Grand Canyon

I'm so behind on what I want to be blogging. We've had so much going on around here, but I still haven't even updated about the rest of our wedding week!

After spending the weekend in Las Vegas, we got up early Monday morning and rented a car to drive out to the Grand Canyon. We chose to visit the South Rim because from what I've read, that is the spot with some of the easiest trails to walk and still get awesome views. The drive out took only about 3 hours and was very scenic. I love the desert, and watching the sunrise over the mountains was beautiful.

We arrived at around 10:30 am and although we were tired, we went ahead and spent the day at the Grand Canyon. The day was beautiful but was so cold! It was windy and the high was around 40. Luckily, we came prepared and had Audrey in her warmest coat with lots of blankets around her little legs.

I'll let the pictures speak for themselves, but really, they do not come close to capturing the vastness of the Grand Canyon. It is huge. Beautiful. Peaceful. I kept snapping pictures and then looking at them with disappointment because they didn't look like what it looked like in person. I guess that's the nature of something this Grand!

 One thing I thought was cool was that they don't have fences and bars to keep you from falling off the side of the mountain. In some places they did, but for the most part, you can walk right up to the edge of a cliff and get as close as you want. We didn't get too close, but standing out on some of those ledges was exhilarating!

 After a while, Audrey got fussy and we got hungry, so we went to the hotel and ate and napped. We headed back to the South Rim a little before dusk so we could see it at sunset. Unfortunately it had gotten soooo cold that we didn't take Audrey out of the car, we just drove the trails and then got out individually when we wanted a closer look. It was so beautiful at dusk, and in the distance we could see the storm rolling in.

 We caught a very close view of some deer and elk while we were driving around.

 We planned on spending most of Tuesday at the canyon as well because there is soooo much to see, but we woke up to a small snow storm! Although it was only a few inches, the entrance to the park hadn't yet been plowed by the time we had to check out of our hotel, so we just packed up and headed home. I really wanted to see the snow covered canyon, but had to settle for snow covered desert. It was gorgeous!

I am very happy with our short visit to the Grand Canyon, but I know there is so much more to see there, so we'll definitely have to make it back again one day. Next time we'll go when the weather is warm so we don't freeze our butts off!

Las Vegas Trip

Our trip out to Las Vegas started early Friday morning. We caught the first flight out of Dulles (as we always do) so that Audrey would be nice and sleepy for the ride. And as usual, my attempts to get her to sleep on the plane worked! We woke her up at 4am and kept her awake through our short flight to Cincinnati, but once we were on the long flight to Vegas, she fell right asleep and stayed asleep until we were about an hour away. So far every time we've flown, this has worked for us....until the flight home. Audrey was awful! She was wired and refused to sleep and was kicking us, kicking the seats in front of us, climbing all over us, hollering, whining, pushing, etc. I thought that flight home would never end, but it did and we made it home safely.

Our first day in Vegas was easy (the whole trip was, really). We checked into our hotel - the MGM Grand - and unpacked a bit and then hit the strip to meet Maria and Josh's aunt Gloria to get a bite to eat. The restaurant had a mechanical bull that people were riding and as we were leaving, the hostess asked if Audrey would like to get on it. Haha, um YES she would (YESI would like that photo op..). We put her up there and she was pretty proud of herself! It was so cute.

After that, Josh and I hopped in a cab and went down to the old part of Las Vegas to get our marriage license. We met another couple getting their license that was also from Northern Virginia. Its a small world! When we got back to our hotel room, we had a very sweet surprise waiting for us. My family had ordered us a bottle of champagne, some chocolate covered strawberries, a bottle of milk, and cookies! It was a very nice treat and Josh and I enjoyed the champagne on our wedding night. The rest of the day was spent at the hotel gambling and resting. Josh's dad and uncle and their wives arrived at the hotel late that afternoon, and then my mom got in that night. Josh and Audrey retired to bed early (we were all sooo tired after being up at 4 am, plus the time change), and I stayed in the casino with Maria and mom having some drinks and winning (mostly losing) some money. Maria was the lucky lady of the trip - she won thousands! She even was kind enough to share some winnings with me, which I promptly lost. When it was all said and done, I think Josh and I both won enough to make it even and call it a day. I really want to like gambling, but I don't. I can't stand to lose money. I guess I'm just too cheap to be a gambler.

