It’s Annie’s birthday!! Our baby girl is three today! She is an old lady. She was having fun on this trip, but didn’t really appreciate that it was her special day. Every time we wished her happy birthday, she said, “It’s NOT my birthday, it’s DAD’S birthday!!” She’ll realize one day what a cool birthday she was having.
We packed up last night (and by we, I mean me) so we could leave early today. I’m talking 4:30 am. We wanted to miss the lovely California traffic and this trick worked great. The kids were still tired, so they slept for a few more hours. It seemed to make the drive quicker.
On this trip, we were hooked up music-wise. I had my IPod and Joe had his IPhone. When his phone was plugged in, it would automatically go to the first song on his playlist. Anytime we switched it on, or a chapter ended (we listened to part of the book “The Lost Symbol” by Dan Brown), or anything, it would go to this song.
“The time is here!” We heard it so much, it became our little joke. Good times. And yes, that’s 5:54 am.
They slept until we got to Barstow and we woke them up to eat breakfast. We love this McDonald’s because it’s on some old train cars.
Joe even got the fancy breakfast, we were traveling in style folks!
This is what a father of six looks like.
Since we had some extra time, we stopped in Primm and walked around the outlets. They have some great stores there, and we found some cute shoes for me. Totally worth the stop! We got back on the road and made good time to Vegas. We surprised the kids by booking some rooms at the Luxor. We’ve never stayed there before and we wanted to try it out. Plus, it’s right next to Excalibur, which has a fun place for kids. This was the outside view from our room in the pyramid:
This was the view from our door, to the inside of the building:
Thankfully, they let us check in early, so we dropped off our stuff and headed to Excalibur. We stopped to eat at the Luxor buffet first, it was pretty good, but the kids mostly ate dessert. Hey, whatever works!
Fun Dungeon, here we come!!
Joe gave each of the kids some tokens and we played lots of fun games. Fruit Ninja! Jump rope game! Basketball! Guns! Fishing!
Whac-a-mole!
Dad gave them each enough to try their hand at fishing, and they all won a present for Annie. Four ducks and an orange, she was thrilled! Happy Birthday Annie!
We got back to our rooms and Daddy and Koko went to go get dinner. We ate McDonald’s for the second time today while we watched a movie “Parental Guidance”. It was a cute show, then it was time for bed. The girls had one room and the boys had another. Joe protested saying he should take one of the girls to make it even. The girls responded by saying, “Dad, you’ve driven so much and done so much for this trip, you’ve earned your own bed tonight!!”
Besides, the three of them fit just fine on one bed….see?
Sleep tight my darlings, we’re gonna wake you up early again tomorrow!
They slept until we got to Barstow and we woke them up to eat breakfast. We love this McDonald’s because it’s on some old train cars. 
Joe even got the fancy breakfast, we were traveling in style folks! 
Whac-a-mole! 
Dad gave them each enough to try their hand at fishing, and they all won a present for Annie. Four ducks and an orange, she was thrilled! Happy Birthday Annie!
We got back to our rooms and Daddy and Koko went to go get dinner. We ate McDonald’s for the second time today while we watched a movie “Parental Guidance”. It was a cute show, then it was time for bed. The girls had one room and the boys had another. Joe protested saying he should take one of the girls to make it even. The girls responded by saying, “Dad, you’ve driven so much and done so much for this trip, you’ve earned your own bed tonight!!” 
We drove over to Carlsbad again. It’s so pretty there. 
We went to the Outlets in Carlsbad. We saw some cute stuff and got a couple of things for the kids. 
We got back to our room and worked on our Easter eggs while we watched a movie. Some more swimming, more games, more playing, more food. 
