Lungs of Steel

So this weekend we spent in Calgary, staying at my mother-in-law’s. This, however, also meant very limited time on a computer since I would either have had to borrow one while visiting at the brothers-in-law or using one at the library and who wants to do that when they could be spending the time visiting and stuff instead? Hence the reason for not posting over the last few days.

This weekend was a really nice visit with family which made us want to stay longer than we could. Not only did we get to visit with Dan’s mom and brothers and their families, but we also got to spend time with his cousins, Elaine and Tanya, and their families. Tanya came in from Regina for the visit, which was amazing and so appreciated! We hadn’t seen her in easily a decade and had never met her husband and child.

Friday didn’t really see us do much besides a little bit of shopping and then supper and a visit at Eddy and Marie’s. Eddy made this amazing lasagne and manicotti with caesar salad and garlic bread. Made from scratch without a recipe, I might add. Jessica was duly impressed when I told her. She didn’t realize it was without a recipe. Jessica managed to hang out with the adults for the evening while Jarod was kept plenty busy being the only boy in a group of girl cousins, all of whom were at least four years younger than him. Oh, did they love playing with him! They would bounce and jump all over him, it got so that he was twitchy no matter who was talking or sitting next to him.

Saturday was a little busier, but mostly because we all pretty much got up late. Went for a long drive looking for a Taco Bell (sheesh) and then ended up with a shorter than desired visit to the Zoo. The Calgary Zoo is always a great visit and deserves longer than we were able to give it. This however was followed by a visit with John and Leah for a classic BBQ supper. Elaine and Leo and their kids joined us for this one, along with a friend of John and Leah’s, Tony. It was a full house, but a really nice time. The bongo (?) ball game between the guys was classically interrupted by the girls, especially with Celeste’s attempts to jinx Eddy’s throws with “Don’t….Don’t….Don’t….Miss!”

Sunday Tanya, Arlen, Stella, and Kyann had to leave for home. We were sorry to see them go, but were grateful for the visit. The afternoon was spent at the CrossIron Mills mall. Nice, Big place! We managed NOT to visit Bass Pros and Outdoor Gear stores. We had been warned that they were huge and VERY distracting! One can happily get lost in those two stores and we just didn’t have time for that kind of distraction. Jessica was extremely joyful at finally finding her Converse high-tops, though. She managed to find not only a pair that fit, but also a pair themed with Dr. Seuss. I can’t remember which book, but she knows it from her performance of Seussical Musical this summer. She was very happy. After the mall we dropped Mom off at home and joined John, Eddys family, and Elaine’s family at McMahon Stadium for a CFL football game between the Stampeders and Eskimos. What a game! I’m ashamed to say how pathetically the Esks played. The Stamps truly massacred them! The score was 56 (I think) to 15. The Esks just couldn’t hold on to the ball if it killed them. They were so frustrated by the end there ended up being a couple of fights resulting a disqualification of players from both teams. Poor John ended up sitting at the end of our row next to me, and all I kept doing was asking him questions about the game, since this was the first game I’d been to that I wasn’t freezing my ass off. He was awesome with me though. Jessica was having fun using the horn I bought her. You can so tell that girl used to swim competitively! Damn she could hold a note for a long time! Dan didn’t see much of the game because the girls, Anna and Cassie, were busy distracting him and visiting. I’m not sure how everyone else did because I made the mistake of purchasing a row of seats rather than breaking us up into two or three rows, which I will make sure to do next time. I think we all still had a good time, though.

Today, Monday, was time to head to Edmonton. We managed to spread a three-hour drive over seven hours by detouring through Horseshoe Canyon and Drumheller. At Horseshoe Canyon Dan and the kids went for a helicopter ride while I went for a hike in the canyon. No, I did not find the cache I was looking for because I was stupid enough to think it might be IN the canyon even though the title of the cache was “Lookout for the Horseshoes”. The ‘Lookout’ part should have clued me in. Damn it. Essentially I ran out of time to go back up and around to where it likely is. Drumheller was a shorter visit as the Greek restaurant we wanted to stop at for a snack doesn’t actually open until 4:00 in the afternoon, which we really should have known anyway. So we stopped instead for ice cream and a brief walk in the spray park at the information centre, the one where the giant T-Rex is. The rest of the way in to Edmonton went up to Stettler before crossing over to the QEII, and included stops at a couple of quick caches, including one at a railroad graveyard where we met a couple of girls on their motor bikes and told them about geocaching, and one where I managed to crack my skull with the lid of a roadside garbage can. There was another one cleverly hidden in a maglight near a freshwater pump.

We finished the day with supper at Red Robin’s and a movie.