Mickschl's May 09

Kathy's cousin Shawn and his family (wife Tammy and daughters Evelyn and Joey) were invited to a wedding in Las Vegas and they decided to make a family vacation out of it and start their trip with us in Arizona!

We started off by taking them to do a little shopping at Arizona Mills and the Superstition Ranch Market and then to lunch at Waldo's BBQ (best kept secret barbeque joint in Phoenix area)!

On Sunday Kathy took Evelyn to the Puppet Theater to see Animalopis and Chris took Shawn to do some golfing at the Duke golf course in Maricopa while Tammy was able to have some quiet time alone with Joey.

On Monday Chris took Tammy and the girls to the Phoenix Zoo. We had a great day and we got to see all kinds of interesting animals.

After the zoo we had specific instructions from Grandma Mickschl that we had to go to the Rustlers' Rooste restaurant in Tempe. It is a very unique western style restaurant with a large bull outside and a slide to get from the door to your table and a live band that plays country music that you can dance to all night.

On Tuesday we hit the road to Las Vegas! We took the long way there so that we could visit the Grand Canyon and have a nice picnic near the South Rim.

We then headed onward to our timeshare in Las Vegas with a slight detour onto Route 66.

Our timeshare was a very nice two bedroom unit on the first floor that was very close to the swimming pool.

Shawn and Tammy went to the wedding with the one and only Elvis Presley officiating!

While they were at the wedding, Kathy and Chris took Evelyn and Joey to Peter Piper Pizza to celebrate their 6th and 1st birthdays respectively because we were not going to be able to be in Kentucky to celebrate with them on the actual days of their birthdays (July 13 & July 16). We were able to get a birthday hat for the girls and we had one of the people working at Peter Piper Pizza announce that they had some very special guests here celebrating the birthdays with them over the intercom system! Evelyn was very proud!

Evelyn then thought that because we were not going to be able to be in Kentucky with her for her special day that it would be a very good idea for her to ride the rides and play the games with us as our gift to her (smart little girl).

Here are a couple of shots of the Mickschl's enjoying Las Vegas.

On the way back to Phoenix Evelyn had a revelation that not only were Kathy and Chris not going to be able to attend her and her sisters birthday party, they were not going to be able to attend Natalie Sarahs (her American Girl doll) birthday and that it would be a wonderful idea to have a party for her at their house when we returned! Kathy though that this was a good idea as well and was able to put together gifts from everybody along with decorations and for dessert we had ice cream with avocados (sounds a bit strange but give it a try, you'll like it).