At the end of May, we took a weekend trip to Vancouver, Canada. Leaving the country meant a break from internet and phones, which was actually rather relaxing after all of this adoption anticipation.
I am getting ahead of myself though. Before we made it out of Washington, I got a text from my mom about the "I-5 bridge collapse 60 miles north of Seattle with cars in the water." I was confused. We had taken I-5 all the way north and were approaching the Canadian border. We hadn't seen a bridge collapse. We turned on the radio and heard more details. We calculated that we passed over that same bridge less than 20 minutes before it collapsed. We felt so blessed to be safe. That is a parent's worst nightmare with kids stuck in car seats - I don't even want to think about it. We are relieved that there were no fatalities. I was so glad that I was packed and ready when Jason got home from work (rare - I am a packing procrastinator). Also, we had planned on eating before making it over that bridge, but the girls weren't complaining, so we kept going and got dinner just after passing the bridge, before we knew about the collapse.
On the way back, we had to take a detour and could see the bridge in the distance. If you look closely, you can still see cars in the water.
Now, back to happy things: safe in Vancouver.
We enjoyed the views from Stanley Park, but the girl's preferred the playground. (Because, after all, playgrounds are hard to come by in the States.)
They did like walking along the beach exploring though.
We went to the Vancouver Aquarium.
Luckily, it was a nice enough day to eat outside and enjoy a Beluga whale show. It put the girls in the mood to go swimming in our hotel swimming pool that night.
The next day, we explored Granville Island. The kids were allowed to pick one souvenir from the children's market. Gabby noticed nail polish being sold for the first time. (Man! I knew we shouldn't have come to Canada!) We managed to convince her that she could use some of mine at home instead of us paying $15 for nail polish. Of course, then we got home and I discovered that I don't actually own any nail polish. Oops. She survived and I bought a cheap bottle from the grocery store when we returned. Luckily, the girls are happy with their name puzzle souvenirs.
