A much needed vacation

For the past few days we've been visiting my parents in Nevada (and Arizona and California). We flew out on Saturday and got down to the resort that we're staying at between Laughlin, NV and Fort Mohave, AZ at about 7:30 p.m. We had a nice dinner with Mom and Dad that night and then crashed hard as our bodies were three hours ahead of local time.

Jake and Hannah had us up bright and early at 3:45 a.m. the next morning and no one could get back to sleep. I let the kids watch a movie on my laptop while Lincoln tried to get some more sleep and I read my book. At a more reasonable hour we got dressed and headed out to pick up pastries before going to Mom and Dad's for breakfast. After breakfast, at 9:30, I looked at my watch and could have sworn it had to have been noon. I felt like I had been up forever. Since it obviously wasn't noon yet Lincoln and I headed into Mom and Dad's room to take a nap and Mom took the kids to play down in the Colorado River.

After Lincoln and I took a nap the whole gang - minus my 96-year old grandmother who lives with my parents - headed down to Pirate Cove. Mom and Dad had heard about this place and checked it out before we came and the way they made it sound I thought it was a theme restaurant for kids. Instead it's more of a theme restaurant for adults. The waitresses are very scantily clad and the bar on the beach is blaring music. It turns out it's a little mini-resort on the river and you can rent cabins, go boating, etc. We ate in the restaurant and I think I had the single most wonderful sandwich of my entire life. It was that good.

Once we finished lunch we headed up to the resort where we are staying and hung out at the pool for a few hours. It was warm but incredibly windy but that didn't both the kids any. After swimming we got dressed and headed out to dinner in one of the casino resorts. Jake fell asleep at dinner so he ended up back in the hotel room with Grandpa after dinner while Mom, Lincoln, and I went to see a movie in the theater at the casino. We checked Hannah into "Kids Quest" which is a supervised play area that she refers to as "a cross between Chuck E. Cheese and McDonald's Playland". She absolutely loved it there and Mom, Link, and I picked her up on the way back from the movies.

Monday morning the kids got up at a far more reasonable hour than the day before but it appeared it was going to be a somewhat icky day with on and off rain showers. After we went down to breakfast Mom and I headed out to do some shopping while Lincoln took the kids to see a movie. After the movies he took them to the pool between rain storms before dropping them both off at Kids Quest - at their request - while Mom and I headed to their rental house in Needles, CA to do a little laundry. Lincoln, meanwhile, proceeded to lose a whopping $2 at penny poker.

Once we picked the kids up at Kids Quest we headed out to meet Grandpa for dinner at a Mexican restaurant in Ft. Mohave. After dinner Grandma watched the kids up in the room while Dad, Link, and I went down to gamble. We didn't stay down there long as neither of us are big gamblers.

This morning was a beautiful, clear day without too much heat. After breakfast we headed over to check out the new house that Mom and Dad are buying in Ft. Mohave. Once we were done there Mom, Link, the kids and I headed up to Davis Dam and then out to lunch. Dad is still working days so he's only hanging out with us in the evenings. After lunch we headed back to the hotel and hung at the pool for a few hours before picking up Grandma B (my grandmother) and going out to dinner for Dad's birthday which is on Thursday. After dinner we went back to Mom and Dad's rental house and opened presents and had cake for Dad's birthday.

And now it's time to head home tomorrow. I have a bunch of pictures that I want to post in the next few days but the internet connection in this hotel is too slow to upload them now.

It has been an incredibly wonderful vacation and I really wish we didn't have to go home tomorrow although I am very excited to see how much has been done on the garage in our absence. With all the craziness of the past few months I have to say, this is just what I needed.