On our way....

We are officially on our way to Carpinteria! I will update the blog tomorrow evening after we get settled and I have pictures. Have a great Monday!

Celine in Vegas!

For my sister's birthday, we went to Las Vegas to see Celine Dion in concert! It was so much fun. We saw her in concert almost five years ago. She didn't disappoint then and she really didn't disappoint this time! I picked up my sister at the airport the morning of her birthday and we had breakfast at Einstein's. I love that place. We then had a fun time window shopping and even went and saw a movie. It was such a relaxing day. We finally got over to the Flamingo to check in. What an awful place to stay! We couldn't find a place to park in the parking garage! I had driven the truck since my jeep was having some problems and that thing was such a pain to park the whole weekend! We asked for a strip view and he told us it would be a little bit of a walk, but we didn't mind. Well, it was quite a walk! And, it was a pool view, but oh well. The hallways were so dirty and the carpet was wrinkled. Our room was dirty too. The carpet actually smelled like someone had vomited on it in the corner. One of the drawers in the dresser was permanently wedged open the whole time we stayed there. The shower only worked when it wanted to. One of our room keys didn't work, and every time we went down to the lobby to get it fixed, there was at least a line of 20 people. Such a terrible place to stay. I would never stay there again! It was very convenient because Celine sang at Caesar's across the street so we didn't have to drive.That evening we got ready and headed over to the show and we were so excited. Everyone in line was!

The show was amazing! Her voice is so awesome. We waited for the audience to leave after so that we could get our picture in front of the stage. We walked down to the floor in front of the last row of the orchestra seating and asked a french lady to take our picture. All of a sudden, there was a security guard in front of us and then behind him was Celine's husband with some family, I assume. The lady taking our picture was stunned and therefore, the picture was pretty bad..lol. I told my sister that he comes to her show every night, but we didn't expect to see him. How funny?!
We headed over to Cheesecake Factory to eat dinner and my sister got some birthday Cheesecake. It was so good! I love all of the food in Vegas!
The next day, we got up and walked around the strip. We got our picture taken with some showgirls from the show at the Flamingo.

There are tons of performers all up and down the strip. People dressed up like transformers, Freddy from Nightmare on Elm Street, mimes and some classical musicians. Crazy! They all worked for tips. Must be a good way to make money because there were alot of them!
We went and had lunch at a yummy place called Cafe Rio. Very good mexican food. I guess they have them in AZ and Utah, so Cathy had eaten there before. We just walked around and window shopped some more until we had to pick Harrison up at the airport after spending a week with some family back east. After picking him up, we went to the Bellagio to walk around and found an arcade..

Then we headed off to the best buffet in Vegas, the Bellagio Buffet!
Stuffed and hardly able to move, I drove them around the Fremont Street area to show them the old Vegas signs and of course, a trip to Vegas isn't complete until you drive by Wayne Newton's house...

The next day, we were trying to find things to do with Harrison, so we came across this gem! It is the Pinball Hall of Fame Museum. There were pinball machines from the 20'- today! This place is ran by people who care and collect these games. Anyone can play them! The were cheap too. Only a quarter a game. Harrison found the original Tron game and sat there almost the whole time. There was all kinds of old school games. We played Pac Man, Donkey Kong, Super Mario Bros and Centipede. They even had popcorn and sodas! This place was awesome!! The best place to put your quarter into in Vegas!! Here is their website: http://www.pinballmuseum.org/

Here is Harrison playing a really old, old game with what looks like an exercise bike..

What a fun trip we had. We hung out by the pool. We ate too much. We saw Celine. We came, we saw, we conquered!!



Have a blessed week!

Deep in the Heart of Texas Part 2

So sorry it has taken me so long to finish this post! We have been sick and out of town.

Day two in San Antonio, we went to the town of Gruene (pronounced Green) and what a quaint little town. Lots of cute shops and restaurants and one of the oldest performance halls around! We had alot of fun going from shop to shop and I especially enjoyed the coffee shop!

After getting my espresso, so good..We hopped over to this cute little cupcake shop. I loved it!! As you can see by the pictures. YUMMMMMM!!

Say hello to pumpkin spice, red velvet and vanilla bean....



Must say that the red velvet was probably my favorite. They added mini chocolate chips to it. YUMM-O! The vanilla was so fresh and just amazing...I cannot even describe how good of a vanilla it really was. Pure. The pumpkin spice, moist and delicious. Hard to pick just one, so I sampled them all! They were so cute.

Only open until they ran out of cupcakes. Love it.

Then we did some more shopping, to burn off those cupcakes, and I came across a rock that looked like the state of Texas!

Sorry it is sideways, but you get the idea...



The Gristmill Restaurant on the river and in an old cotton gin.









