Family Fun

About a month ago, Brady read online that Who Wants to Be a Millionaire would be auditioning in Vegas on the 29th. Since he loves trivia and it's always been his dream to be on a game show, he switched his day off with a co-worker and yesterday morning we headed into Vegas for the auditions. Emerson and I had planned on just roaming around while we waited for him to take the test but all the workers there with the show kept giving me stuff to test with and told me to take it anyway. I tried to use Emerson as an excuse, but they wouldn't have it. They were all playing with him and having fun so we got ushered into the ballroom along with everyone else. The test itself was only 10 minutes long and you had to answer 30 Multiple Choice questions. It wouldn't have been so bad except this crazy old lady in front of us kept turning around and glaring at us and then during the test she'd whirl around yell at Emerson "SHHH!" "Go to the back of the room!" Which would have been understandable if he had been talking, or crying, or singing, or banging on the table, or making noise...but he wasn't!!! He was being amazingly quiet and well behaved. The test proctors were in the back of the room laughing and joking, half of the old farts taking the test were coughing and hacking like they were about to lose a lung, but my sweet baby boy hardly made a sound! At one point she turned around were her pencil held like she was going to stab us...I seriously thought she might so I asked a proctor if we should leave and she just laughed and said no, stay put. So I did...for about 2 more minutes but then the crazy lady started shaking and glaring again, so I marked random answers as fast as i could just to finish and headed to the back of the room. lol

After the test, I apologized profusely to the lady next to me and she said "Seriously? He's the best baby ever. My kids would never sit that still. That lady's crazy." Everyone else thought so too cus they were all talking about the crazy lady yelling at the cute baby. :)

Long story short, we didn't pass but it was definitely an unforgettable experience. I didn't get any pictures of this part of the day, but we both got free Millionaire t-shirts, pencils, and magnets.

Afterward, we grabbed some breakfast and decided to head over to the Bellagio to check out the botanical gardens since we were so close.

There were dozens of hand-blown glass hot air balloons floating above us

the Aviary House

He was fascinated by the birdies

walking under the water tunnel with daddy

They had this cute little carousel on display that Emerson really liked so we decided to take him to the Mall just down the rode to ride a real carousel!

He was kind of unsure at first, but once it got going he loved it.

After the carousel we headed over to the Lied Children's Discovery Museum.

There was so much to look at and do, Emerson didn't know where to start.

He really loves tents...it took forever to get him to leave this and look at something else.

growing so fast! 32" tall!

You can't see it real well but he's inside a giant bubble :)

planting trees with daddy

roasting marshmallows with mommy

every few hours they do special activities for the kids. This was a science show where they made ice cream :)

This may have been Emerson's favorite part of the day...little guy has such a sweet tooth.

making music

We got in the car to drive home...it was raining and 119 degrees outside. I'm starting to miss Idaho lol.

We had so much fun today. Best part was that our sweet little guy was so worn out he took a good long nap when we got home, which meant we got a good nap too :)

Daddy's Birthday!

Brady had to work all day so Emerson and I stayed busy playing and decorating at home. Since Janika and Brady share a birthday, we all went to Red Robin and met Brady there for a big birthday dinner after he got off work.

 Once we got home we had cake & icream and presents.

Emerson and I made an oreo crusted cookies & cream / mint chocolate chip checkered ice cream cake for Brady - which was super yummy if I do say so myself.

I had put trick candles on Janika's cake...they didn't work! She ended up relighting them and blowing them out until they finally started working and re-lit on their own lol Didn't work out like it was supposed to, but it was still fun.

 Pistachio ice cream is Brady's favoriteand we can never find it so when I saw it at Albertsons, I bought it right away and ended up sticking it in a gift bag as one of his presents.

 this was as much for emerson and I as it was for him lol

 Emerson's favorite part of the night was all the balloons.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY BRADY & JANIKA! We Love You!!!

Ninja Basketball

Every Thursday, Brady goes down to the chapel to play basketball with some other guys from the stake. About 20 minutes after he left, I got a text from him..."I think I dislocated his shoulder".  Now, before he left, we had been jo3.k.ing about playing ninja basketball so I thought he was kidding.  He wasn't. I guess he went up for a lay-up and another guy tried to block him. He ended up slamming into the wall behind the backboard and when he stood up, he realized his shoulder wasn't where it should be and he couldn't really move it.

We ended up just icing it for the night since it was almost 10pm when he got home, and he wasn't in a lot of pain. On Friday morning, we went to Urgent Care and got some Xrays.

Here's his shoulder...can you tell what's wrong???

Here's a hint:

The yellow circle shows where the collar bone is separated from his scapula.
The blue lines are where two ligaments should be (he ripped them both) and the red triangle is the cartilage that holds the two bones together (which he snapped).

The doc said overall, it's the best of the 4 possible shoulder injuries to have because it doesn't require surgery. He said to give it about 6 weeks to heal enough to feel mostly normal but that Brady would always have a bump on his shoulder where the bone will stick up.

Great news overall, but in the meantime, he has very limited motion and can't pick up Emerson or tie his shoes or really do much of anything. I tease him that he did it on purpose to get out of diaper duty, but I know he feels terrible about it.

*UPDATE*
It's been almost a month and he's doing MUCH better. His shoulder still gives him some trouble at night and he has trouble sleeping but during the day, he's got full use of his arm and shoulder and says it doesn't bother him at all, which is great :)

4th of July

This 4th of July was a blast! We had planned on eating at the town pancake breakfast but we ran out the door without the diaper bag which conveniently had both our wallets so...no donation to the Rotary Club = no pancake breakfast. With all the diners closed for the big celebration, we headed to McD's. Emerson LOVES pancakes. It's so cute to watch him eat them....one itty bitty bite at a time. Eventually he finishes the whole thing though.

After breakfast, we met up with my cousin, Hillary, to watch the parade. Emerson loved the loud music - he'd dance every time a car drove by with music playing. Here's some pics from the parade:

watching the parade

I don't think guy was even part of parade...he just kept showing up lol

awesome constitution bike

 taking pictures with Hillary

 The water section! woohoo!
About 90 seconds after this picture, some girl in a jeep came cruising down the road and a bunch of guys ran out to soak her with their water  guns, she ducked and punched the gas and hit some 16 year old kid. Needless to say, the  parade ended immediately and the kid was taken to the hospital.
Not the greatest parade, but definitely unforgettable!
Oh, and he was ok - just a few broken ribs.

 At the carnival, Emerson played the "find the gumballs in the whipped cream" game. Obviously, we didn't let him get the gum, but he had a blast licking up all the whipped cream and he even got a sucker and they took his picture for the paper! :)

 Did I mention it started pouring rain after the parade? Can't really tell in this picture, but we were wet!

 Sparklers!

 We did a 21 sparkler salute

Watching the Fireworks with Daddy.
He was running a bit of a fever, but we took him anyway - he clapped whenever the big ones would BOOM.

Overall, it was an awesome day. Wish our little guy felt better, but he still seemed to enjoy himself and we definitely had fun with him :) Hope you all had a wonderful 4th as well!