So yeah!
So much wine tonight, you guys. So much wine. And an afternoon beer.
(I'm too old for that nonsense, but so far, so good.)
I'm up to my eyeballs in this book called Dragons Love Tacos. I am told that is my bedtime story.
I'm just sitting over here chilling out while my mother-in-law, who just rolled into town today, feeds the children the organic wild blueberries I bought today. I put back the conventional blueberries, mostly because I wanted to impress her.
So yeah! Vegas, baby! The kids and I liked the Vegas portion of our family vacation the best -- so comfortable. So fun. It was HOT in Las Vegas (even hotter than where I live in California's central valley), but the Mandalay Bay is attached to the Luxor, and between the two we pretty much didn't even have to go outside.
We saw Blue Man Group.
We saw a shark reef aquarium, with those tunnels so sharks were swimming around and over us.
We saw dolphins and "white" tigers & lions (which didn't seem to be white ones, as far as I could tell). Those were farther than anticipated, so we 'bout died and then took an Uber back to our hotel after taking that walk! It was about an hour in 100 degree and rising heat.
And there was a cute little tram car that connected the hotels, which we rode more for the fun of it than for efficiency. Because it wasn't necessarily all that efficient.
Then came the national parks, when we were forced to unplug fully. Ben gradually unplugged from his work over the course of our time in Vegas, and I worked HARD before we left to finish my grad school stuff.
The national parks were great. My favorite was Bryce Canyon. The hike was amazing.
Before we left, we took another incredible hike through a low river up to a waterfall. It's such a stunning place.
At Zion, we did this crazy hike into The Narrows, which we couldn't fully complete with the kids along, but it was beautiful, hiking through a river. Although, sadly, it's a little hard to fully drink in the views when you're so focused on not falling over.
On Sunday, we rolled in to the Grand Canyon in the late afternoon/early evening and camped for the night. Monday morning, we took a walk on the south rim trail, a broad, smooth, easy-looking flat path for an easy end to the trip after so many rigorous hikes.
The paramedic told me, later, that the particular stretch of that deceptively smooth path that led her to us, takes a lot of people down. Perhaps because people get confident and comfortable and stop paying attention.
Which is exactly what happened to us.
Our little man, who is a little wobbly anyway due to his dwarfism, was finally gaining confidence walking on his own. He was running and joyfully telling us how good his "hustle" is.
Then he tripped on a rock that jutted out slightly into the path, which sent him flying headfirst into an even bigger rock.
So much blood, you guys.
Ben scooped him up heroically and ran him to the nearby geology museum. The girl and I followed behind, following his cries until they faded from hearing, at which point we followed the path of bloody drips.
We found them in a back room at the museum. Someone had given my boy a stuffed squirrel from the gift shop (which was perfect because he loved the squirrels there in a big way). Ben was covered in blood.
The ambulance came and it was all very dramatic.
They bandaged him up, and the paramedic said she couldn't advise us, but if it were her kid, she'd skip the Grand Canyon clinic and go to the nearest emergency room, in Flagstaff, 75 miles away.
They gave us a courtesy drive to our campsite, where our neighboring campers rushed to help us toss all our stuff haphazardly into the back of our minivan, and I drove like Mad Max to Flagstaff. The squirrel was very much snuggled and appreciated when it came time to get stitches. In between, the boy went from being subdued to cracking a lot of jokes throughout the drive, much to my relief.
I don't think the anesthetic worked, because of all the screaming and writhing. It was my job to hold him down. It was really brutal. Like, worse than the actual incident. I had no idea stitches were such a big greusome deal. I swear I saw fat cells in there and everything (yeah, I oogled it morbidly once it was cleaned).
Then we skipped our second night of camping, went out to Burger King instead, and stopped in Laughlin, Nevada on the way home.
Laughlin is like Vegas lite. Instead of signs for David Copperfield and other such shows, there are signs for free parking and penny slots.
Now we know! We'd rather fork out for Vegas.
And we are definitely going back to Vegas.
