Las Vegas Day 1 (August 8)

The day to head to Las Vegas to celebrate Becca's 21st birthday was finally here! We had been planning and waiting for it to come for so long! The night before we left, we started celebrating by going to supper at the Pizza Ranch. Magan had come on Friday for the limo ride and celebrations and was here for all the events and just stayed with us until Sunday when we were flying out.

The day of our flight (Sunday) Bernie, Becca and Magan toasted our trip with a beer. We are off and running!We met Dan and Mary Hughes along with Steph & Josh at the airport restaurant, where they had lunch. Becca, Magan and Bernie toasted our trip....again! Do I feel a pattern for our trip....Dan and Mary took a nice picture of us before we boarded our flight.We went upstairs through security and once again Bernie and Josh were singled out and had to have their hands tested for gunpowder. Memories of Florida trip where they were the only ones searched! Saw Nelda Eitreim up by the gates – she was traveling to San Francisco to a workshop. Climbed on the plane and enjoyed a great trip until we hit turbulence near Las Vegas. A few screams were heard and Becca and Magan got a little pale. But we landed and were all OK. Caught a shuttle from the airport to our hotel, Imperial Palace, and stood in a long line that took about 45 minutes to get through. Found our rooms, moved in and relaxed a little. Then walked around the Imperial Palace and discovered the restaurants. Had a wonderful supper at Burger Palace. Decided to go walk the strip, but it was raining out!! All the Las Vegas residents were happy, but we were not! Waited out the rain by touring the shops in our hotel. Bought Becca a new friend, Chubby. Rain stopped, so we headed out to the strip to look around. Stopped at a little area that later would have bands playing. Enjoyed watching the gondola's at the Venetian.Stopped at Walgreens and had an awful, embarrassing incident. Saw some large plastic yard glasses with straws. Went to look at them, touched one, and they all tumbled down! We were so embarrassed. Could hear the crowd laughing and telling us to “just walk away”. “Clean up on aisle 4 and 5” was echoing around the store! We helped clean up, grabbed bottles of water and Josh and I got an icee and we were gone. This is what the bottles looked like the next day. I didn't get any pictures of the incident and my family could not believe it. But I was helping put them back up!All up and down the strip they are handing out cards like this. Steph & Josh had bought one home for Bernie when they were there - Tiffany. Bernie told everyone he was going to Vegas to find Tiffany. So we started collecting cards for Bernie. We got quite a few! Walked back to our hotel and relaxed in the room, talking over our day and making plans for our week. Then off to sleep. It is 9PM Vegas time, but 11PM Sioux Falls time and we are exhausted. Night, night!

It is an Ideker tradition to tell me each day what their favorite part of the day is. Then it becomes part of our scrapbook. Josh fell into the tradition very well and Magan wanted to take part, too. So each day I will post them.

Favs:

Bernie – Plane ride
Connie – Walking outside
Steph – Lunch at airport with family
Josh – Bottles falling down
Becca – Walgreens
Magan – Bottle falling down at Walgreens