Oh, What a Week

...and the craziness has really only just begun.  As a quick recap: It started raining on Sunday, with only a couple of breaks between then and Friday morning.  With the severe burn in the mountains this summer, there are no plants left to either soak up rainwater or prevent erosion, so there was a pretty great risk of mudslides.  Therefore, homes that were deemed vulnerable were evacuated as of Wednesday morning.  That night, residents were allowed in with ID.  Whew.  Thursday, however, was a different story.  Levi and I were not allowed past the barricade, so we called Aaron, who was at home with A.J., and we all headed out.  I am lucky enough to have an awesome cousin that lives in Las Vegas who had already invited us to stay at her place if we needed it, so I took her up on it.  It was so great to have a relaxing weekend with lovely sunshine.

This week, Aaron is in Phoenix until Thursday afternoon.  I'm supposed to leave for Catalina Thursday morning.  He leaves for Phoenix again on Sunday before I get back and he'll return again on Friday.  Oh, my goodness it's going to be challenging.

However, I did take a few pictures of the fun.

Since Jake and Carrie were taking Lila to Disney on Ice Friday night, and our boys were absolutely not interested, we went to an aquarium instead.

Look at the size of that fish!

This aquarium is one of the most interestingly decorated I have seen.  It's in the Mandalay Bay casino/resort thing.  Because ALL entertainment, including movie theaters, in Las Vegas are in casinos.  Not my favorite place, but there's not much I can do about it.  Casino money buys nice looking stuff, though.

They had a really neat exhibit that made you feel like you were inside a shipwreck, and then one wing was a tube, so the sharks and rays could swim all around.  It was pretty fascinating.

This is a very impressive waterfall that we missed the first time we walked past because from the back, and upstairs, you can't even tell it's there.

And finally, one of my favorite photos of the trip.  The three little ones together.  A.J. and Levi and sweet little Lila.