Ready to Thaw Out!

Enough already of life in the freezer! We have had a "warm up" today and it's about 20 degrees. Still cold, but a 41 degree warm up from the previous night of -21!

Mitch and I are headed to Las Vegas tomorrow, and hopefully it will continue to be in the 60's there as it has been. That will feel like summer to us after what we have experienced this week!

Grandma and Grandpa Scott arrive tomorrow to be here with the kids while we are gone. We couldn't do this without them, we have no family here in town. It is a much-appreciated break from work stresses for us, and a great chance for the kids to have some extended time with their grandparents. Now that everyone is in school during the day, there is time for Grandma and Grandpa to have a break from kid duties, and it hopefully will be a smooth week for everyone.

We are heading to a large international convention affiliated with my job. It's always fun with big sessions with lots of pomp and circumstance. We'll stay at the Treasure Island Hotel.

Sunday night we have a welcome reception, Monday we have meetings and will be going to dinner at Emeril's steakhouse (Delmonico). On Tuesday, we'll attend the Opening Ceremonies of the convention, which are usually complete with indoor fireworks in some large arena type facility. Since it's Inauguration Day, they will broadcast that live for us, and then the keynote speaker is Lou Holtz. The trade show opens that day and is huge and takes several days to see.

There is a group of about a dozen people from this area on our flights and going to the meetings. We'll have a little fun with them on Tuesday night when we go with one couple to the "Elvis Chapel" to renew their wedding vows. They just celebrated their 20th anniversary and thought this would be a fun thing to do. The Elvis Chapel limo picks us up at the hotel at 7:30 pm, and the wedding ceremony is at 8 pm. If you are feeling very adventurous about 10 pm Central Time Tuesday night, you can see the ceremony live on the chapel's web cam, http://www.elvischapel.com/ and it should be a real hoot!

Wednesday night we have a dinner to attend and the musical entertainment is "The Beach Boys" ... the real ones! Should be fun! We'll continue with meetings and events, and return home Friday. I'm taking the laptop with me so I will probably post while we are gone.

Then we are back just in time to celebrate Abby's 6th birthday on the 24th! Drew returns from Europe on the 25th, and is having a great time. He called yesterday and it was so great to hear his voice.