We loved Gruene! Cute shops, good food and a fun time! So we drove back to San Antonio to rest up and get ready for another fun filled day. Except, yep, it decided it was going to rain! Yea, I hadn't planned for that. So we drove back through Gruene to the outlet malls to shop around. Then, we just drove around looking at the different towns. Really cute places. I really didn't take any photos that day, because it was rainy. We asked different people we knew where we should eat while in San An and my sister in law Crystal told us that if we wanted something different and crazy, to try this place called the Magic Time Machine. Then she told me to make sure that I asked where the bathroom was while I was there..huumm. Well, we were all game and gave it a try. It was super eclectic. Kind of like Red Robin meets T.G.I.Friday's meets Chili's meets Bucca di Beppos, well you get the idea..CRAZY! Our waiter was dressed up, and I think he really believed that he was, Captain Jack Sparrow. He was alittle too flirty. He asked us lots of funny things that I will not post here and I am not sure why he asked why the rum is always gone, when I do believe he might have been into his "cups" before work. He gave us (temp) skull and cross bone tattoos and took our order. We were warned that the food was so-so, so we knew were were there for the flavor of the restaurant and not the food. We were beginning to think that this was just a place for families, yes I think it was. He wasn't our only waiter, we also had Ace Ventura, and this guys had to be the real one too...He was pretty funny. Anyway, after we orderd, Captain Jack took us to the salad car, yes I said car. I didn't take any pictures while I was there...so sorry!! It was a VW Bug with the salad bar in it. It was cute! Our food was pretty good, no complaints and I just waited to hear someone ask to use the bathroom to see what was up. It was clear that it was hard to find for a reason. One lady did at another table and Captain Jack shouted " OK, she has to use the bathroom, line up and here we go..." he took all the ladies and a guy to the bathroom muttering, "Hope we don't run out of toilet paper!" Thanks, Crystal, glad I saw that coming before asking!!

On the day we left, I took some pictures of the inside of the hotel. So cute.



Original elevators, the new ones were around the corner
  

So on our way out and about for the last, rainy, day in San Antonio, we ate at this restaurant near the airport that a local had recommended. Apparently there was a flood, I cannot remember when, but everything in that part of town was ruined but this one restaurant. You can defiantly tell while in there because it leans and I mean leans.We were really glad that we were referred this place because the food was wonderful! It was alittle hard to eat and look out the window, it really messed with you, but was a find! Even the drinking glasses leaned!

Here is their website, but it is under construction
http://www.boehlersbarandgrille.com/

Even with all the rain, the crazy waiters and cold beach, it was such a good time among sisters. I know that mom would have been proud of us coming together to remember her. I thought of her everytime I looked at jewelry, or anything shiny.We laughed about what mom would have said if she was with us on this trip. In a sense, she was. I am so happy that I got to have this time with the two most special sisters and friends that I have. Thank you mom.We will always think of you and miss you....



Deep in the heart of Texas Part 1

This month, my sisters and I took a trip to get together and remember our mom who died a year ago January 12th. We wanted to go somewhere new and different and mostly not cold! We thought about Florida, but the tickets were alittle higher than we could afford, so my sisters came up with San Antonio, TX. We thought it would be warm and the downtown area was full of touristy things to see and do. Here is where our adventure begins.
First of all, we wanted to travel during the date of moms death, but what we didn't think about is that the day we flew out of Sky Harbor, was the day after the Tositos Bowl. Even though our flight was for 9:45 a.m., there were still people in line around me reeking of alcohol! Some were talking about how they didn't get to bed until 2:30 that morning. Lots of interesting people! I will say that the people at Southwest Airlines did a bang up job of getting everyone where they were supposed to be regardless of the large crowd! They were prepared!
I got to the airport before Cathy and Ginger and was whisked through the baggage check in and up to the security area. I haven't flown since, well, I went to visit my friend Carie in Virginia, and that has been at least 10 or 11 years ago..maybe more, do you remember, Carie? Anyways, there was no taking off your shoes, no you can't bring your water bottle that you just purchased across and no patting down poor old ladies in their wheelchairs! As I stood in that line listening to the instructions from the intercom, I was going through them in my head. Take out your laptops if you have them, no video recorders...ect...everything in the bins, got it. Why did this scare me so much? I know that Joanna is reading this and just laughing at me since she is a seasoned world traveler and now with child! Thankfully I made it through, no problems. I paid attention to the rules..;)
I headed right for the nearest Starbucks after the security, thanks to hearing about my sister in law Marisue having to dump hers at the security only to find another Starbucks after the security! Got my fix and waited for my sisters to arrive. We got on a very packed plane, mostly full of Auburn fans, and headed to San Antonio.
Got to Texas. It is very VERY cold in Texas. Even thought the sun is out, and that was the only day it was out the whole four days, it was pretty chilly even for  me a mountain girl! This might sound kind of crazy but here is where our quest for true Texas accents got going. So far, the guy at the rental car lot was from Alabama, not really the accent we were looking for. The lady who showed us the car had no accent either, interesting..So we got into our cute little Dodge Caliber and headed to the hotel.

