Jeff's Northfront Trip to Vegas!

A couple weeks after Disney, Jeff and I went to Vegas without the kids. Jeff took all of his staff for an appreciation trip with all play, no work! It was the most fun trip I've been on in a while!! His staff absolutely loved it, and it was a good combination of getting together as a group, separating into smaller groups, and just being together as a couple. I got to know a lot of people he works with a lot better, which was really nice. 

After Disney, I got pretty sick and tested positive for covid. I got the cold symptoms as well as fever, chills, and body aches. It felt like the flu, and after a few days I felt better. It's always so hard to be a mom and get sick with anything. Even though I wasn't technically supposed to go out of the house for a few days, life goes on and I still had to drive kids places and do all the things. Lets just say, I was very ready for a kidless vacation in Vegas! And thank goodness I tested negative in time for our flight. My parents were heroes and stayed at our house to watch the kids. Don and Cindy took them for a few hours in the daytime on the weekend, which was also a lot of help. 

We went for 3 nights and packed it in with lots of stuff, but also made sure we had time to relax! The first night we headed to Area 15 with about half of Jeff's staff, which I knew very little about, but the website for it looked really cool. The entrance was really neat with lots of art and neon. There were lots of things to do like axe throwing and laser tag, but we were all starving after the flight so we headed to the restaurant first. We ordered a big BBQ platter to share with our table, and also tried out the peanut butter and jelly wings, which were actually way more delicious than they sound. After the great meal, we decided to do the Omegamart, because that's what this place was famous for and it took up probably half of the building. They didn't tell us much of what it was about, but we knew we would go in and have to find our way through, and it was full of mystery. This turned out to be one of the biggest inside jokes that we would constantly make fun of afterwards! It was a fair bit of money to get in, so let's just say we expected a lot more. It was cool, but there was no mystery to solve, just different rooms to explore with different weird things in it. We enjoyed it for a while, and especially loved the strobe light room where it projects pictures of you doing different poses onto the wall. It wore us out too, and most of us were ready to go back to the hotel after that! 

We stayed in the Cosmopolitan, which is actually one of the highest rated hotels on the strip. Our room was absolutely beautiful, although a little scandalous, but it had a balcony and the nicest bath I've ever seen. 

Friday morning we took it very slow. We slept in (as much as our bodies would), ordered some room service and enjoyed our room! The bathtub was like a hot tub, it was so big. Then we headed to the pool and met up with Jordan and Andrew Rodych. It was so nice to just read and relax, and go for a dip when I wanted. Afterwards Jordan and I got our hair washed and styled at the Drybar, and I got a makeover at Sephora because I literally forgot to bring my makeup! Then we had a dinner at the Blue Ribbon with the whole company. It was delicious and fun to chat with everyone. Andrew thanked the partners and Jeff gave a small speech as well. Then we headed to the Ferris Wheel with the Lockings, Rodychs, and Nick and Kylie. They are all such fun couples and we had a great night together! They made walking the strip so much fun. The Ferris Wheel was beautiful, we stopped in at the Venetian, and grabbed snacks all along the way. I haven't laughed and had that much fun in a while!

On Saturday Jeff went to Top Golf while I got a massage at the spa. I found some quick breakfast food and then got a wonderful massage. Then I went shopping for a little while until Jeff got back. I bought some things at Guess, and then headed to find Target. I didn't realize the Target on the strip was not a real, full one, and it pretty much had nothing. I bought some personalized m&m's for the kids and was just about to choose the colors when the fire alarm went off. We literally all had to go out the fire exit. I didn't know how long it would be until they'd let us back in so I gave up on the m&m idea, which was a bit of a bummer. Especially because I had already paid for them. Jeff and I finally met up again and got ready for the night. We headed over to Resort World for some dinner and then the Katy Perry concert! We ate at a really delicious Italian restaurant and then went over to the theatre. We snapped some photos, bought some snacks, and waited for her to come out. She was quite late, but we'll forgive her because the concert was AMAZING! We all loved it so much and danced the night away. We took a limo ride back to our hotel and hit the sack pretty quick afterwards. 

On Sunday we squeezed in a breakfast buffet at the Wicked Spoon before leaving for the airport. It was an amazing buffet and Jeff and I had a great time. I didn't feel quite ready to go home yet, but we were so glad we were able to have so much fun! We were already talking about going again, not as a company, but with some of the couples there. I can't wait!!

Disneyworld with the kids!

 We decided to take the kids to Disneyworld (Florida) when the covid restrictions changed and didn't make kids quarantine for 2 weeks after leaving Canada. I didn't want to vacation and then come home and have them miss 2 weeks of school and be stuck at home, so once those lifted we booked the trip! The Lockings actually had a 3 week trip planned and invited us a long time ago. We kept saying no, and then finally decided to do it! The kids were SO excited and looked forward to it for weeks. They also didn't really know quite what to expect because they had never been, but they knew it was exciting. I also had them doing chores to earn money to spend at Disney and they were pretty motivated with that. 

