually feel our wedding was ruined. I will not recommend a wedding here, and will in fact discourage it. We are frequent visitors to Vegas and on a positive note, I will say we did like your casino and hotel.

Three weeks after receiving this letter, the last wedding coordinator (who I will call K) we had called. She said she had a copy of the letter along with a post it on it that said "take care of these people now". She offered us a few different options/ideas that she had to try and make us have positive happy thoughts about planet hollywood which were A) $500 cash refund B) come back and have a private photo shoot with the trademarks we didn't get C) a free weekend, show tickets and restaurant certificates. Leaning towards option C. If I didn't gain back the 10 pounds I lost for the wedding I might have wanted the photo shoot. That could of been fun but not when I feel like a fat ass!. K told us if we picked option C she could give us a lot more and was open to other suggestions. I think anything we could cram into one weekend they will accommodate. If its done at PH it doesn't cost them any money to give us...so here is what I am asking for...

ROOM: 3 nights in a Hollywood hip room with a strip view. Hollywood hip room is their standard room, can't believe I didn't try for a fancy room being in the room so little I didn't think it was necessary to ask for anything more then that.

FOOD: Spice Market buffet dinner, KOI certificate (Japanese)

SHOWS: Holly Madison Peepshow ~of course we are gonna try for the meet and greet tickets, Tony & Tina's Wedding ~VIP style

EXTRAS: Poolside bar credit & a couples massage at the Spa

Being that everything is at PH I am pretty confident we will get it all. Value of it all would be about $1500. We are supposed to call K Tuesday with our decision. Do I try for airfare deals? and be a greedy bitch Hoping for $99 airfare through Allegiant in Aug or Sept to buy for Oct 1st =)

Crazy Summer!

Seriously, almost August? Really?! Why can't winter months go this fast? Its half over and feels like it just started....but its been fun and not so fun.
I've managed to go to Vegas and get married, have a kick ass wedding reception which sucked ass to plan, exchange old for the new items with SO many wedding gifts TOOK ME WEEKS to put away and get off the floor, paint my living room, paint and redecorate my bedroom completely, had a overwhelming number of birthday parties to attend,

 had many playdates for C and myself AKA adult cocktail hours

organized a neighborhood rummage sale, went through my entire house and priced it all for this rummage sale, had a flooded basement, tore apart the flooded basement, managed to get C to all of his baseball games except the one I didn't want to drive to

 drove 2.5 hours to see the Twins play a few times

got the adoption process 90% complete, had more people over and fires then I can count, and had 4 puppies!

 Now planning a trip to Wisconsin Dells for August, and a Luau adoption celebration party for September. Seriously? What happened to the simple summer days?! I miss them.

Doing all of this, my regular house chores have taken a back burner a lot of the time. Picking up after myself and two boys is enough Laundry & dishes have become enemies! Who has time for this stuff, at least ones with rugrats running around making a mess back in the room you just cleaned up before you started the dishes? Its a never ending battle and sometimes I just don't like to accept thats the way it is. Cook dinner? where would you like take out from? The normal things have been the most difficult this summer.
My rummage experience was AWFUL! My rummage experience was interesting....my procrastination took over and the basement drama didn't help either. I was still going through, marking and setting up the day before. My sister also thought she would make it more fun and give me 4 totes of my neices clothes to mark for her. How thoughtful, I really didn't have enough to do:) Pretty sure I slept about 4 hours three nights in a row to get all this done. Thursday was the first day and to start at 4pm. A little preview of my day....get up, stayed in my shorts&tank aka jammies  thank god I put a bra on! and start setting up first thing in the am. I am still marking my neices clothes as I am putting them out, its 80 degrees by 10am and the humidity is out of control. Going up and down stairs in that heat, imagine the beauty I had going on LOL, then being the wonderful neighbor I was to put this nightmare thing together I get to put up all the signs, balloons and get people here the day of. So that all happened about 12:30pm had them done by 1:30. Thought I could shower, get my money out, set up a table for myself to sit at and be ready by 3. Did I mention I had C this whole time too? Good times. Lunch was extra special this Thursday. So around 2pm I am a sweaty mess, still have no make up on, still in the clothes I slept in and still haven't showered....enter our first customers.   Just shoot me in the face All I am thinking is "you've gotta be kidding me" come to find out I had a free loading neighbor that didn't want to help pay for the neighborhood sale ad (I asked everyone involved for 10 whole dollars) so she started her sale at 2pm so it was "different"'. Well thanks lady, not only have you annoyed me with your free loading quality, but now really made my day suck. People just kept coming and DD was still working....so here I am. Ugh, awful. All I had was a chair and money for the first two hours cause I couldn't get away for even 2 minutes. There was always at least 6 people here at one time.  Then enter DD to the rescue! Whew!

