Home!

The weather cooperated with us and we were able to spend the entire morning at Calaway Park with the kids!  There weren’t a lot of people, so the lineups were minimal and the kids were able to do pretty much any ride they wanted to.  It was so fun watching them run to the next ride, and the next and the next!  Lennard even managed to get a few rides in.  I was content to watch!

 

We finally called it quits at about 1:00, headed ten minutes down the road to fuel up and get some lunch and then were on the road by about 2:00.  Thankfully, both kids fell asleep!  It was a good thing too because we hit some nasty weather and we didn’t need any distractions getting through it. 

I was so glad to see the welcome sign coming home.  It has been an amazing trip and we’ve made lots of wonderful memories.  It’s always good to be home too though.  The kids were able to run around, ride their bikes, go play at the park… all within a half hour of getting home! 

After dinner I found Emma ‘packing’ a bag for our next camping trip!  Guess we’ve been gone long enough!  Time to settle into a routine again, although I’m not looking forward to Lennard heading back to work.

Another Travel Day

I had mixed feelings about being on the road again this morning. I was glad to be getting closer to home, but not really looking forward to another long day of mountain roads. I think that Lennard and the kids felt the same way because it ended up feeling like a very long day. We stopped in Revelstoke to fuel up and then we drove, and drove, and drove. We did stop for a lunch break for 45 minutes, but the rest of the time we were just driving. The kids fell asleep for about 45 minutes. We were really hoping they would sleep longer than that, but no luck.

The entire trip, Ben has thought it was hilarious to squeeze his water bottle and have a puff of air pop out.  He did it over and over.  The funny thing about today was that I’d filled the water bottles right up!  Ben had a little bit of water squirt, but Emma got a face full!  To say that I laughed would be an understatement.  Such silly kids!

We finally got to Calaway Park at 4:15. While we got set up, Emma and Ben played with some kids from the next site. It was nice for them to have someone to play with. Unfortunately, the rain that we'd been driving in all day decided to follow us. We got set up just in time for the rain to come down while we had our dinner. We finished watching a movie together and then then rain stopped long enough for us to decide to walk over to the park.

It was 6:00 when we headed over so we knew we wouldn't have much time, but because it was so late there were almost no lineups at all! The kids did the bumper cars three times in a row, then we went on the merry go round, another balloon one that turned (although Emma didn't like it) and then the cars. The kids had a lot of fun and were not happy about leaving. We are really hoping the weather cooperates tomorrow morning so we can go back!

  

By the time we got back to the trailer it was time to wind down. The kids played Lego for a while and I started to watch a movie. Then the thunder and lightning started and the skies opened up! The rain has been crazy! We are so thankful not to be in a tent right now!

On The Road Again

We knew that Lennard's dad was going to come to the campground this morning to say goodbye, so I got ready as soon as I got up instead of sitting around. It was a good thing too, since I'd just got dressed and was getting Emma ready when he showed up! It was fun to show him our campsite and the trailer. We had breakfast and visited for quite a while and then, while the kids played at the playground, we got everything ready to go. We took a few pictures with the kids and grandpa and the we were on our way.

 

We didn't leave until 11:30 (10:30 BC time). Once we got going, we didn't want to stop. We had planned to stop in Merritt, but we missed the exit and ended up having to keep going on to Kamloops. We hadn't had lunch, so after we fuelled up, we went in to Costco, let the kids wander for a bit and then get some lunch/dinner.

It was definitely slow going on some of the long climbs! 

They were not excited to be getting back in the truck and every few minutes we heard, "This is taking a long time!" We finally stopped for the night just outside of Sicamous. We pulled into our campsite and the kids hopped out of the truck and took off running. It was so good to let them just run and play. It didn't last too long as the mosquitos were horrible!

We'd bought the Lego movie at Costco and so we put it in to watch while we played with some Lego that I'd brought with us. The kids loved it and it was fun to see what they came up with. We had leftover Chinese food at about 8:00 for dinner and then the kids went straight to bed. It's been a long day. We are planning on going as far as Calgary tomorrow, so it will be another longer day.

