Life around here seems to have been a bit chaotic in the past month! Since my trip to the Lower Mainland and the Sunshine Coast, the month of May flew by. How is it already June? I don’t even know. Anyway, we’ve been keeping ourselves pretty busy these days. With Kyle’s awesome Monday-Thursday work schedule, we’ve been packing our weekends with plans, and May was no exception.
Two weekends ago, Kyle had grand plans with the boys for a bachelor party. He’s one of the groomsmen in the wedding party (for the same wedding in which I’m a bridesmaid and Isla’s a flower girl), and the guys all went paintballing for the day, and then rented a townhouse at the local ski hill for the weekend. I’m not going to lie, I’m a little jealous that they went paintballing because I find it to be a lot of fun. Kyle even joked to the guys that I probably would have enjoyed the bachelor party more than I will enjoy the bachelorette party in July. (He may be right, we’ll see. That’s a whole different blog post, right there.)
Since Kyle wasn’t home, I hung out with my mom on Saturday. We hit up the Farmer’s Market, which wasn’t too exciting since it was just a lot of bedding plants; I much prefer the market further into the summer when there’s amazing fresh produce! I did get some ideas for a bridal shower gift, so that was a plus. We eventually grabbed some lunch and by the time we were done it was time for Isla to have a nap! When she woke up, we drove down to my mom’s for dinner and my grandpa ended up being in town as well, so he and his girlfriend joined us. After dinner, Isla and I went home, she went to bed, and I watched a movie On Demand – American Hustle! It was good, but maybe not as good as I thought it was going to be.
Saturday Farmer’s Market
This past weekend was a crazy whirlwind, to say the least. On Friday we loaded into the truck to head up to William’s Lake to visit Kyle’s sister and our new nephew! Really, it was a long overdue trip to begin with since we’ve been meaning to visit her since she bought a house two(?) years ago, but babies just seem to make everything happen! We left Kamloops around 10 a.m. and after a stop for lunch (which takes longer these days because Isla is a slow and distracted eater), we finally got there around 2 p.m.
Little Logan was born on May 15 and weighed 6lbs, 10oz, and he was 20.5″ long – such a tiny little string bean! Isla loved holding him, and even demanded to have him back on her lap when I picked him up to adjust his positioning. (“NOOO! I DO IT!!!”) Eventually I got him back – I think one of the cats caught Isla’s attention – and then I got peed on – Fun! Actually, it was payback I’m pretty sure, because Isla pooped on Kyle’s sister when she first met her.
We headed home around 5 p.m. and didn’t get home until 8:30. Isla managed to have a short nap on the way home, but being in the truck for 6 hours in one day was way too much for her and she was getting pretty cranky by the time we were home. After a quick bath and a story, it was bedtime, because we had another day of travelling on Saturday!
Our good friends welcomed their baby boy, Oliver, on Wednesday. Since we already had plans to go visit them on Saturday, we ended up meeting the baby as well! Luckily, this drive was only an hour long and Isla handled it much better. Plus, she got to play with her friends the whole time we were there, which she absolutely loved.
Let me tell you, all these babies have been making my uterus yearn in a bad, bad way. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again – trying for your second baby is a lot more frustrating and stressful than trying for your first. You have it in your head that you think you know all the signs and symptoms of early pregnancy, so you get anxious over every little cramp, queasy feeling, and desire for a nap. I know I just need to stop stressing out over it and remember that Baby #2 will happen eventually.
ANYWAYS – We got home Saturday around 3ish and worked on the yard a little bit (our lawn was a forest), and then ate dinner and turned in early for the night. Sunday was laid back with nothing but grocery shopping and relaxing at home – very muchly needed!
Of course, this week consists of mine and Kyle’s 3-year wedding anniversary on Wednesday, so I’m sure we’ll be doing something to celebrate on the weekend. Then next weekend is my grad reunion and Father’s Day, the weekend after that I have a bridal shower to attend, and the weekend after THAT is Isla’s 2nd birthday, and the start of Kyle’s holidays. WHAT THE HELL, LIFE? SLOOOOW DOWWWWNN!
