A Holiday full of lots of fun and surprises!

Now for the "mammoth" post as Anna from Borderline Bonkers would call it! It has been a long time since my last post. The reason is that we have been away on holidays. Then when we got back our Internet was down until just a few days ago. After that I was just too tired and it took me two days to actually get all the pictures down loaded to my blog. So now here it is.



We had a very interesting, frustrating, and most of all fun filled holiday. We left in the afternoon on Friday, August 22 and after a very long, tiring, and pain filled drive we arrived in Medicine Hat where we had booked a hotel. When I say long, tiring, and pain filled, it is because the whole way there Skip was pulling over so that I could throw up! (And "no", I am not pregnant again!) When we left I had mild cramps that I thought was because I was about to get my "women thing". But as we drove they just got worse and worse. We drove to Moose Jaw to drop off the dog at the kennel and afterwards we went to get some supper. All I could do was drink water! So we kept driving thinking things would get better but they just got worse. And to top all this off Duncan was running a fever because he was teething and so he would drift in and out of sleep but couldn't get comfortable because his mouth hurt. So like I said we arrived in Medicine Hat and got to our hotel room. By this time I felt so sick that I actually said to Skip, "I think I might need to go to the hospital."! Skip didn't know what to do and neither did I. Here we are in Medicine Hat with two small children (who are super tired) and a sick mommy who wanted to go to the hospital. So we decided to wait it out and I was finally able to fall asleep after some gravel. Each time I woke up I was feeling progressively better and by morning I was almost fully recovered. Whew! Thank God! Duncan seemed much better too and we continued on our journey.



We arrived in Calgary all in one piece and we drove to our friends Ed and Fran Browne's place where we would be staying for the first couple of days. They were so welcoming and it was good to get settled for a good nights sleep. We spent the first evening visiting with them. On Sunday we got up and went to our old church where Skip used to work. Everyone was so surprised and excited to see us and our new addition Duncan, whom they had only met inside my tummy! We enjoyed our visited there and afterwards we went for lunch with our good friends Caine and Grace and their little boy Gideon who is just a few months younger than Skyla. We enjoyed Vietnamese food and then made a trip to Market Mall to play on the play structure. The kids had a blast, even Duncan who climber his way in and out and over the equipment! (Sorry! No pictures we forgot our camera in the van.)



On Monday morning we got up and went on our way to Banff for a day of fun. Skip and I used to enjoy doing this before and after we had Skyla so it has become a tradition! We had a terrific day walking in Banff and enjoying the shops. Our favorites are the candy store, the chocolate store, and the Christmas store! Skyla had a ton of fun walking through the "Christmas Store" looking at all the pretty decorations! After a day of shopping we were off to set up our tent because we had decided to camp for one night. We found out that this may have been a big mistake or we might have not been enough prepared! Every thing was going great. We made hot dogs for supper. Then we got the kids into their pj's but we just couldn't get them to go to sleep. So we took a drive with them up to Banff Springs Hotel. They fell asleep and we transferred them to the tent. Now, we realized that the mattress we bought said it was Queen sized but really only was a double. Pretty squishy for a large man, one full grown women, a toddler that moves around a lot, and another sort of toddler. I even find mine and Skip's Queen size at home a little to small for the just the two of us. So anyway, Skip and I then had some fire side popcorn, a snuggle, and a talk outside the tent. The kids stayed sleeping. So about an hour and a half later we joined the kids in the tent. After about half an hour of trying to get to sleep but not being able to because of a rolling toddler and an ice cold butt and feet I was almost ready to give up and go to a hotel. Then I tried to rescue Duncan from being rolled on by Skyla. Skyla was not impressed with me trying to snuggle her down and she protested with wild little girl screams! So Skip had to take her out to the Van in the pouring rain with no shoes on his feet to prevent her from waking up the whole camp ground! Once in the van it took an amazingly long time to calm her down. She did not want to come back in the tent (in fact she wanted to go home) and I had to run out in the rain to bring them any spare blankets we had (which wasn't much). So to make a long story short the only person that really got much sleep was Duncan because mommy (bless her heart) wrapped him up in most of the remaining blankets. What a mother does for her child!

In the morning we got out of there as quick as we could, ditched our plan of a camp fire breakfast because of the non-stop rain and went into Banff for a muffin, coffee, and a relaxing dip in the Hot Springs to warm up our freezing cold and tired bodies. The kids had so much fun doing this and even forgot about how tired they were.

Then we headed back to Calgary to surprise our friends Jon and Lindsay at their house. Jon was tiling their kitchen floor and was very shocked and happy to see us. Lindsay was out running errands and returned to find us there. She was so happy, as well, to see us. We spent the afternoon hanging out with them before we headed to my sister and her husbands house to spend the night and visit with them for a few days.

Wednesday we went to visit with my friend Sherilyn and her little boy Mark and also got to seeing her bulging belly for she was due to have another baby on September 3 by c-section. We haven't heard anything yet though. Also, it was Skip's birthday that day and we celebrated by going out for supper with my sister and her husband and Jon and Lindsay. Then we had ice-cream cake back at the house.

On Thursday we made a trip to the Calgary Zoo! That was a load of fun. We didn't see everything but it was just enough for the kids and we saw all of Skyla's requests. We also made a stop at the ZooVenture play structure before heading back to my sisters. The kids zonked out in the Van and we stopped a M.E.C. so that Skip could get some guy stuff. I waited in the van while the kids slept.

Then on Friday we had a long day of shopping at my favorite mall in Calgary 'Chinook Mall'. We had a lot of fun but the kids started to get cranky so we headed to our next over night stay. Skip's friend Adam and his parents, the Clarke family. We had a nice little visit with them before headed home to Regina in the morning.

So all in all, we had a relaxing, rejuvenating family time in Calgary. Despite a few bumps in the road it was a much needed and wonderful time away from the life of the every day! Have fun enjoying a heap load of pictures. We took about two hundred and we even forgot the camera some days or were having to much fun to bother with a picture. So even after much deleting and picking and choosing I narrowed it down to these ones. Enjoy!

I have to make a comment on this one. Skyla wanted this popsicle and it was bigger than her head. So I thought she would eat maybe a quarter of it and I could it the rest but she gobbled down almost all of it and I was left with very little. "Thank you Skyla!" Take a look at a few pictures down to see the remains.

Duncan, who is not even fourteen months, climbed up the slide ladder without me even laying a finger on him. At the top he got his legs out in front of him and slid down all by himself. Daddy caught him at the bottom! Amazing!