We got up Saturday morning and enjoyed breakfast at the hotel next door to ours, New York New York. After breakfast, we went back to our hotel and showered and got ready for our wedding. The pre-wedding jitters never actually hit us until we were in the hotel, and I think that was more excitement that jitters or nerves. I got really giggly...

You've already read about the wedding, so I'll just say it was perfect and Josh and I were on top of the world afterwards! We headed back to the hotel, had lunch, and then everyone parted ways. Mom and Audrey took a nap, Josh and I walked the strip with his dad and step mom, and I think Maria went and won a bunch of money again (she was doing this the whole time, just picture her with cash flowing out of her ears). Josh and I had tickets to see the Cirque du Soleil show, KA, that night. I had seen one other Cirque du Soleil show before this - Mystere. I was really disappointed in the show this time. I had been telling Josh for weeks how awesome the Cirque du Soleil shows are and then this one turned out to be nothing like the first one. He still said he liked it, but I was mostly just irritated I spent that much money on a show that I didn't even like. After the show we hit the casino for a bit and Josh actually won some money! I think he won about $150, and then we went and got some pizza with his dad and Debbie to celebrate.

Most everyone left Vegas on Sunday, so Josh, Audrey, mom and I went to the MGM's breakfast buffet that morning. It was amazing. I normally don't like buffets because they are expensive and I don't eat my money's worth, but this one was actually reasonably priced ($20/pp) and I did go back for seconds and thirds. Mom and Audrey and I walked around between hotels for a while to tire Audrey out, and then went back to our room to put her down for a nap. Maria joined us that afternoon and we walked the strip and headed down to the Bellagio to watch the fountain show. It was very neat!

We had wanted to see some more hotel attractions but we needed to get back to our hotel to get ready for another show that night.  To make up for the disappointing Cirque du Soleil show the night before, Josh suggested we go see another one, so we picked the sexy and sensual show, Zumanity. Our friends saw this show a couple years ago and raved about it, and this one did not disappoint! It was much more entertaining and fun than the other one, and it was a great way to end our weekend in Vegas. We were exhausted afterwards and went straight back to our room and fell asleep immediately!

We got up very early Monday morning so we could get our rental car and drive out to the Grand Canyon (again, early in the morning so Audrey would sleep in the car). The drive was beautiful, but the farther we got from Vegas, the colder it grew. We stopped about an hour away from the Grand Canyon to stretch our legs and the wind was bitter cold! I'll write more about our Grand Canyon visit in another post, as I'm realizing this one is quite long and probably boring to everyone except me. :)

Our Wedding

Happy One Week Anniversary to us!

Last Friday we traveled to beautiful Las Vegas, Nevada to get married. This wasn't really a surprise or a secret, but a lot of our friends did not know we were getting married this weekend. We had originally planned to have the wedding this coming summer, but as the wedding planning went along we both were feeling too stressed and were realizing how expensive weddings are and how it wasn't fitting what we wanted. When we were in Vegas a few years ago, we almost got married but decided not to because we wanted our mothers to be there. So as we went along in the planning over the past few months, we both kept coming back to the idea of going to Las Vegas. We decided to go ahead with it in January, so we had about a month and a half to plan.

Getting our marriage license

Pre-Wedding bar stop

The wedding ceremony was at the Little White Wedding Chapel at 11am on Saturday. We all got ready in our hotel rooms and then headed down to the casino for a quick drink (a shot of whiskey, of course) before the limo picked us up to escort us to the chapel. Our guests included my mom, Josh's mom, his aunt Gloria, his dad and stepmother, his uncle Israel and aunt Evelyn, and of course our sweet Audrey. My mom and Maria walked me down the aisle. Audrey was going to stand with us up front, but she decided to run around wild instead. Our minister was a black guy with dread locks...that was pretty cool! He was a very sweet man and we enjoyed chatting with him and his wife while we filled out paperwork before the ceremony. While we waited we even got to see a couple go through the drive through. We loved it! It was a very short ceremony - about 5 minutes long - and we were able to live stream it over the internet. We are so happy that our family and friends from all over the country were able to watch us get married! After the ceremony, the photographer took some pictures and while we waited for the disk, we all gathered around and took family photos. We got some good ones (aside from the super cheesy backdrop!). The limo picked us up and took us back to our hotel where we went out and had a celebratory lunch. After that we were all pretty exhausted so we took it easy for the rest of the afternoon.