So we drove to our cute little hotel, which was right across from the Alamo, really cool! The Alamo to me was some huge thing, but it was much smaller than I thought it was going to be! Anyways, we checked into the hotel and then did some searching for a place to grab a bite.

We drove around the downtown area, which is nice and then, not so nice, but there was a really nice park in the middle of it. The Riverwalk had lots of restaurants to eat at, and so we drove around looking for somewhere new to try. We ended up at the Riverwalk Center Mall, parked and looked at the restaurants there. The River in the Riverwalk is usually really beautiful, but as our luck would have it, they drain it once a year to clean the bottom and they had just drained it the week before we got there. The had started to refill it, but it still needed some more water to look like the pictures we saw on the website. We had some wings and then grabbed another coffee..yes...I am on vacation, those calories do not count! We didn't want to just head back to the hotel, so we headed back on the freeway to the Alamo Quarry shopping center near the airport.

The County Courthouse

So the Alamo Quarry shopping center was awesome. The had a Charming Charlies, and if anyone who loves bling as much as I do, you NEED to find one near you NOW! Cathy had taken me there at the San Tan Mall and I was in love. All of the tables of bling, purses, shoe and hair accessories is all by color! It is amazing! We shopped around at Old Navy, CC, and a shoe store and decided to head back to the hotel to figure out what to do that night. It was pretty cold, but I came prepared with a scarf and coat, thinking, I won't need this, but I will take it just in case..




Alamo Quarry

We got back to the hotel to decide what we were going to do that evening. Lots of things were closed since it was not really tourist season. They have a Sea World and a Six Flags, but hey were both closed until Spring. It seemed we would be doing a lot of shopping! We had asked a local at the wing place where a good local place to eat was, and she told us about this cool mexican restaurant called Mi Tierra downtown. Oh, I forgot to add, she didn't really have that Texan accent we were looking for! :( So when we got hungry, we headed to the place she recommended. It was awesome. It always pays to ask the locals where to eat! It had a mexican bakery, streamers on every part of the ceiling and yes, they never close!This place was like a mexican Bucca di Beppos! We had such good food and good entertainment. They have mariachis that came and sang us an awesome song!

So when we got back to the hotel, I got on facebook and asked for some ideas on where to eat and things to do in San Antonio. Crystal told me about a place that has the "best taco" in town. Food Network had even named it that! So we slept and got up early, thanks to my super peppy sister Cathy, and headed there for breakfast on our way to Corpus Christi to see the Texas coast. Props to Crystal! Those tacos were pretty amazing. I was so afraid that I would have a lot of Tex-Mex and so far we didn't! True mexican food..that made me so happy! So having our fill of delicious tacos, we took the 3 hour drive to the coast. Wow. Texas has really no mountains. It made me miss them so much! Lots and lots of flat, brown land. So Ginger and I passed the time by telling redneck and Chuck Norris jokes thanks to Chacha, while Cathy read and slept in the back.
Made it to Corpus Christi, wow. Not the prettiest town. Finally made it to the coast. The cold, COLD COLD coast! Not like the California coasts that I am used to. It was super overcast that day, and it was just blah.

After stopping to take some picture of the coast. We continued on to Rockport, which we were told was a nicer coastal town. We were hungry again, of course,so we headed that way to find some seafood. Let me just tell you, it was so dead everywhere we went! We definitely visited Texas at the wrong time of year! We drove through smaller towns to get to Rockport and came across alot of little islands that had huge beautiful homes on them. Mostly for summer I am sure. It reminded me of the Florida Keys. We didn't see much in the way of eating, so we stopped at a gas station for a better map and asked where we could get some good seafood. The lady just told us of this little cafe/bar around the corner, which we didn't really want to try, so we saw a billboard for a seafood place and called the number to see if they were opened. A lady answered and said "Hello", I was thrown off and told her I had the wrong number and she said no, but that they were closed until Spring. Big surprise. So we headed back to this little town Fulton and ate at a little place called Hammerheads. It was ok. The waitress did have a little of an accent which we were happy to hear! She is from a small town called Flatonia. She told us about this tour of churches that they do there and that her Grannie has a restaurant there. So, we ate our lunch and then took the long way North to Flatonia to sight see. Yet again, another flat, brown road, but the little towns were really cute. Lots and lots of cattle....EVERYWHERE!We stopped at one of the famous churches outside of Flatonia. It was really beautiful. Too bad it was so late and we couldn't get in to see it.

We laughed at the name of this restaurant!

Belt Sander Racing? Sorry I missed that!