Christmas in Sin City - what irony!

HELLO LAS VEGAS!! Merry Christmas!

We arrived to Sin City on 23 Dec evening and got settled down in our nice non-casino hotel, Desert Rose, which is just behind Hooters and opposite MGM, south of The Strip. It's less than 10 minutes walk to the start of The Strip but less glitzy than the huge casino hotels in the area. That's how we preferred it, to be near enough to the action but not to be in the middle of it :) PK was in the city a day earlier and had stayed at Aria so we picked her up after her show. The travelling troupe has now expanded to 4 persons! Yay!

Christmas in Vegas is quite an irony to me personally since Christmas to me is about Jesus Christ and his birth while Vegas is known as the City of Sin. So much for remembrance of redemption, gift and God's amazing grace ;) But once in a while, I think it's good to do things a little differently so I can be reminded of the reason I chose what I believed.

We celebrated Christmas Eve the Finnish way but making Finnish dinner - oven salmon, ham and smoked salmon. We opened a bottle of wine and (Jarmo) made our very own mulled wine, which was delicious! It wasn't a white Christmas but the winter cold was in the air, plus Christmas carol too and it felt good to be surrounded by friends who shared in this journey. A thanksgiving thought went above for the blessings that we had.

Vegas is pretty much crowded despite the family holiday. Many families are here to celebrate the holiday and there are many children tagging along their parents at casinos as well as on the street. Shops are still opened til' late night and obviously the show must go on. Christmas or not, Vegas is still Vegas :) Pretty exciting to be in this city to experience all the excitement at the gambling tables. We lost $20 to one of the hundreds gambling machines at Mandalay Bay but it's all for good fun. No point to be in Vegas if we didn't try our hands at making (losing) some money.

Also, what is Vegas if we didn't catch one of the strip tease shops in town :) There are many shows to choose from and we decided on the Peep Show since Holly Madison is famous from her Playboy days, plus I really wanna see her boobies :) It turned out to be a very entertaining performance, not so much for the boobs, but for overall showmanship. The vocals were strong and the lead male singer was quite a cutie ;) The comedy moments were timely and the supposedly audience person was an actual actor of the show. The dancing ladies were gorgeous and their acrobatic abilities were amazing to watch - my favourite was the poll dance! Their boobies seemed real, no boob job there I believe :)

We still have 1.5 day more in Vegas so let's see what other actions we'll have here. Trying to update the blog with more pictures but the travelling has taken a toll on us, trying to see as much, sorting pictures, doing laundry and keeping our sanity intact :) Fingers crossed!