WHAT A WEEKEND. I’m not sure how to fully explain how much this weekend meant to me without sounding unhinged and I’m also not sure I care? I am unhinged! Joey and I flew out to Vegas Thursday evening, had an amazing breakfast, walked all over The Strip, made our way to Allegiant Stadium to buy our Army Bombs, then had an early dinner (or a late lunch??) and got in line for the concert and HAD OUR MINDS BLOWN BY BTS! I have watched just so so so many performances on YouTube and it was so surreal to finally see it all in person. The performances were INSANE, just full spectacle and they hit every move and note like the born stars they all are. We had the very best time and man, it was just nice being amongst my people. We were all unhinged 😋

All Vegas fun aside, I missed our boy so much, so it was soooo nice to be back home with him. We hid Easter eggs for him and had his basket all loaded up and the smile on his face when he saw it all was the most special 🥰 Got to spend some time with both sides of the family and everyone spoiled Dempsey so good. He is very loved ❤

I wonder if Joey and I are the only people in the history of the world to fly into Vegas, immediately check into their hotel room and go to bed at a regular hour? We stayed at the Palms Place, off the strip, and the view was insane! It was a very nice stay 🙂

I told Joey I was going to sleep till noon — when you have a 1.5 year old, you do NOT sleep in — and then proceeded to wake up… 6 AM 😂 We took our time getting up and getting ready and maybe spent too long trying to find a breakfast spot before just heading to our usual, PublicUs. I don’t even know why we would ever not go there, considering how good the food and coffee are! That corned beef hash was insanely delicious.

We didn’t really have anything planned for the rest of the day, so we walked down Fremont, hopped a cab to The Strip, walked through the Bellagio — I can never believe those fresh flower displays they always have! Smelled so good! — chilled at a table outside and watched a hummingbird zoom about, visited the PTD sign at Mandalay Bay, let Joey get his 10 minute gambling fix and then eventually made our way over to Allegiant Stadium. We were going to check out the merch tent, but turns out that’s a whole thing and you have to get there EARLY. Fortunately, you could buy your BTS Official Light Stick (aka Army Bomb) at an express booth. Picture to come if you’ve never seen one, but it’s programmed to your seat number and it’ll automatically light up at the concert and make sort of a little light show out of the crowd. I was more excited than I expected to be to finally have one!

All cleaned up and ready for dinner and concert! If you can believe it, I did not have any restaurants picked out for this trip, but I came across Shang Artisan Noodle earlier when we were trying to find a breakfast spot and it had really good reviews and was close to where we were staying, so we were sold. You can put your name on the waitlist via Yelp, which was so nice and easy and we could see how many parties were ahead of us too! Got there and got sat right away. It was a lot smaller than I had expected and even though we thought it was going to be filled with ARMYs (that’s what you call a BTS fan :P), it seemed to be all locals. Everything was so good but the spicy wontons were our favorite! And it was so cool to watch them make the hand-pulled noodles. Highly recommend this place 😊

Over at Allegiant, it was time to get crazy in the best possible way! Doors opened at 4:30 and there were already so many people in line. We are nothing if not dedicated. Got to our seats at 5:15 for a 7:30 show and it was already bustling. They were playing BTS music videos (literally could not have been happier about it) and everyone was cheering so loud. I turned to Joey and said “and these are just music videos!!” It was fun people watching and checking out all the outfits. Everyone looked so good!!!! I was impressed.

I can’t think too much about the show or I’ll cry 😂 Joey got us such good seats! It was the same set list as the live show we streamed a month or so ago, which was really nice because I knew what was coming and what I wanted to grab a photo or video of and when I could just put down my phone and watch with my own two eyes. Again, just so surreal to see them in person. They really can dance and sing like that! Not that I ever doubted they could. Such professionals in every way and they looked like they were having fun too. I’m still in such awe of what we saw 💜💜💜

They shot off so much confetti at the end of the concert and everyone was crouching on the ground to pick it up. I love us! I grabbed a few pieces as they fell to bring home for Dempsey and he put them all in his mouth 😬😂 They took a few breaks for costume changes and those were the only times anyone sat down, so Joey’s back was a mess afterward 😂 We thought the ride share line was going to be a mess, so we walked back over the highway to The Strip, made a pizza pit stop at Eataly, then over to Bellagio to try and catch the water show hopefully playing “Dynamite” or “Butter” but it was just playing Cher. What can you do! Once everyone was decked out in their BTS gear, it was much easier to spot all the ARMYs and WHOA, THERE WERE A LOT OF US!

Had one last Vegas meal before heading to the airport and I think every meal I’ve eaten at the hotels on The Strip have been underwhelming, including this one. Our waiter was so all over the place and my food was definitely lukewarm. At least it was seasoned well. Back at home, Dempsey ran right over and grabbed my hand ❤ He had too much fun playing with Joey’s Army Bomb too! We ate leftovers, put him to bed and collapsed onto the couch to watch TV until bedtime.

Would you look at that little Easter egg hunter! He was so excited! We got him a little gardening set and I think he was very happy about his watering can.

Over at my parents’, there was an amazing breakfast spread (Mom killed it!), an entire wheelbarrow of goodies for Dempsey, including the cutest little Crocs you’ve ever seen, and then I remembered to take a family photo at the last minute!

Someone fell asleep in the car on the way home then didn’t want to go back to sleep once we got him in his crib. So that was kind of a mess, but we were only sort of late to Easter #2 with Joey’s family. Another amazing spread (Italian this time!) and Dempsey went ham over the Jello eggs 😂 Back at home, Dempsey finally got to see his gift from Grandma Lori… a sandbox! He loved it of course and did not want to come inside. We relaxed inside for a bit, then put him to bed and watched Top Chef and Better Call Saul.

I already have post-concert blues but I’m trying hard not to be too sad. I do have my sis’s birthday later this week to look forward to and a smiley toddler is the best medicine ❤ Before I end, I do just want to say that everyone I encountered this weekend, from the staff, to the other ARMYs were just the nicest. What a wonderful feeling. Also, I had so many people tell me they looked up BTS when they saw we were at the concert and I love that so much! Hope you all had a nice weekend!