How was your weekend? Do you tend to jam your summer full of plans on your days off?
Whew! I’m back from a seemingly whirlwind trip to Burnaby/Sechelt/Vancouver. My mom, Isla and I headed down to the coast Friday morning for a little weekend getaway, not only for some shopping, but also to bring a little closure. (More on that later)
We left around 9:30 Friday morning after rushing Isla through her breakfast and getting her motivated to sit in her carseat for 4 hours. She actually travels really well and just played with her Mangadoodle until she fell asleep after we were about half-way to Chilliwack. She woke up just in time for us to stop for lunch, so it worked out perfectly! After lunch, we continued on our way to Burnaby, where we were going to stay with my grandpa and his girlfriend. We got there around 2 p.m. and were able to unpack and relax for a little bit before we headed to Ikea!
I probably could have gotten into a lot of trouble in Ikea, but I had a mental list of things I wanted to get, including something for Isla’s birthday, a cake stand, and a little plant for the hallway. I managed to get those three things, plus a few extras: some wall art for the ensuite bathroom (pictured on the right –>), cutting boards, a clock, a pig stuffy for Isla, and some more cork hot pot holders. The bonus? I didn’t spend more than $100! Go me! After that we headed back to the house and got ready for dinner. As it turns out, my uncle and aunt had also come down for the weekend, so they came over for dinner as well! It was actually great to see them, because I haven’t seen them both in about 2 years!
So, the main reason behind this whole trip was because we were going to go to Sechelt on Saturday to spread both my Nana’s (my great-grandma) and my Grandma’s ashes. May 9th was my Grandma’s birthday, and with Sunday being Mother’s Day, my grandpa thought it would be fitting to do it that weekend.
We got on the road fairly early and were able to catch the 8:30 a.m. ferry up the Sunshine Coast to Langdale/Gibsons. It’s been about 15 years since I’ve been that way, and let me tell you – I appreciate how beautiful it is more than ever now. Seriously – if you haven’t been, you should. We all met up with old family friends of my Grandma’s, as well as her cousin, and we made our way to the seaside.
I must say, I wasn’t sure how I was going to react while we spread the ashes. It’s been 8 years since my Nana passed away, and 2 years since my Grandma, but it still seems like it was yesterday. The weather was windy and the waves were making their presence known, but it still felt so peaceful being there at the water. We tossed roses into the water and along with a few tears we shared a few memories.
Afterwards, we spent some time walking along the shoreline before heading back to a family friend’s house, where there was a delicious luncheon prepared for us. I really can’t get over all the wonderful people my grandparents have got to know and became friends with over the years. They were like an extended branch of the family. After lunch my mom, aunt, Isla and I went for another little walk to the water, and I couldn’t help but strike a quick tree pose in a little sandy spot in the ocean.
By 3:30 is was time to head back to the ferry terminal so we could get on the 4:30 ferry. We could have done so much more exploring if time had allowed, but when travelling with a 2-year old you can’t push your luck too much ;)
The view from the ferry along the Straight of Georgia.
Let me just say that I had the wonkiest sleep patterns ever on this trip. I would go to bed around 9:30-10 p.m. and wake up at 5:30-6 a.m. without an alarm or anything like that. I don’t know if it was the pressure of our busy schedule, but I was exhausted and a little cranky by the end of the day. Thankfully my Grandpa is an early riser as well and always had a hot cup of coffee ready for me when I came upstairs.