The wedding planning was very easy and now that it is all done, I am so glad that we did it this way! I loved the fun and flirty dress I got to wear and the dangerously high heels. Josh looked so snazzy and handsome in his suit with a pinkish tie to match Audrey and me. The wedding was simple, unique, and definitely not traditional - it was perfectly US!

I will update again with more about our trip to Vegas and the Grand Canyon! We are having more pictures taken this coming weekend so stay tuned for those. xo

The Falcons

Tough Toddler

Even when Audrey was a very little infant, I knew she was tough. I could tell by her personality that she was going to be a tough cookie and a bit of an....explorer.

This has turned out to be true. When she was 6 months old, she had a 4 inch long bruise along the side of her face from when she tried to climb a bar stool in the living room and it fell over onto her. We should have been watching her. We baby proofed the house (or so we thought), and haven't had many issues since. Until this weekend. As I was getting out of the shower, I hear Josh in the living room scream, "Audrey No. Audrey! Audrey STOP!" and then I heard the crash. And then silence.

I came flying out of the bathroom to find blood everywhere and Josh screaming "her eye her eye!". I thought she had impaled herself, but quickly realized that she had only cut her eye. She climbed one of our end tables and although Josh was RIGHT THERE, he was not fast enough. The end table fell backwards, Audrey banged her head on the tile, and then the corner of the table hit her in the face. We live only minutes from the hospital so we rushed there. At first they suggested stitches, but in the time it took for everything to get discussed, the bleeding stopped and the swelling began to go down. The pediatrician took a closer look at it and decided that although it looks bad because of the swelling, it is not actually a deep cut and should heal just fine on its own. She prescribed an ointment that we've been putting on it every day, and it already looks a lot better. The cut itself isn't even that bad, but now she has an ugly huge black eye. It kind of looks like she's wearing makeup.

Later that day we had family over. Audrey was riding her car backwards and Cristina was pushing her when they hit a rock and Audrey flipped over the car and skidded face first across the pavement. That left her with a bruised and skinned cheek. So now she looks like she's wearing eye liner and blush.

THEN Later that night, Audrey was banging a toy and it bounced back into her face and she cut her forehead. Luckily that one wasn't very bad and only left a scratch.

The following day (Sunday) Audrey had three more accidents (all minor). She tripped over her horse and banged her head, slipped on a book and bit her tongue, and fell into a cabinet and bumped her head.

Yesterday (Monday) she closed the sliding glass door on her finger and got a blood blister under the skin. A few minutes later I found her ON TOP OF the dining room table.

I cannot take my eyes off her for a second. I can't decide if she's accident prone or fearless. Fearless sounds better.

Marcelo's 4th Birthday Party

Two weeks ago we traveled to California to celebrate our nephew Marcelo's 4th birthday. It was a quick trip, but we packed in lots of activities and came home exhausted!

Audrey did really well on the flights. Our flight out was delayed an hour which then made us miss our connecting flight in Salt Lake City. That was a bummer, but ended up being ok because the extra hour in the terminal gave Audrey time to wear herself out. She fell asleep a few minutes after take off and slept for two and a half hours. Unfortunately, the flight was 5 hours long so after her nap we still had a lot of entertaining to do. Maria and I gave her lots of new treats and snacks to eat, some new toys to play with, read books, and sent her across the aisle to sit with Josh for a bit. This was the hardest flight only because it was so long, but the rest were relatively painless. We are hoping to get one more vacation in before Audrey turns two so that we can still get by without buying her a seat. Yep, I'm still cheap.

On Friday, we took Marcelo and Audrey to Chuck E Cheese. Marcelo loves the place, but it was Audrey's first time. She loved it too! They had rides that were just her size and games too, although she is still too young to get the hang of them. She and Marcelo had a blast on this one car ride, they were jumping around like crazy monkeys.

First time licking the cake batter spoon!

Marcelo's party was at a gymnastics gym and OMG it was so much fun. I can't wait until Audrey is older so we can have her party at one! The kids were able to run free and wild and everything was padded and soft and safe. They had lots of fun in the foam pit! Even the adults....so much fun that I didn't remember to take any pictures actually

It was such a fun trip and so cool to see the cousins together. They adored each other. Hopefully we can all get together again before the kids are teenagers!