The Mall

The West Edmonton Mall is the largest indoor mall in the world. It has a water park, amusement park, hockey rink, mini golf, and of course over 800 stores. It was a little overwhelming, but we had fun and even bought a few things.

The water park.

The pirate ship that is in the center of the mall and has all kinds of attractions on it.

Rebecca in front of the ice hockey rink.

A seal show that performs twice a day.
I think I could have spent a lot more time there walking around and looking at all the different stores, but even I can only take so much shopping in one day :)

Neerlandia, Alberta

My parents have lived in Neerlandia for a year and a half now. Here are a few of the local sites.

This is farm country just like Iowa. Here they grow fields of canola, which are the bright yellow flowers. And as always, Rebecca likes the cows.
In Canada they sell gas by the liter.

My parents often go to the indoor pool in Barrhead so we thought we would check it out too. No out door pools - too cold!

There is a local ferry that will take you across the Athabasca River - the only way across for quite a few miles. On the other side of the river are sand hills and miles of walking trails. There was also a beautiful look out spot that over looked the river. You could really see the great country side and the canola fields.

We also thought this fire watch tower was pretty interesting.

More of Jasper

Here are a few more pictures from our time in Jasper. We stayed at the Athabasca Hotel right in down town Jasper. It was a short walk to the shops and places to eat.
We also went to the Sunwapta and Athabasca Falls. There were beautiful! The color of the Athabasca river is a striking green-blue aqua color from the rock flour that it picks up in the mountains. Rebecca is the perfect poser!

On our way out of the park we drove past Jasper Lake and saw people walking out to the middle. We had to stop and get it out. It was a full size lake that was only about a foot deep all the way across. That is my sisiter Rachel out in the middle of the lake.

We also saw a lot of elk along the road side.

Oh Canada

We've made it to Canada to visit my parents! They live in Neerlandia, Alberta which is a very small town NW of Edmonton. We've been having a great time. Here's a little bit of a recap so far.

Rebecca did pretty well on her first flights.

We went to Jasper National Park for two days and one night. It is a mountain town with plenty of tourism. There is a tram that will take you to up the mountains. The elevation of the tran when from 1304 meters up to 2277 meters above sea level.
There are two trams that counter balance each other as they go up and down. Each car holds about 30 people and takes about 8 minutes to go up the mountain. We went up on a very clear day and we were able to see Mt. Robson (snowcovered in the middle of the picture) which is the hightest point in the Canadian Rockies at 3954 meters. After the tram dropped us off we hicked another 200 meters to the very top and ejoyed a 360 view of the beautiful mountains.
More to come...

Night Roller

In an attempt to encourage "big girl" status and also to ease the transition to a big bed some day, I decided to take the front off Rebecca's crib. It's call a convertible crib and it came with two small sides that I guess are suppose to prevent falling out of bed - they don't work for Rebecca.

Rebecca is a mover and a shaker when she sleeps, we knew this before because every time we would check on her she would be tucked in one corner of her crib or sprawled out with feet or arms hanging out between the rails.

The first night in her "new" bed she fell out and started to cry and I had to rock her back to sleep. Not too bad for the first night I thought. The next day during nap time she ended up asleep on the floor amongst her toys - probably by choice. The second night around 3 AM I heard faint crying that lasted for a minute or two so I went in to check on her and couldn't find her anywhere! I finally turned on the light and heard the crying coming from under the bed. She had rolled out of bed and then rolled completely under the bed. I had to reach under and pull her out!

Two mornings later when Dan got up and checked her room she was sound asleep just feet from her bedroom door. Since then she has fallen out at least five more times but usually goes right back to sleep when I put her back in bed. Last night she managed to stay in bed all night with the thanks to a large teddy bear that I put next to her to stop her if she rolled the wrong direction. I'm sure she'll learn to stay put eventually. I'm also glad she has never tried to leave her room - I do not need another sleep walker in the house - one is enough!

Here's a picture of her napping yesterday. Looks comfortable uh?

Just Hangin' Out

This week has been pretty quiet. Rebecca and I have just been hanging out. We had our first play group with some other teachers and their kids. Rebecca had fun playing with some new toys and kids. Other than that we've been at home having some fun.This was Rebecca yesterday playing with Playdough. She mostly just puts the lids on and off, but at least she is practicing matching colors.

This morning I caught her in the cereal box!

Isn't her hair cute? I've had a few moms comment on how much hair Rebecca has and that they are jealous because their daughters don't have enough to even put in a ponytail. I like it too, except when Rebecca refuses to let me put it up and she walks around with it hanging in her eyes.

On another topic, how soon can you tell if your child is right or left handed? Rebecca seems to favor her left had when eating and drawing. I really don't have a preference which one she is, but I was just curious.

Happy Birthday

This past Thursday we celebrated our neighbor Millie's 85th birthday. Attitudes towards one's own age can be very strange. If you ask a young person their age they will usually tell you with pride. If you ask a middle aged person their age they will usually avoid the question or sometimes even lie. At what point do you become proud of your age again? Do you ever?

85 great years is something to be proud of!

Congrats Millie!