New Baby!

There's our new baby!  10 weeks along, and it looks like this one is going to stay.  The baby is the blob at the bottom of the kidney-bean shaped dark patch.  Lizzy and Rachel were really excited to see the picture of their new little brother or sister.  They both insist that it will be another girl, and Lizzy wants to name her Clara.  In fact, Lizzy has learned how to spell Clara, and she writes it on little bits of paper and leaves them all over the house.  Jason doesn't like the name, though, so he has "vetoed" it!  Meanwhile, because Lizzy and Rachel were both born at 36 weeks, which is considered pre-term (before 37 weeks), and because I'm 30 now, this baby has a high risk of being born dangerously pre-term.  So, I get the fun of having weekly progesterone injections, starting at week 16 until week 36.  I'm SO looking forward to it.  Anyway, I'm feeling the usual nausea that comes and goes all day, and fatigue, but it's not unlivable. 

Last weekend we took our first trip EVER without the kids (they stayed at Grandma's house) and we went to Las Vegas.  It was a really fun time, but also really crowded, since it was the Labor Day weekend.  We left Saturday morning, and arrived in the early afternoon.  We went grocery shopping for breakfast stuff, and then checked in to our hotel.  We were staying at the Marriott Grand Chateau, which is right next to the Planet Hollywood Casino.  That evening, we walked down to the Venetian and had dinner at Emeril's Delmonico Steakhouse.  It was fantastic!  The service was amazing - there were at least 4 different people waiting on us - someone to pull out my chair, and put my napkin on my lap, and someone to bring rolls, someone to fill the water, someone who took our orders, and other people who brought out the food... and the food was incredibly good.  We had lobster bisque, with the most tender and delicious bits of lobster I've ever had, and then Jason got Steak Oscar (filet mignon with crab, asparagus, and bernaise sauce), and I got the special, seared scallops with black truffle butter sauce, green beans, and wild mushrooms.  For dessert we split an orange mascarpone cheesecake slice.  On Sunday, we ate breakfast in our room, and then went up and sat by the rooftop pool and read books until lunchtime.  For lunch, we just went over to the Planet Hollywood casino, where there is a sandwich shop called "Earl of Sandwich" that is actually owned by the real 11th Earl of Sandwich!  They have incredibly delicious baked sandwiches.  Then we walked around the Planet Hollywood Miracle Mile shops for a while, and then went back and had... A NAP.... ah the indulgence of it all.  Then, our friends, Lane and Melinda, arrived (we had a two bedroom condo).  We went over to the Caesar's Palace Forum Shops with them and marveled at the extravagant prices of designer handbags and Tiffany diamond jewelry.  $25,000 for a 1.5 carat diamond solitaire!  For dinner, we headed back over to the Venetian and ate at our favorite Italian Restaurant, "Tratorria Reggiano."  Jason and Melinda had wood-fired pizza with pepperoni and fancy Italian olives.  I had tortellini alfredo - imagine it - tortellini stuffed with cheese in a cheese sauce, with MORE CHEESE sprinkled on top!!  Lane had linguine carbonara, which is linguine in a bacon and cheese sauce.  We all sampled each others', and they were all excellent.  We were too stuffed to have any dessert, so we headed back to the Planet Hollywood casino, where we went to see the show "V."  It's a variety show with lots of different (family friendly!) acts, such as juggling, acrobatics, comedians, etc.  It was really good.  On Monday, Jason and I went down to the hotel gym in the morning to work off all the heavy food!  Then we all went for lunch at Earl of Sandwich, and then Jason and I headed home.  We were really happy to see our girls, and they were happy to see us, although they had a fantastic time at Grandma's - she took them to the zoo, and the library, and wore them out good!