We got pretty lucky to find a place to stay kind of last minute. We bought someone's DVC points and stayed at Old Key West for 1 week. It wasn't the same resort as the Lockings, but we figured we would meet up at parks and other times. The other obstacle we had been dealing with was whether or not to bring Boston. We knew it was going to be a lot of work and didn't know if it would be worth it if we brought him. When Don and Cindy said they would come with us, all the pieces fell into place! We got a suite so they could have a room. We had our own room, Boston slept in the laundry room, and Bentley and Deacon slept on the pull out couch. I was planning on having Leo on the floor in our room, but Don and Cindy had an extra bed and had no problem having Leo as a roommate. He loved it too!

The flight there went surprising well. Boston was a little tricky, but we managed to get him to fall asleep for an hour, and then he was pretty happy the rest of the time. The other kids were awesome. Once we arrived, you could feel the heat, and everyone was very excited! We took an Uber to our hotel, got settled in, and then ate at the restaurant there, Olivia's cafe. I got the kids matching Mickey and Minnie pajamas, which they loved. I also bought a few matching outfits for us, it was so much fun packing!

The first full day there was Sunday, and we made the call to allow the kids to swim. We don't do that very often, but this was an exception! We went over to the Animal Kingdom Lodge where the Lockings were staying and had breakfast at the restaurant there, Boma. It was an amazing buffet! Then we explored the resort and saw lots of animals. There were giraffes and lots of different animals that just walk around! It's really cool. We enjoyed watching them feed these really large birds. Afterwards, we hit the pool. The kids all had fun playing together and we had fun with Ryan and Angie, and Rebecca and Trevor. They also brought Rebecca's cousin, Olivia, to help with the kids. After swimming for a while, there was a thunderstorm on the way, so we had to leave the pool. We went to the arcade for a while and the kids had a blast! There was also a kid play room with games and coloring where we spent some time as well. Then we headed home for dinner and to get some rest before a big park day!

Animal Kingdom was one of the best days! We woke up bright and early (got to the park at 7am) for magic hours, and ended up staying there for 10 straight hours. The Avatar ride was Bentley's favorite and Mount Everest was daredevil Deacon's favorite. Leo loved the safari, but was terrified of the dinosaur ride (I had to cover his eyes for most of it!). Boston loved napping in his stroller and going on the navi ride. We also let them play a few carnival games and they won 3 stuffies! I couldn't believe it. They were so happy to have their first souvenir. We ate at the Tusker house to finish the day off and the kids loved meeting Mickey, Daisy, Donald, and Goofy. Leo's excitement was especially adorable. The food there was awesome too. We definitely wore them out, and Deacon fell asleep on his chair at the restaurant. It's so hard not to when there's just so much to see! The kids were thrilled with the day.

Tuesday was another early morning at Epcot. The kids were a lot more tired and Leo didn't seem quite himself. After being at the park for a while, we realized he was getting a high fever and Don and Cindy took him home early. He slept the rest of the day! He missed out on the T-rex restaurant that night, but I was happy he slept it off and then felt better. 

Epcot was a much shorter day, but we made sure we hit the Frozen, Nemo, and Soarin' rides. We also loved Figment and the activities in that building afterwards, along with the aquarium in the Nemo building. We ran into Rebecca and Trevor at the Frozen ride. We were just getting off, and they were about to go on, so the worker let us skip the line and ride with them again. That was so nice! After Don and Cindy left with the littles, we took Bentley and Deacon to get some crepes. It was so hot that day, and there wasn't a ton of shade at Epcot, so we were dying a little bit. We also saw Winnie the Pooh catching butterflies from across the pond and Deacon had a full conversation with him from afar. We headed home pretty quick afterwards because we had an early dinner reservation at the T-rex restaurant in Disney Springs.

Cindy was nice to volunteer to stay with sick Leo and Boston while the rest of us went. The restaurant was really neat and Deacon had me take a picture of him by every single dinosaur. We surprised them with the dry ice volcano dessert and they loved it so much! Afterwards we went to the Lego and Disney stores, where the kids spent some of their hard earned money. 

