More Reeves, Please!: The journey is half the fun

The Reeves journey to the Stephens family summer vacation in St George Utah begins with a long trip through Las Vegas. Up at 4am I finished a load of laundry and zipped the last of the suitcases before waking the three boys for our early morning flight. ( This will begin the sequence of events that take a fairly simple trip across the country to a whole other level of insanity.)

Due to some bad math on my part I had our sleepy family at the airport about an hour later than I had planned. An error I didn't realize until we were about 20 minutes away. We pull up to curbside and are met with a freakishly long line and four and half southwest baggage guys who are moving at a snails pace. Daddy drops Hudson and I off at the back of the line while he and Ryker speed off to park the car. Hudson - barefoot and still in last years Jammie's - waits patiently in his car seat stroller as I try to handle his stroller and our two enormous suitcases that keep falling over as we inch forward in line. (Thanks man behind me hands free carrying only a man purse and a small rolling bag. I got this.) For a second I try to step out of line and scoot toward one of the men who might have the authority to take pity on me and skip us to the front of the check in line. No luck. He's not buying it. Defeated, I turn around to notice I'm feet away from Hudson who's crying big tears from fear I was leaving him there in that line alone. I pick him up and console him only to realize I now will be attempting to inch forward in line while pushing the stoller and 2 wobbly suitcases with Hudson on my hip. Not long after I see Daddy and Ryker through the glass doors inside the airport. Ryker is close to melt down and I don't blame him when I learn he was told to run through the parking garage while barefoot and rolling his own suitcase. We finally check our luggage and have a small glimmer of hope we may actually make our flight. Which is only possible since we are TSA approved and can skip through another freakishly long line security. This VIP global entry has paid for itself ten fold. (Shhh don't tell anyone. It's nice being a group of elite who knows about this trick). We rush to B4 - kids still shoeless, clad in mismatched pjs and Justin looking similarly rough (I later learn my tag is hanging out my new outfit). Plane is still there but in true Southwest fashion there are only middle seats left on a full open seating flight and we must negotiate for two seats together. At no help from the miserable flight attendants. Sweating and flustered we finally sit and prepare ourselves for a three and half hour flight to sin city. Since it's only 730am, I ask for Bloody Mary please. "We are out of vodka". Alrighty then.

Three and a half hours later we land in Vegas, change kids out of jammies, unload the plane and head to baggage.

Waiting (what looks like patiently) for our bags to arrive.

More waiting at the rental car place. Bellies full of orange fanta, fruit chews and reeces pieces.

Finally - we are free to pile in our Altima! It's a beautiful sunny day and a scorching 100 degrees in Vegas. We take a drive on sunset strip and decide to go have a little fun. Daddy and Ryker find an arcade and we spend the rest of the afternoon doing what most of Vegas is doing - dropping coins in slots!

The claw! Daddy warns Ryker this game is really hard and no one ever wins. To which Ryker responds that Uncle Todd won him a turtle. And now it's game on. Thankfully Dad had today but what most who come to Vegas hope to have. A steady hand and a lot of luck. Down drops the claw and out drops the minion. And one very happy child. Ryker hasn't put his new sleeping buddy down ever since.

Another favorite was the race car and motorcycle games. They were both pretty good!