On Sunday my mom, Isla, and I caught the Skytrain into Vancouver to meet up with my brother! I haven’t ridden the Skytrain in ages (I think I was probably 11?) so we were a little lost when it came to what train to get on, but some very nice people happily pointed us to the right side of the concourse. My brother met us at the Tim Horton’s right by the station, and we caught the bus (my first city transit bus trip EVER) to the apartment he shares with his girlfriend. Let me tell you, his view is HORRIBLE:
I have no idea how he can stand looking at the inlet and seeing those gorgeous sunsets. Pfft …
After letting Isla stretch her legs we walked about 4 blocks to Stanley Park (AGAIN – How can my brother stand living where he does?!) and walked along the seawall to Third Beach, where it was nice and sandy. I let Isla walk through the sand with bare feet and she loved it! We went to the water edge so she could put her feet in the ocean and she thought it was the best thing ever. She was seriously upset that she couldn’t go all the way in.
Balancing rocks along the Seawall
We grabbed lunch at Fatburger, where I opted for fish & chips instead of a burger, and then walked it all off on our way to Robson Street to do a little shopping. I bought a couple of tanks from Old Navy, a caramel apple for Kyle from the Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory, and some new yoga shorts from lululemon. (I seriously have a lulu addiction.) After that, it was back on the bus to my brother’s place, where we met up with his girlfriend so they could both join us back at my grandpa’s in Burnaby for dinner.
We ended up not going for dinner until just after 7, and the restaurant was PACKED. We didn’t get seated until around 8 p.m., and I was really worried about Isla having a meltdown, but she didn’t have a care in the world! She was too busy playing with chopsticks and teacups to care about eating dinner at the time when she’s usually going to bed. We eventually got home around 9 p.m. and Isla was out like a light after a quick bath and story.
My mom and I loaded up and headed home yesterday morning and made good time. Isla dozed in and out of sleep the entire way home. It feels great to be back home; I missed Kyle a lot, and even my doofusy dogs too. As much as I love travelling, it can be so stressful, especially when you have a jam-packed schedule and a toddler. Isla had a blast the entire time and was so well behaved; she was seriously the centre of attention the entire trip. Some sweetly-cooky older lady on the ferry stopped dead in her tracks and commented on how gorgeous Isla was. Apparently the lady used to work as a casting director for films and said that she “still has the eye.” It was a little weird, but Isla loved the compliments ;)
So there you have it – my busy, crazy weekend in a nutshell! Now I’m back to the regular routine at home, and I wouldn’t have it any other way :)
I’ve been hinting at the fact that Kyle and I were heading to Las Vegas at some point this month, and since this last weekend was a long weekend, we went! We had actually had the trip planned for quite some time, but since we were being cautious of not letting too people know we were leaving our house, I tried my best to keep it on the DL. (Although if you follow me on Instagram, you would’ve seen a few photos here and there.) We went with our two closest friends, Dave & Callie, and had a blast!
Friday:
We left earrrrrrlyyy Friday morning from Kamloops and drove to Kelowna to catch our 8 a.m. flight. (2:30 a.m. wake-up time? Not ideal!) We attempted to check-in for our flights Thursday night, but the airline wouldn’t let us. It also said that our flight was overbooked and we may not all make it onto the plane. WHAAA? We managed to get out the door ahead of schedule with plenty of time to check-in at the desk. No one was bumped from the flight, and we grabbed breakfast after we got through security. (Oh, and who got additional screening? This girl. Ugh.)
Somewhere over the West Coast of most likely the USA. (So many clouds until we got to the Lake Tahoe area!)
First big trip together. Best travelling partner ever :)
We had a 3-hour layover in Los Angeles. Going through customs and security was a pain in the ass; we arrived RIGHT after a huge plane from Asia landed, so the line was sooooo slow through customs. Thank God for that 3-hour window until our next flight. We had some questionable airport food and just sat around and waited for our flight to board. I must say, LAX is a pretty underwhelming airport. I was expecting it to be a little fancier!
We finally landed in Vegas around 3 p.m. and I was instantly excited! I’ll admit that I wasn’t super excited about the trip, mostly because of all the travelling and leaving Isla. But once we actually got there? Amazing! The Strip is SO overwhelming! I seriously couldn’t believe the traffic and the people EVERYWHERE. After regrouping at the hotel (we stayed at Treasure Island), we decided to take a stroll up and down the Strip and hunt down some dinner. The boys had been before, but it was Callie and I’s first trip. We ended up strolling into Caesar’s Palace and stumbled upon Gordon Ramsay Pub + Grill, and since going to at least one of his restaurants was on my “Need to do” list, we went in. I had the sautéed Scottish salmon, and it was delicious! Best meal of the trip, by far.