Wednesday was an adult only day at Hollywood Studios. Don and Cindy were awesome, and watched the kids all day while Jeff and I met up with the other couples. It felt like a group date all day and we had the best time! I always love the tower of terror, and we went on the new Rise of the Resistance ride which was really neat. We did other rides and shows, but I especially loved just walking along the boulevard, stopping to shop here and there, and grabbing ice cream when we wanted. Eating at the Italian restaurant, Mama Melrose, was also so good, and we even went into the Cantina for some drinks and appetizers which was neat. There was a big rain storm before that reservation, so instead of wrecking my birkenstocks, I took them off and ran barefoot. It was amazing how wet it gets so fast! We had a great day and were excited to get back to the kids. Jeff had bought a really good storm trooper costume that we were excited to give to Deacon to go with his light saber he bought the day before. He was obsessed with it!

On Thursday Jeff woke up a bit sick, so we took it slow, but eventually all made it to the water park - Typhoon Lagoon! Don and Cindy stayed home with Boston, which made it a lot easier. We met up with all the Lockings and it turned out to be such an awesome day. The kids played so well together in the big wave pool and shallow area and sand. It was the first time I just laid down to suntan! We loved the lazy river and rode around that thing multiple times. We also loved the slide with the rafts you go down on. We spent some time in the kid water area as well, and before we knew it the park was closing! The time just flew by. We grabbed some Heihei's, which is a really cute and delicious ice cream cone that looks like Heihei from Moana, and then we headed out. We made some frozen pizzas we had picked up earlier at home for the kids, and Jeff and I headed to Disney Springs to eat and shop that night on our own. We ended up eating at the Polite Pig and it was so good and fast because we were starving! Also, we took the boat ride from our resort to Disney Springs, which made it all the more fun. 

On Friday the whole gang headed to Magic Kingdom! I was looking forward to this day all week, because it's such a great park for the kids. We started the day off with the parade, which everyone just loved. Then we used our genie+ passes over and over all day and never really waited in a line. We rode Peter Pan, Winnie the Pooh, Little Mermaid, Buzz Lightyear, Pirates of the Caribbean, and the Seven Dwarves Mine Train, which was probably the biggest hit! 

Around 3pm we had a lunch/dinner reservation in the castle, called the Royal Table. Don and Cindy left with Boston at that point, and the rest of us continued on until late that night. When we entered the castle, we first met Cinderella. The kids got her autograph in their books, and then we took lots of pictures. The kids thought she was beautiful and really loved seeing her! Then we went inside to eat and the food was amazing. One of the favorite things for the kids was the dessert, where they got to decorate their own cupcake. There were also wishing stars for each of us, and at one point music came on and the fairy godmother announced that we should all make a wish. Once we were done, the kids got wands and swords on the way out to keep as a souvenir. We all loved the experience! It was also nice that we happened to be inside at the exact moment of a big rainfall outside. When we were done, it had stopped, so we definitely had the timing perfect on that one! The stepsisters were outside the castle, so we ran over to get in line to see them, and it was perfect. They were so funny, and the kids still rave about how fun it was to meet them!

After doing more rides, it looked like it was going to rain again, so we went into a building to relax for a while until it was time for the fireworks. We met up with the Lockings in the building and grabbed some food. When it was time for fireworks, we found some ponchos to purchase, and stood in our place to watch them. The rain had stopped, so we thought we got them for no reason, but not long into the firework show it started pouring and we all put them on. Leo was exhausted at this point and fell asleep on the ground for a little while! The fireworks were awesome, and then we went to the Afterparty we had purchased where they had lots of yummy desserts. We didn't stay too long, as we were all exhausted, and then went home and went straight to bed!

Saturday was the day we had to fly back home and we were all pretty sad about it! Some of the things I missed that we did were lots more shopping at the parks, swimming at our pool, and riding the bus around. We bought food at the little grocery store in our resort, and Cindy made breakfast for us some mornings. The kids had such a great time and I was really happy with the whole experience we gave them! I could tell Leo was a little overwhelmed, but he also loved the characters and the little rides so much, and it was so fun to see his excitement. On Saturday morning we had our last swim at the pool and it was glorious. We soaked in that last bit of sun and heat and it couldn't have been better! The kids loved the pool and it was so nice having one near our room that was almost always empty. It also had a park and sand to play in right there. 

The airport on the way home was a lot crazier, and our flight got delayed a couple of hours. We finally got on the plane and sat there for another hour, waiting for the storm to pass, apparently. We finally took off and the flight seemed like an eternity. It was super late so the kids slept a lot of the way, but Boston was having a lot of trouble getting comfortable and would wake up in half hour increments screaming until we settled him into a better position. Jeff and I just about died with sore butts and arms from holding still with sleeping kids on us. It was actually really painful! We finally arrived at midnight, 2am Florida time. After a delay in getting our luggage, we made it home eventually and went right to bed. 

I was so grateful we were able to do this Disney trip with the kids. Don and Cindy were such great help and we wouldn't have been able to do it without them. We made lots of memories that we will never forget and it was truly magical!!