Family Time

When we asked the kids what they wanted for dinner last night, Ben said he wanted waffles. Grandpa told him that we could come to his house for breakfast this morning instead for waffle since I don't have a waffle maker in the trailer. The kids were excited for that idea, so this morning was easy to get them up and going.

We had waffles, eggs, and bacon and then dad had to go for an appointment, so we went to go visit Lennard's mom's gravesite. It was a little confusing for the kids, but they were excited to put flowers on her grave.

We then went exploring and tried to find where Lennard's Oma and Opa are buried. We actually found the cemetery (Surrey City Cemetery) without too much trouble, but then we couldn't find their grave sites. It was quite a hot, muggy day, so the kids weren't very excited to keep wandering around. I finally found a phone number and Lennard talked to someone who looked up where the graves were. We were able to get a city worker that was working in the cemetery to help us and we finally found them. The grave markers are getting quite worn and are hard to read, but it was nice to have found them and photograph them.

The kids were getting hungry by then, so we headed to grab something small for lunch. Emma ate pretty well, but Ben wouldn't eat much of anything. They fell asleep on the way home to dad's place, so we decided to skip going down to the boardwalk so that they could sleep. Unfortunately, they had other ideas. As soon as we got them to the condo, they both woke up and were ready to play. They were wild! Racing around and wrestling each other.

Thankfully, we didn't have much time before we were leaving to go in to Vancouver for dinner. We all piled in to Dad's car and headed out. I squished in to the back with the kids, although we had to stop to take the seat backs off their booster chairs so that I could sit back!

Emma fell asleep on the way in and we had to wake her up when we got to the Flamingo. To our dismay, the restaurant was closed! Grrr! I guess they are closed Wednesday nights. Who knew. We loaded up and headed back to Surrey. I'm so impressed with how well the kids did with being hungry and tired and driving for an hour and a half.

Dad took us to a Chinese food place that he's gone to before in Surrey and the kids chowed down! They love won ton soup and literally inhaled it. They ate everything else really well too. It was good food (not as good as the Flamingo, but a good substitute!).

After dad dropped us off at the truck, and I grabbed a few groceries that we needed, we headed down to the boardwalk. There was a train going through when we got there and Ben was in seventh heaven! He loves trains. We walked down to the pier and went all the way out to the end. It was such a beautiful night! I would have loved to have sat out longer, but it was already after 9:30! So much for bedtimes! Emma was really sad that we weren't able to do another fire tonight. Hopefully wherever we are tomorrow night we can do a fire for her.

Housekeeping

We've had a very low key day today. Breakfast was interesting as we managed to stretch two eggs into five sausage and eggers. We got to dad's place by about 10:30 and I started our laundry right away. I thought I'd be able to get the kids clothes to last longer since some of the days we would just be driving, but I didn't take in to account eating snacks in the truck or playing at playgrounds, etc. We ran out of clean clothes for Ben, so we were glad to get laundry done.

We went out to the White Spot for lunch so the kids could get their pirate ship, but it was fairly expensive just for lunch and the kids didn't eat much.

 

      

When we got back, I worked on laundry again while Lennard took the kids to play at the park down the street. Apparently Ben loved the digging toys as they were more his size and he could use them by himself. Emma was just all over everywhere!

The afternoon was spent watching tv and visiting. Ben fell asleep bout 4:00. Dinner ended up being a bit later so the kids were overtired and hungry. Thankfully they both ate really well, especially Emma. I think she had about 4 slices of lamb! When we left to head back to the trailer for the night, they were both so tired. Emma was especially cranky and cried most of the way. It took her a while to calm down.

Lennard pulled out the fire pit after we put the kids to bed and we attempted to have a quiet evening. Unfortunately the kids windows look directly on to where we were sitting and they didn't think it was very fair to be missing out on a campfire! We finally gave up and brought them out with us for about 15 minutes. It was actually a lot of fun, but it was already 9:30, so we had to at least try to be responsible and get them to bed!