After dinner we stopped and bought some booze at a Walgreens somewhere, (SO cheap!) and kept strolling. We stopped to watch the fountain show at the Bellagio (video below) before continuing on our way. We ended up walking all the way down to the MGM Grand, where we decided to turn around and walked back to our hotel. We were exhausted from all the travel, so sleep was definitely in order!
Saturday
We went for breakfast at one of the restaurants in our hotel and Kyle & Dave accidentally ordered $7 orange juice. Pretty sure it was just Tropicana OJ and nothing special. Anyway, after that we took a cab down to New York New York to see about playing some Blackjack. We were on the hunt for $5 tables but we couldn’t find an open one. Dave and I decided to ride the Roller Coaster while Callie & Kyle played the slot machines. I haven’t been on a roller coaster probably since high school, and I screamed like a little girl. We met up with them at the slot machines and I stuck $5 into some random machine. After a few pulls bells and whistles started going off and I ended up winning about $45. Go me!
After that we started wandering over towards Mandalay Bay to go to the Shark Reef Aquarium. While I’ve seen some of the same things at the Vancouver Aquarium, the Shark Reef had amazing displays of different lizards, fish, rays, and of course, sharks! We got to pet sting rays (terrifying) and the big shark tank was SO cool. There were some pretty gnarly looking sharks in the tank.
We grabbed some lunch at Slice of Vegas on our way to the Luxor, where I had my first Bloody Mary. I was craving one ever since we landed in Vegas, so I finally saw one on the drink menu and ordered. How does it compare to a Canadian Caesar? Pretty much the same, but a slightly different taste. Mine came with a huge pepperoni straw, lol.
Callie had heard that there was a Titanic exhibit at the Luxor so we thought we’d go check it out. When else are you going to be able to see 100-year old items that have been recovered off of the ocean floor from the most iconic shipwreck ever? We weren’t allowed to take photos inside for obvious reasons, but the tour was so breathtaking. It was so amazing to see all the recovered items on display; you’d never guess that most of them were laying on the bottom of the floor. The best part? An actual piece of the side of the ship, which this recovery team call, “The Big Piece.” It was truly remarkable seeing such a huge piece of history.
We caught a taxi back to our hotel and had dinner at one of the restaurants there, called Kahunaville, and then Callie and I got all dressed up to go to the Coyote Ugly Saloon (Yes, that Coyote Ugly) at New York New York. While we did that, Kyle and Dave played blackjack in the casino. OMG, it was SO much fun! The music was awesome, the bar girls were so good at getting the crowd riled up, and it was just great to let loose and have some fun! And for the record – we definitely danced on the bar!
Also – we ran into some Canadians from Alberta at the bar outside of Coyote Ugly and had a fabulous time with them as well. We laughed at this American guy for hating healthcare. It was a good time ;)
Sunday
Sunday morning I woke up with an epic headache from the previous night’s drinking binge. Kyle and I ventured down to Starbucks so I could get coffee and something to snack on while we waited for Dave & Callie to get up and moving. We were moving slow, so we ended up having breakfast down on Fremont Street at the Golden Nugget’s buffet. After breakfast we managed to find a $5 Blackjack table, so we all put down $60 to play for a while. It was my first time playing Blackjack, and I did okay, breaking even in the end. The dealers at our table were super friendly and made the experience a lot better too.
Once we finished playing cards we wandered up and down Fremont Street for a little bit. Seeing all the old casinos was pretty neat. One of them had been in downtown Las Vegas since 1948! While Fremont’s casinos are smaller and less “upscale” than the ones on the Strip, they certainly have a lot more character!
When we decided to head back to our hotel we stopped by the Hand of Faith inside the Golden Nugget. It’s the world’s largest gold nugget, and it’s pretty impressive!