First half of the summer was more work, now we're on to the more play time. Wisconsin Dells in 3 weeks should be a blast! We will be doing this as a substitute for our Disney trip that won't be happening in Oct. MONEY SUCKS But super excited to get C on a water filled mini vacation!

Our Story

Exciting family news today!!! Adoption papers came back in the mail today, signed by let's call him "sperm donor". Our little family will be official in no time.


I am very open about my life, my past (even the bad parts), and how I got to this point in my life. This is my story about how I got my happy little family.....

At 23, I was a carefree party girl with little responsibilities and had no interest in a serious relationship. Fun was my top priority! Summer of 2004, one of my girlfriends and I went to Valleyfair, stayed at a hotel, went shopping and made a weekend of it. Sitting at the pool, there was a group of guys our age so we talked to them, drank with them that night and had a great time. We quickly learned they were staying there for the summer for work. I exchanged numbers with the one I hit it off with (later to be known as sperm donor) for now I will call him J. I made a few more trips to the cities and then before I knew it I was there every week even if it was for 24 hours. One weekend late July, I forget my birth control for the weekend. Who would of thought missing three days could make u get pregnant!? Not me!


The 2nd weekend in August I was down there, we went out for some drinks and to play pool. To my surprise my first drink tasted awful and I just felt funny. Didn't think a whole lot of it, just thought maybe I was getting sick. So I took driving role and let the boys drink. The following Thursday night was my "tap room ladies night". My girlfriend and I went out, same thing happened with my drink. We talked about it, and discovered I may be a couple days late. Shit! That's all I could think or say. We decided to go to Perkins (which was a common thing) and the smell of our food made me wanna throw up. That moment, I said "OMG I'm pregnant!" Did I mention my boobs hurt the last two days but I was trying to convince myself it was something else? Couldn't eat my food, could barely sit at that table with it in front of me. Stopped at Walgreens on my way home to buy a test. Couldn't wait until the morning, I had to know now! Yep, positive almost instantly. At the time all I could say was "oh my god! Shit!" my poor roommate at the time, I swear I had her up all night with me freaking out. Called J the next am and here began the downward spiral. Instantly started questioning if it was his, blah blah blah. All my thoughts changed quickly, all I cared about was this baby. J's feelings were the complete opposite. Even asking me about getting a abortion, multiple times. That wasn't even a option to me.


Through the next couple weeks, we got it confirmed at a doctors office, giving me a due date of 4/25/05, started talking about the future, J said he would move here after his work was over, trying to figure out how this is gonna work. September came, they were headed to CA for their last project (which was about 3 weeks long) before headed back to his hometown, Dallas TX. J became more and more distance as the time went on and by Nov he was no longer returning my phone calls. This continued until March 2005. Finally, he calls to tell me when he got home he started using meth on a regular basis, he wasn't moving here, and if I would let him he wanted to come for the birth. At this point, I had high BP, was on bedrest, and very angry with this guy leaving very little to say. When the time came closer I let him come up for C's delivery (now regretting that decision). J slept 18 hours a day, was a crabby jerk the entire time, ate everything I had in my house, and had nothing to say to me. I wasn't getting a paycheck anymore being on bedrest, and he didn't give me a dime for anything. Including gas for my 2.5 hour drive to get him from the airport and drive back. Fun, fun!


Delivery day, he couldn't have been less interested. Lucky for me, I had made my sister my labor coach many months before. J had left and went to my apartment for most of my labor, came back about a hour before I started pushing. In the room he was hiding in the corner and I had my sister and best friend at my bedside. Which I wouldn't of wanted it any other way, BUT why did he want to come for this exactly?! Still unknown.

After C had arrived, J started to act like a human again and I saw a glimpse of the guy I knew 10 months prior. 36 hours later, J left to go back home. He had been here 2 weeks waiting for them to induce me. We all thought it would of been sooner then it was.

During the next 6 weeks, J called almost daily, we were getting along again and it seemed there might be a tiny ray of hope we'd somehow figure this out for this little innocent boy. The last weekend in May, J came back for 5 days. Everything changed. He was back to being a jerk, didn't want to help with C, and even got in my face yelling about C not being his, he didn't believe me, wasn't paying child support, infact called me "crazy" for thinking he would ever pay anything when he's not going to see him. Who said he wouldn't see C? It would just take some work, plane trips, or one of us moving. I did say, I would not move. In my mind, I had this little boy, he was my responsibility, I needed the help and support from my family that was here. I wasn't moving for this guy who was so unsupportive, meth doing, mean guy he had become. He had no interest in moving here anymore, to quote him "Duluth is F**ked up! I can't live here!" I guess his son wasn't a good enough reason.

