Canada Highlights, Eh?

Our trip to Canada, continued...

I won't bore you with a play by play of the rest of the trip, so I will just bore you with the highlights.


Highlight #1: Awesome hotel room and awesome girls who slept well. (ok, they were up before the sun, but at least they slept through the night.) We had Gwen do her bedtime routine in Grandma and Grandpa's room, so all she had to do was sneak into our room quietly and climb into bed so she wouldn't wake an already sleeping Fiona. They were so good.






Highlight #2: Fun pool. Gwen insisted that we swim (ok, it was really just Gwen, Grandma, and Rick) right away. It was freezing, but they had fun

Highlight #3: The movie theater at the resort. Gwen ate popcorn and watched Bolt.

Highlight #4: Playing games in Bob and Cathy's hotel room at night. We had our video monitor on the girls while they slept, but I still checked on them a ton. It felt weird to leave them in their alone. During the games I also learned that a furlong is a unit of measurement and not an animal. Who knew?

Highlight #5: Eating breakfast with our cute girls in the hotel room.

Highlight #6 (according to Gwen): Riding the shuttle bus from the church parking lot to the temple.

Highlight #7: Not having to wait in line quite as thought as we thought we would. But man was it COLD!

Highlight #8 (The highlight of all highlights): Taking my girls to see the temple. I have to admit, it was very crowded, a little chaotic, and really hot because we were all bundled up from the wait outside. Next time we might try to go on a weekday rather than battle the crowds on the weekend. Totally worth it, though.

Highlight #9: Snacking on delicious cookies after the tour.

The final highlight was when Fiona had a MAJOR blowout while waiting in line to get back in the US. We weren't about to pull over and lose our spot, so we got to change her while in the car. It was tricky. And messy. Gross.

What an awesome trip- our first successful overnighter since Fiona's been born. I'm ready for another trip!

Getting there is half the fun

Like the majority of the Pacific Northwest LDS population, we took a roadtrip North to see the Vancouver Temple open house. We went with Rick's parents, Andy, Jessica and Charlie, and Kirk and Whitney too.

We left early in the afternoon on Friday with plans to go as far as Semiahmoo in Blaine, WA. Rick and I have never stayed at the resort there before, so we were excited to check it out.

On the way, we decided to stop and see what was left of the Tulip Festival. Not much. It was still fun.

After the tulips, we continued North and the girls were such angels in the car. At one point I turned around and saw this:

Isn't that pretty much the sweetest thing you've ever seen?

More to come soon...

Birch Bay Part Five: Go Carts and Trains

Gwen and her cousin Tanner share a love for trains- especially Thomas. There is a fun little place at Birch Bay that has go-carts, mini golf, and a Thomas the Train ride. Gwen and Tanner enjoyed a train ride together during our vacation.

The train takes you through an "enchanted" forest where there are lots of "fun" and "whimsical"
displays. This forest is anything but enchanted. It is downright creepy. Gwen doesn't seem to mind.

Minnie Mouse is hanging by her ears. Looks like she's enduring some type of torture if you ask me.

The train ride ends with a trip through a tunnel with a Christmas lights, a strobe light, and some lights that I've seen for sale at Ikea. The grand finale is a life size Yoda figure with his face falling off.

Gwen and Tanner survived the train ride and didn't at all appear to be permanently damaged emotionally

A few days later we went back to do a little go-carting with the Uncle Kent clan.

Rick opted to take photos while Gwen rode shotgun with me.
Kari rode solo while Max was Greg's copilot

This is Kent and Paxton, either right before or after they tried to run Gwen and me off the rode. Kent knows how to spice things up!

Gwen decided that she hadn't endured enough emotional abuse yet and wanted to ride the train again- this time with Max. Kari and I took them this time, and Madison and Kent are good sports and came too along with Al and Paxton.

Waiting to get on the train

Gwen with Jon and Jen's daughter, Madison. We love her.

Kent with Al and Paxton

Denise, Cheryl and Rick couldn't handle the train. They chose to wait for us and were instructed to go and get help if we weren't back in an hour.

Here is more of the train and the creepiness...

A mannequin, Christmas Pooh, and Abe Lincoln.

An advertisement to ride their Santa Train. I wouldn't be too sure this place is capable of capturing the Christmas spirit.

Although there is nothing that says Christmas quite like a polar bear waving at me while he does his business in an outhouse.

The figure staring at me from the window really freaks me out

Looks like the rest of the crew had fallen asleep while we were gone. I take comfort in knowing that they can sleep peacefully even while we our out risking our lives.