Mom Life in the PNW

Traveling to Vegas With a Baby Part 1

Traveling to Vegas With a Baby Part 1

Vegas was interesting, to say the least

It’s like a whole other experience when you have to be a responsible adult. Hah.

The first day was pure chaos.

There’s so much extra crap you have to bring when you have kids.. like a car seat, stroller, diaper bag, toys, food, etc etc. I felt like I was moving across the country with how much stuff we shoveled into the airport by ourselves.

The flight there was fine. No turbulence and only one loud outburst from baby. I thought she would end up taking a nap during the 2-hour flight since she usually does around that time, but nope.

New environment, too much excitement… must stay awake mommy! She did end up falling asleep for the last 20 min we were in the air. Hey, I’ll take what I can get!

So we grab our million items once we get off the plane and go catch the shuttle bus to the car rental place and wait in a long line. My husband was stressing cause his friend was the first UFC fight of the day which started at 3 pm. We landed at 1 pm and got to the shuttle at 1:30 pm. We should have had plenty of time to grab the car and go. Nope. Apparently I scheduled the car pick up for the following day, so our car wasn’t even there. It took an hour back and forth to finally get a minivan, which added $10 to our bill. My husband wasn’t happy about having a minivan when we booked a small SUV, but we didn’t have time to mess around. We finally get going and it’s like a little after 2:30 and he still has to drop me and baby off at Harrah’s to check-in. Next time we’ll just plan for a pickup service from Limo Find

Needless to say, he didn’t end up making it there before 3 pm and actually missed his friend’s fight which got stopped due to injury. This was kind of the whole point of our trip, but we had no clue when he’d be fighting, otherwise, we could have scheduled better flight time for him to make it. It sucks, but what can ya do?

So I was alone with baby waiting to get the check-in email alert that my room was ready but nothing ever came. So I had to go stand in a line after all even though I attempted to avoid it by the email text check-in they sent the day of our arrival. Meh.

Once I got into the room though, it was great; nice and newly updated. Not the nicest room we’ve ever stayed in, but it was pretty decent!

harrahs las vegas

I basically just stayed in the room to nap with her and walked around the hotel a bit to get food.

Other than that it was a pretty boring first day…

Since this post is long enough, ill update with another.

Earn REAL FREE Las Vegas Rewards with myVEGAS Facebook App!

Earn REAL FREE Las Vegas Rewards with myVEGAS Facebook App!

I have stumbled upon a new addiction to my already current addictions, which have been freebies and Las Vegas. It’s a Facebook casino app game called myVEGAS where you can earn real rewards to shows, restaurants, or even hotel rooms just by playing slots, which are absolutely free!! Of course there are the pop-ups that prompt you to buy chips with your real money, but all you have to do is click the “x” to get it off the screen. It’s the only minor annoyance, but it’s the whole point of the game, to get the consumer to buy chips.

I have been playing the MyVegas app game on auto-spin since Sept 6th 2012 trying to accumulate as many loyalty points as I can for all of my Vegas trips, which So far, it’s been easy as long as I stick with it every day. Even if you’re at work or school, you can have it set on auto-spin on your android or apple device by using the photon browser(iphone) or puffin browser(android). These are the only 2 that have flash capabilities.

myvegas

As of today, I’ve accumulated:
  • 2 Nights in Mandalay Bay Great Room Suite – my post about Mandalay Bay
  • 2 Tickets to see Carrot Top in the front row. You can read a blurb about that on my personal blog.
  • 2 Lunch Buffet Passes in Bellagio
  • $100 dining credit at Nine Fine Irishmen at New York New York Hotel & Casino
  • $75 Beverage & Drink Credit for NY NY.
  • $50 Food & Beverage Credit at Monte Carlo. I plan on using this one at The Pub since it has a wide variety of beers and ciders.
  • 1 Night in the Tower Suite at Mirage
  • 2 Tickets to KA
  • 2 Breakfast Buffets at Mirage
  • 2 Unlimited 1-day pass on the Monorail
  • (2) $50 in Free Play at Monte Carlo
  • 3 Nights at Monte Carlo
  • 2 Shark Reef Passes at Mandalay Bay
  • 2 Nights in the deluxe room at Mirage (upgraded to the tower suite for an extra 2 nights for $200)
  • $75 Drink Credit at Bar at Times Square Dueling Pianos in New York New York
  • 2 Tickets to Secret Garden in Mirage
  • 2 Tickets to Zumanity

 

I have done an estimate of the cost of all the rewards above and it’s worth around $3000+ that I didn’t spend one penny on, just loyalty points from playing the MyVegas game on Facebook! Even though I have no plans to go back for a couple years since we’ll have a little one with us, I still play so I can save up my loyalty points for a future date. They’ve even added options that aren’t for Vegas, like airfare travel to certain cities and even a cruise!

