AZ

In spite of my swearing off family vacations after last year's stint in a Mexican hospital, we decided to give it another try. This year we stayed a little closer to home and spent 5 days at a wonderful resort in Phoenix.

Shown here is LT, a seasoned traveler by now, on the bus at DIA with his Elmo "pack pack."
Our hotel/resort.

When we got to our room LT went right for the mini-bar. Amazingly, we manged to keep him from opening any of the overpriced candy or booze.

Our hotel was right next to South Mountain Park and we went for several short hikes in the mornings. We got a map from the concierge the first night and LT was determined to help pick out trails. He carried his cup of Life cereal with him almost all the time in the hotel room. By the second day of the trip he was calling our room, "Etti's wooom."

We took the Sit and Stroll with us . It's great for traveling but isn't exactly the ideal car seat for day to day use.

The little guy doesn't seem so little when carrying him in the backpack.

LT was, for some reason, determined to look for monkeys on our hikes. I assume he's pointing out some perceived evidence of monkeys to his mom here.

We always made sure to carry emergency juice and snacks with us on our outings.

We were pretty excited to take LT somewhere with a huge water park but he was most entertained playing with rocks. Everywhere we went, he found rocks to play with.

LT kept his normal routine of a little TV before nap time (sometimes mom didn't even make it though TV for her nap). Lucky for us, Clifford with LT's favorite character T-Bone, came on at the perfect time.

Getting ready to go swimming.

On our way to swim at the water park.

Relaxing after a hard swim in the wave pool.

One evening we drove up to the top of South Mountain and had a little picnic.

Another hike - this time mom carried the little guy on her back and the really little guy in her belly.

LT and Kari took me out for a special birthday dinner near ASU and LT apparently thought they had some pretty good water.


Raiding the mini-bar naked (except for socks) - watch out world, this kid knows how to party!

We went to breakfast a couple times at a very cute little farm. For some reason it reminded me a lot of some of the places we ate in Kenya on our honeymoon.


"Aunt Chilada's" was a nearby restaurant with a nice patio that we went to a few times.

LT played with rocks at the restaurant, of course, but also found some ducks to chase.

The walk home from "Aunt Chilada's."

Sometimes pants are just too restraining.

LT pointing out that he still qualifies as carry on luggage, though not for long because he turns two in a couple weeks.

The entire ride to the airport LT was asking for pizza. When we finally got checked and past security, we went looking for something to eat. When LT spotted the pizza place, he yelled out, "yay! pizza, yay!"


LT was a fantastic traveler thanks to a little portable DVD player (an early birthday present from his grandma) and a sticker book.