The day I brought J to the airport, I wondered if I would ever see him again. Sad to say, I was hoping his plane would crash on the way home. I know that sounds mean, but he was so awful to us I couldn't believe this was the father of my child.

We talked briefly the next week or so, I went back to work and so did J. He said once he got his paycheck he'd send me some money to help with daycare ect. Guess who changed his number and never called?! Seriously. Thank god I was able to sign up for daycare help through the county and figured it out on my own. J also never signed C's birth certificate, cause he denied him for so long. After I started getting daycare help, they wanted to find him to pay child support. It took 13 months for them to find him and force him to do a DNA test. After that came back he was obligated to pay. 7 months later I got a half payment for 2 months, then nothing for another year. Quiting your job and working for cash he thought he could get away from it. He now owes me about 10,000 in back pay.

October 2006, DD and I met. DD and C hit it off right away and C loved to jump around on him and seemed so excited to have a guy around. They bonded so quick, like it was meant to be this way. C was into baseball since before he could walk. Always wanted a ball in his hand! DD was excited about that, and took on daddy role and was playing catch with him, teaching him how to bat ect. Not to mention, C was entering his "terrific twos and threes" and DD stuck it out with us. If that didn't scare him away, I knew we were golden. Haha, C was a screamer too...did I forget to say that? It was bad, but yet he was so sweet at least twice a day too :). We took C to his first Twins game summer of 08, he's been in love ever since.

Shortly before C turned 3, he had a new name for Doug(DD), it was Daddy Doug...where DD comes from. So freaking cute! Now, almost 4 years later daddy doug gets to become just daddy. Couldn't be happier or more grateful how things have turned out for all of us. Thank you all for your support during this journey! xo

Coming Together

Remember the week I got back from Vegas and I thought it would be a good idea to start painting?? Well...I am finally finished (for now!). What?! It was only like 4 or 5 or maybe 6 weeks. Some things I put on our registry...(at target of course) I knew I'd have to paint to use them. I have done the living room in tan and brown tones, which matches all my stuff well. Actually didn't require new wall pictures ~yay! Can that count as saving money? I couldn't get a good picture of my dark brown wall, with the big window the sun always had a huge glare. Here is the other two colors :)

 

My bedroom is my favorite to date! Never thought I'd want a black bedroom wall LOL but I am lovin this room! Saw the purple on a episode of The Hills (I know, don't laugh) but thought it was so fun. It was Audrina's bedroom...just incase you were secretly wondering. I was able to make some good use out of some wedding pictures, even our picture that our closest friends and family signed. The purple makes it a little on the girly side...but the black even's it out right? Poor DD lol. He actually seems to like it...at least commented he liked the black wall. The other two walls are gray :)

Can't wait to get blackouts under those curtains!

Vegas ~ Bachelorette ~ Wedding ~ Reception

Where do I begin?!? Its been nearly 2 years, now I am trying to get back into blog world.
Got married 5 weeks ago! In Vegas!!

Wedding was at Planet Hollywood Resort, which was awesome. The couple months leading up to the wedding, was stressful (what wedding isn't). PH was not the best people to deal with. I will never recommend anyone to get married there. In fact, I will discourage it. We booked a outdoor ceremony 16 months in advance....3 weeks before the wedding they called to say they were booking a pool party with a DJ, 5 feet from where our guests would be seating. Yes, not even kidding. After a couple days of arguing with them, we moved inside and got comp'd with a very fancy suite on the top floor of PH. Honestly, not worth it or a fair trade to me. Um, this is my wedding and they just f*#ked it up! What made us agree to this was when we were told our pictures could be outside.... Guess what wasn't outside?! Still got a bunch of good, cute pics, but still...thinking about writing a letter to the head guy at PH and see what happens. There was so many things along the way in the 16 months we dealt with them. Happy that part is over.

