Mother's Day, Anniversary, Commencement

May tends to be a month full of celebrations for us, which makes it very fun!

Mike and I celebrated our anniversary with our first Las Vegas night out on the town. (Let's be honest: we were home by 9. But it was still fantastic to get out!

Mike sent me these beautiful tulips to celebrate 7 years of wedded bliss.

And dessert at Cafe Bellagio included this lovely creme brulee.

We celebrated Mother's Day with some friends from the library by going to the conservatory at the Bellagio and seeing the seasonal flowers there. Nora's favorite part was watching the fish in the koi pond.

Yesterday I went to UNLV's commencement. I was thinking about my own college graduation 10 years ago and the last commencement I went to, which was my graduation from library school 5 years ago. I love celebrating new graduates! They've worked so hard and have so many interesting things ahead of them. 

Commencement selfie

Since the semester wrapped up at UNLV, the semester also concluded at UNLV preschool. Nora is moving on to a new class!

This giant owl is in the lending library at the preschool, and every day when we leave Nora says hi. Friday she wanted to hug the owl.

Petting zoo

One of Nora's friends from preschool had a birthday party that included a petting zoo. It was awesome! Seeing these animals up close was a pretty big thrill for our little girl.

Easter 2014

First, a little throw-back to Easter last year:

Check out the cheeks on that little baby! We lived in Laramie and visited Idaho, so she wore a sweater dress for Easter.

This year, we had lots of Easter fun in Las Vegas.

Yes, you can see a jelly bean in her mouth.

We had a wonderful Easter brunch with friends from the library:

And we had a very fun Easter egg hunt with my cousin and her family:

Nora was absolutely thrilled with her Easter basket.

She stopped and clapped for herself every time she found an egg and put it in the basket.

We also colored some eggs.

And feasted on a Honey Bunny from Great Harvest Bread.

Swimming, partying

We went to a fun baby shower yesterday for one of Michael's co-workers. It was a pool party! Nora loved splashing in the little pool and eating fruit. (Later she got some meat from the grill -- yummy!)

Discovery Children's Museum

Last weekend we made our first visit to Discovery Children's Museum. Nora's favorite part by far was Water World, which features all kinds of neat water works and a mini replica of the Hoover Dam.

Nora got to wear an awesome rain coat

She got to experiment with floating balls in the water

Do some splashing

And it was great fun!

Later we went to the park:

Two Las Vegas Adventures

The first adventure I'll report on was very early in the month, when Garth and Sheri came to visit. Nora was so thrilled to see them -- when they arrived she started saying "Pompa!" for Grandpa and she hasn't stopped talking about Pompa ever since (every older man she sees, every author picture in her books, is Pompa). We had a great time going for stroller walks, visiting Ethel M. chocolate factory (it's within walking distance from our house), eating at our new favorite restaurant, Paymon's, and visiting the Shark Reef Aquarium at Mandalay Bay.

(Sidenote -- we thought Mandalay Bay was awesome and then it showed up on one of our TV shows this week, Modern Family!)

The second adventure was this weekend, when we visited Red Rock Canyon, a conservation area just outside the city. It was colder and windier than we expected, but absolutely beautiful. Nora was talking about the rocks (Ocka! is how she says rock) for at least half of our scenic drive.

Other daily adventures include wandering our neighborhood, going to the park, and doing some shopping. (Nora even says "shopping" now.)