Festival of Trees

As our days in Edmonton are coming to an end, we continue trying to enjoy what the city has to offer.  The Festival of Trees was held downtown in the Shaw Conference Center and I was amazed at the assortment of trees.  There was just about every tree you could think of....every theme of decorations, a tree made of wrapping paper, a pink tree, neon green tree, and an upside down tree just to name a few.  Ethan enjoyed decorating a mini tree, frosting a cookie, making an ornament, and writing a letter to Santa.  (Sorry about the picture quality...I forgot our camera and was just using my phone).

 

Fall trip to Kansas

Once again, I am behind on posting but I'll try to get caught up.  We recently enjoyed almost 3 weeks in Kansas visiting family and friends.  Ethan did really well on his first flight(s) and even slept most of the way from Minneapolis to Kansas City.

 We started off the trip with trick or treating.  Ethan and Kay Kay quickly picked up where they left off and it was fun to see them back together.  They both seem to have had fun trick or treating together. 

Ethan and I made a quick trip to Wichita to see Jake and Cara and see everything they've done on their house in the last year.  The Kansas wind didn't stop us from enjoying the fall temps and we enjoyed a trip to the zoo and just played outside some. 

Then there was fun on the farm.  Ethan got to ride the new combine a couple times with Wade.  Wade really enjoyed being about to try out the new combine and he was thankful that things ran smoothly so he could get most of the soybeans cut.  I think he would have liked to have been able to relax a little more on his vacation but he was happy to be back on the farm.  Papa was also having some concrete poured while we were there so of course we went out to watch.

Last was a trip to Plainville to see the Hansen clan.  Ethan had lots of fun playing with his cousins (and everyone else too).  Grandpa Charlie managed to call in a favor and we got to go to the fire station one night.  Ethan and I even got to go for a short ride in one of the trucks (we went just outside of town so we could turn on the lights and sirens).

It was so good to be back "home" even if it was for a short time and it was great to be able to see so many people while we were there.

Thanksgiving in Jasper

We've been thinking about making a trip to Jasper (the closest mountains to Edmonton) and decided that Thanksgiving Weekend might be a nice time to finally go.  One of Wade's coworkers recommended the Fairmont Jasper Park Lodge and when we started to look into it they had several activities planned for the weekend so it seemed like it would be a fun place to stay.  It was a beautiful place and we had a great time.

Saturday we picked pumpkins from the "pumpkin patch", carved pumpkins, did a scavenger hunt, and checked out the town of Jasper and ate dinner there. 

Sunday we rented a pedal boat and went out on the lake for a little bit (Ethan complained and didn't seem to enjoy it at all but 5 minutes afterwards he said "That was a fun boat ride"), Craftsgiving, took a guided wildlife walk (and saw some Elk), and ate a Thanksgiving Buffet dinner (Ethan really enjoyed the live band and danced in his chair the entire meal). 

Monday we checked out and then went to do a little exploring before heading home.  Ethan had two requests to start out the day...throw snowballs and pee on a mountain (he remembered doing this in South Dakota).  We took the Jasper Tramway up Whistlers Mountain and had a snowball fight at the top.  Next, we drove up to Maligne Lake and came across some big horned sheep along the way.  Ethan got to fulfill his second request and he also discovered the fun of throwing rocks into the slightly frozen lake. 

More Muttart Photos

Here's a few photos of the last two feature exhibits at the conservatory.  Ethan really enjoys running around in the pyramids and its an easy little activity for us to do.  I didn't like these as much as some of the previous ones but we still enjoyed seeing them.  I'm looking forward to seeing their Christmas exhibit. 

The first exhibit was a Sword in the Stone theme.

This was a beautiful arrangement the was around a tree in the park next to the Muttart.  The colors reminded me of my wedding flowers.

The second exhibit that we saw with Grandma Carol and Grandpa Charlie was a Fortune Teller exhibit.