We had a wonderful Vegas vacation as well! We went out there 3 days before the wedding and stayed a couple days after:) never get enough! There was a bachelor/bachelorette party Vegas style 2 days before. Thats the way to do it! Us girls went to Dicks Last Resort for apps and drinks. Highly sarcastic wait staff...that will give bachelorettes lap dances. It was a blast! Then on to see the Austrailian strip show Thunder from Down Under...yummy! Must say the host of the show (also a secret dancer) is my favorite:) Ended our night at LAX, a dance club inside the Luxor. I have mixed feelings about that place. There was so much roped off for VIP tables and walkways and dancefloors. The part that was for us normal people that only wanted to spend $10 a drink instead of buying a bottle of vodka for $300 was so crowded. If I could afford to spend $300 on a bottle of vodka we would of been, well, high rollin. Since we were not...we missed the "be prepared to be pushed, bumped into every 10 seconds, and 20 minute lines at the bar" sign before we got in the door. OR maybe they should have those...just a thought. So I wore cute heels (of course) out, started our night at 7:30pm...ended about 3:30am. All of our places were at Excalibur, I was staying at MGM Grand. Which is "technically" across the street. With walking through the casinos, up and down the stairs, across the bridges its probably close to a mile. Since everything is so damn huge. Dancing in heels for that 4 hours we were at LAX, the second we stepped out the door back into the casino, my drunk ass took my shoes off. thats right, walked barefoot across the dirty, alcohol spilled, ashed on, casino floor. It gets better.....Shelly and I were solo by the very end. We had to walk through what seemed like every inch of the Luxor to get to the moving walkway to Excalibur. Moving walkway and barefeet do not mix! Tried to put my shoes back on for this....so swollen it wasn't happening. sad. So what do I do after many cocktails, sat my ass down. There was a couple guys that even offered piggy back rides lol. I didn't take them, I was gonna suffer through it I guess. Finally got to Excalibur which felt like 2 hours later. Shelly went up to her room, and I went right out the front door and got a cab to take me across the street. My first words to the cab driver was not "MGM please" it was "please don't laugh or be mad" LOL he did giggle a little bit and say I don't know whats wrong with you girls that you wear shoes like that. At that point I didn't know either. Never felt feet pain like that in my entire life. Also, hope not to ever again. I laugh about it now, but if I would of tried to make it outside I am afraid I would of ended up sitting on the bridge crossing Las Vegas Boulevard hanging out with the homeless guy begging for money. Just couldn't risk it. The next day was also rough, good thing I was fine for Friday!

The men, started for apps and drinks at ESPN Zone, then off to Fantasy which was a topless girl show, then met us girls at LAX to end the night. DD will have to start his own blog to fill you in on his bachelor night. The basics that I remember, ESPN Zone kicks ass. Fantasy is not worth going to. LAX, the boys seem to have the same opinions we did.

We had lots of pool time. C loved the lazy river, could of stayed in there all day! There was a Spongebob arcade that he fell in love with, we almost had to buy another suitcase for all his prizes and stuffed animals he won. DD and I didn't get as much casino time as we would of liked. We did get out Saturday night to play some cards at the Flamingo(so fun!) and won some money to take home with us. Since Saturday was the only night we really had to to enjoy Vegas, we thought it would be smart to take advantage of it and stay out gambling and walking the strip all night long. Got back to PH about 5:30 am...Oh! and did I mention our shuttle for the airport was picking us up at 6:45am?? hahaha at 5:45 we decided to try and stay one more day. Checked with PH and the Miss America padget was that next night so they had no rooms. Thought, thats ok we can move hotels....so called the airline. $200 PER TICKET! Of course we said no, took a 20 minute power nap and got on the shuttle. We get to the airport at 7am to get asked if we would be willing to switch our flight because they are overbooked. REALLY?!? I thought I was going to go postal. I am not a very nice girl when I am tired, then throw in crabby...and you're better off to just not talk to me at all. DD has learned this, incase you were wondering. Took a 2 hour nap on the plane then drove home from mlps. Longest day ever!!

I had another 4 days off after we got back, which kicked ass! I thought I'd try to be "normal" for my last couple days off and do NON wedding stuff! (that was dumb!) So I started to paint my living room. Which by the way, took me 4 weeks to actually finish! Then as I went back to work...for 8 days in a row keep in mind. I started to realize just how much we had to do before the reception. Stress level rising on a daily basis! Ativan please...

Three weeks of madness later, we had our reception. Those three weeks is where my procrastination flaw came in to haunt me! I didn't realize just how much was left to do in this short of time. I was trying to play catch up at work with my hours, even had to work 3 weekends in a row (ROUGH)! Did I mention I had three showers in April and I still had piles and piles of gifts scattered around my house?? good times. After multiple 1am bedtimes, I think we finally finished with two days to spare. Thanks to my bridesmaid Jaime for coming to rescue me and help one night, and to set things up at Blackwoods. Love that girl! Then my FL BFF (also bridesmaid) Lucie, who took time away from her family here in MN to come help me finish 2 nights before the reception when I was about to admit myself into a padded room. LOL. Everything turned out great and I had a amazing time.
Thank you to everyone involved, for all your help, all our guests, our kick ass bridal party that made it to Vegas, and all of your support along the way! We love you all <3>