Hand of Faith
When we booked our rooms at the hotel we got vouchers for 2 for 1 meals at the buffet. Since we had no other plans for dinner and the buffet is usually expensive ($30/person), we used them. The food was actually really good – and there was so much variety! There was a “home cooked” station, fresh pasta, salad, seafood, Chinese, Japanese, and the most amazing dessert station ever. I had a little bit of everything and grabbing some cotton candy and ice cream for dessert, which proved to be a bad decision when I slipped into a sugar coma.
After dinner we caught a cab down to the Luxor and got tickets to see a burlesque show, called “Fantasy.” There was singing, dancing, laughing, and a lot of “Ooo, la la” moments during the show! The comedian was SUPER hilarious too and was probably my favourite part of the whole show.
Monday
I really wanted to go shopping at the big mall right across the street from our hotel, so we found the food court there and ate in the food court for breakfast/lunch. Kyle and I shared Subway, which I think tasted better than the Subway here. And I’m pretty sure the footlong sub was actually a foot long. They just seem smaller up here in Canada! After food, the boys went in one direction and Callie and I browsed some of the stores. We eventually met up with the boys again and Kyle and I went into Build a Bear and made Isla a bunny, complete with a “Las Vegas” t-shirt. (She loves it!) I also wandered into the lululemon store across the way and bought myself a pair of Wunder Under pants. (So comfy!)
After shopping I dropped off my loot at the hotel and we caught a cab back to the Golden Nugget for some more Blackjack. We found the same $5 table we had played the day before and the same dealers were there, so it was a bonus. We had a great time joking with the dealers and I think they enjoyed our company! Once we had lost most of our money we called it a day and headed back to our hotel for dinner. (Pizza/calzones!)
We wandered the Strip one last time after our dinner to say “goodbye.” It was amazing to see the difference in foot traffic on a Monday compared to the Friday we arrived. Dave and Kyle wanted to go to the MGM Grand to the CBS Television City, where you can rate a show that has yet to make it to television. I ended up have to pee reaaaaaal bad about 15 minutes into the show (TMI?) so I bailed. (I wasn’t really enjoying the show anyway). Kyle and Dave liked it though! I just sat around and played Candy Crush on my phone while I waited. Kyle got a discount coupon for the CBS store for watching the show, so I bought a Big Bang Theory shot glass. We made our way back to the hotel to get some sleep before our flight in the morning.
Tuesday Our flight left at 7 a.m. so we were up and out the door by 4:30. We got to the airport way too early – so early that the post-security coffee shops weren’t even open yet. (The horror!) We eventually got some breakfast and coffee, boarded our plane, and after a short 50-minute layover in Seattle, we were back in Kelowna by 1 p.m.!
Overall, I had an amazing time on our trip. It was really hard leaving Isla behind, but she did SO good at my mom’s and Kyle’s mom’s. She was at our house with Kyle’s mom when we got home and when she seen us come up the stairs she was completely uninterested in us, lol.
Isla with her Build-a-Bear bunny, which we named Isobella (Bella for short)!
Now that Kyle and I have one trip together under our belts, I’d totally travel long distance with him again. It probably won’t be for a while, but at least we know that we don’t drive each other crazy while on vacation. ;)
Vegas highlights: (In no particular order)
– Drinking anywhere on the Strip! (And booze, if bought at a CVS or Walgreens, is cheap!)
– Dancing on the bar at Coyote Ugly
– Eating at Gordon Ramsay Pub + Grill
– Gambling on Fremont Street
– Riding the NYNY roller coaster.
– Seeing the Titanic exhibit
Vegas Cons:
– Smoking EVERYWHERE. In the casinos with low ceilings, it was brutal.
– Hustlers hawking whatever they could
– Taxi drivers are INSANE drivers. One more than one occasion I thought I was going to die. (This is also probably why cab fares are cheap)
– Bathrooms are hard to come by.
She Writes Words 