Fourth of July Vegas-style

We spent the fourth of July this year in Las Vegas. Jaren's sister, Kelli, and her family just moved into their brand new house there, so we all went down to visit them. For the past 5 years, Jaren and I have spent the fourth in Oakley (his hometown) and we usually go to the parade in the morning, have a BBQ during the day, and then go to the rodeo at night. This year, about half of his family wanted to do something different (the other half wanted to stick to the tradition), but I thought it was fun. I'm always up for going out of town, so I was ready to go. It was honestly about 30 degrees hotter than it would have been in Oakley, but that did not stop the kids from playing outside. Noah had SOOO much fun with his cousins! I'm so sad that they had to move! Ashton, Claire and Noah played so good together! Noah and Anslee currently have 0 cousins that live nearby! I'm a little sad about that. Anyway, despite the crazy heat, we still had a great time! The girls had a lot of "indoor" fun like shopping and getting pedicures, and the guys went golfing and biking. (BTW, Jaren is training for his very first triathalon in August!) We did our own fireworks show this year--we didn't quite make it anywhere to see the fireworks on the strip. Noah actually held a few sparklers, which pretty much shocked me. I made the mistake of holding Noah while he held one of his sparklers and he just about caught me on fire! All-in-all it was a fun trip and I have to say that if we had stayed in Oakley, I would've gotten no new clothes and no pedicure, so I was pretty happy with how it all turned out!

The whole family (minus Jaren, Anslee, and Oliver)



Even though they loved the fireworks, some of them got a little loud, so they went inside to watch through the window!

Noah holding a sparkler for the first time!

Playing head, shoulders, knees and toes with Ashton and Claire

How cute are they???

Anslee and Claire having a snack at the splash park
Just hangin' out!!
One of the casinos had a "live" mermaid swimming with fish in this huge aquarium. It was actually pretty cool! She did a great job of interacting with the kids there.

I couldn't resist getting a shot of them in the tub together (and I couldn't resist posting it either)!