The great thing about this game is that its not going anywhere for a very very long time and your loyalty points never expire. MGM and Play Studios assures this.

 

myvegas

 

 

If you’re interested in trying it and need friends to get more coins to gamble with, you can add me on my Frugal Jenn Facebook account, as well as ask to join a Facebook group dedicated to helping others with the myVEGAS app.

I recommend checking out this guide that one of the Facebook Group members put together. It will help you earn the most loyalty points in the most efficient way. Like betting 300-400 until you reach level 40, then upping it to 1,000 for the remaining levels.

Have any questions, don’t hesitate to ask. After all, I’m here to help you!

Update:

Rules of MyVegas are constantly changing. Currently you can only redeem for 3 rewards in a 30 day period. Meaning, you can’t go to Vegas multiple times in 30 days and request more than 3 rewards total.

However, there are stipulations to these rules such as MyVegas Partners. Rewards from Sugar Factory, House of Blues, Wolfgang Puck and the Las Vegas Monorail do not apply towards the three reward limit in a 30-day period. Just be sure to read over the reward terms of service before purchasing. You can, however, return a reward if you think you may not end up using it too.

MyVegas Redemption Review: Mirage Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas

MyVegas Redemption Review: Mirage Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas
I played MyVegas enough to snag this awesome Tower Suite Room in the Mirage Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas for 1 night. I can’t remember how many loyalty points it took, but it is no longer available for purchase and has been that way for 6 months or more. I doubt they have any plans on bringing it back since it was so easy to achieve, which makes them lose out on a crap ton of money since everyone was going for that free room reward.

Once you purchase a reward, you have 90 days to book it before it will expire, and yes, you will lose your reward along with your points you used to redeem it. So make sure you have a date planned and get it booked within 90 days. Now, that doesn’t mean the trip needs to be within 90 days. You can book it as far out as 6 months, maybe even more. Once you receive the email for your redemption process, call the number, give them your Mlife number and confirmation code number and they will get the room reserved as easy as that. They may ask you for a credit card. I’ve only had 2 do it to me, and the other never did. To me, I don’t see why they need it, when you’ll be giving it to the front desk check-in clerk at the time of arrival anyways. If you’re not okay with giving them your credit card number over the phone, just hang up and call again and you’ll get a different operator.

Now, I also had a 2-night room reward for the Deluxe King at Mirage through MyVegas. Our whole plan was to try and get the tower suite for all 3 nights that we would be there. It was close to our anniversary, but we never did any $20 or $50 trick to get an upgrade for free. The guy at check-in said excuse me, but I’ll have to go make a call behind closed doors. After about 5+ minutes, he comes back and says we can give you the room 2 extra nights for $100 per night. I figured it would be $50 extra per night, but my husband wanted the room, so he gave in and said yes, we’ll take it. Much to my surprise, the extra $200 was well worth it. This room is the nicest and biggest room I have ever stayed in period. It’s 1200 sq feet, which is bigger than most apartments and some houses!! I wished my downstairs area was as big as this place was.

It was really great to have a big area since we were there with some friends. We can’t very well mingle in a deluxe king room and drink booze before heading out to the strip comfortably. I didn’t take pics of the separate bathroom, but it had a bidet in it. And you bet your sweet ass I used it! I had never seen or used one before, so I had to give it a whirl.

The beds were comfortable, maybe a little too plush for my husband, but he likes his beds firm.

Having a separate powder area for us girls to get ready was nice. Although, we kind of blocked the bathroom, since it’s RIGHT THERE.

The bathtub was big enough for my husband and me to sit in it together. There’s never big enough tubs for us both to sit comfortably. I wanted to take it home with me!!

The couch was not at all comfortable. It’s not cushiony at all and was more like sitting on boards. I guess that wasn’t too much of a deal breaker because we weren’t there to sit on the couch. We mainly hung out by the wet bar and when we weren’t there, we were out on the strip.

The water pressure was also great. There’s one thing I’ve noticed about Las Vegas hotels, and that seems to be the weak water pressure in most hotels. Not so at the Mirage! I can actually get the soap off my body and out of my hair without staying in there for 30 minutes.

Overall, the MyVegas redemption was an easy process. And getting the tower suite for $200 all 3 nights came out to about $66.66 per night, which is one hell of a deal! This room normally goes for $400 per night. Now when I go back to Vegas, I am going to be comparing all of my future rooms to this one and I have a feeling it won’t even be in the same ballpark.

Thank you to MyVegas and Mirage for making our stay pleasant!