Lots of love, y'all,
Kate the Great
(I'm too old for that nonsense, but so far, so good.)
I'm up to my eyeballs in this book called Dragons Love Tacos. I am told that is my bedtime story.
I'm just sitting over here chilling out while my mother-in-law, who just rolled into town today, feeds the children the organic wild blueberries I bought today. I put back the conventional blueberries, mostly because I wanted to impress her.
So yeah! Vegas, baby! The kids and I liked the Vegas portion of our family vacation the best -- so comfortable. So fun. It was HOT in Las Vegas (even hotter than where I live in California's central valley), but the Mandalay Bay is attached to the Luxor, and between the two we pretty much didn't even have to go outside.
We saw Blue Man Group.
We saw a shark reef aquarium, with those tunnels so sharks were swimming around and over us.
We saw dolphins and "white" tigers & lions (which didn't seem to be white ones, as far as I could tell). Those were farther than anticipated, so we 'bout died and then took an Uber back to our hotel after taking that walk! It was about an hour in 100 degree and rising heat.
And there was a cute little tram car that connected the hotels, which we rode more for the fun of it than for efficiency. Because it wasn't necessarily all that efficient.
Then came the national parks, when we were forced to unplug fully. Ben gradually unplugged from his work over the course of our time in Vegas, and I worked HARD before we left to finish my grad school stuff.
The national parks were great. My favorite was Bryce Canyon. The hike was amazing.
Before we left, we took another incredible hike through a low river up to a waterfall. It's such a stunning place.
At Zion, we did this crazy hike into The Narrows, which we couldn't fully complete with the kids along, but it was beautiful, hiking through a river. Although, sadly, it's a little hard to fully drink in the views when you're so focused on not falling over.
On Sunday, we rolled in to the Grand Canyon in the late afternoon/early evening and camped for the night. Monday morning, we took a walk on the south rim trail, a broad, smooth, easy-looking flat path for an easy end to the trip after so many rigorous hikes.
The paramedic told me, later, that the particular stretch of that deceptively smooth path that led her to us, takes a lot of people down. Perhaps because people get confident and comfortable and stop paying attention.
Which is exactly what happened to us.
Our little man, who is a little wobbly anyway due to his dwarfism, was finally gaining confidence walking on his own. He was running and joyfully telling us how good his "hustle" is.
Then he tripped on a rock that jutted out slightly into the path, which sent him flying headfirst into an even bigger rock.
So much blood, you guys.
Ben scooped him up heroically and ran him to the nearby geology museum. The girl and I followed behind, following his cries until they faded from hearing, at which point we followed the path of bloody drips.
We found them in a back room at the museum. Someone had given my boy a stuffed squirrel from the gift shop (which was perfect because he loved the squirrels there in a big way). Ben was covered in blood.
The ambulance came and it was all very dramatic.
They bandaged him up, and the paramedic said she couldn't advise us, but if it were her kid, she'd skip the Grand Canyon clinic and go to the nearest emergency room, in Flagstaff, 75 miles away.
They gave us a courtesy drive to our campsite, where our neighboring campers rushed to help us toss all our stuff haphazardly into the back of our minivan, and I drove like Mad Max to Flagstaff. The squirrel was very much snuggled and appreciated when it came time to get stitches. In between, the boy went from being subdued to cracking a lot of jokes throughout the drive, much to my relief.
I don't think the anesthetic worked, because of all the screaming and writhing. It was my job to hold him down. It was really brutal. Like, worse than the actual incident. I had no idea stitches were such a big greusome deal. I swear I saw fat cells in there and everything (yeah, I oogled it morbidly once it was cleaned).
Then we skipped our second night of camping, went out to Burger King instead, and stopped in Laughlin, Nevada on the way home.
Laughlin is like Vegas lite. Instead of signs for David Copperfield and other such shows, there are signs for free parking and penny slots.
Now we know! We'd rather fork out for Vegas.
And we are definitely going back to Vegas.
Lots of love, y'all,
Kate the Great