What I learned over the weekend – Vancouver, BC edition

~I love being surprised with last minute weekend getaways.
~I really love the guy who so frequently surprises me with these little trips.
~Hotels.com idea of four stars differs a little from ours.
~At a glance, hotel conditioner and lotion can easily be confused with one another.
~Once applied to the hair, the difference between lotion and conditioner is extremely apparent.
~My camera phone takes crap pictures...as you can see.
~Rob has a playlist on his iPod hilariously titled Party Jams.
~Not a single jam on this playlist is party-like, in any way.
~Vince Vaughn and Kevin James are both funny men, but together a not-so-funny movie they make.
~Canadian Mountain Dew contains NO caffeine.

Labor Day the Canadian Way

Rob surprised me with a long weekend in Vancouver, BC over the Labor Day weekend. We stayed at a great place on Robson {where all the shops/restaurants/clubs are} so we didn't have to go far for anything!

We did do our fair share of walking though...there was a lot going on that weekend! We watched some street performers. Our favorite was a guy who juggled fire, then was chained up in a straight jacket and escaped. As if that wasn't good enough...he was quite the comedian as well. There was some sidewalk art too...this MJ one was probably the best.

We went to TaiwanFest, which had the absolute scariest food I have ever seen! People were lining up to get fried octopus and grilled squid on a stick and pickled pork belly, fish ball {?!?} soup, blood pudding on a stick and of course, bubble tea. Needless to say, we passed on every single bit of it!

We spent one day at the Vancouver Aquarium, which was mostly like any other aquarium we've been to, except they had beluga whales, dolphins and a 4-D movie.

It was SO crowded there. We got there fairly early and the line was snaking all away around the building. It was raining so they were passing out umbrellas to people who didn't have them {ahem, Rob}. Here he is with his cute froggie umbrella. I kinda wanted to keep it. ☺

I took a million pictures, but none of them showed up well because I just haven't learned how to master the flash/glass combo on my camera. Oh well!

We also did a bit of shopping, got in some good eats and saw a terrible movie {The American, don't waste your money}. It all went by way too fast. Good times.

Winter Olympics

One of the many perks of living in Seattle...only two hours away from Canada. So of course we had to head up to Vancouver for the Winter Olympics!!

We got up there a bit later than we'd hoped. We lost some time by having to turn back around and go home to get the hockey tickets that someone (I am not mentioning any names) left on the kitchen table.

We got through the border in no time...shocker, I know!

The weather has been strangely warm this Winter, so that made it a weird environment for the Winter Olympics. We even got hot after a bit and had to take off our sweatshirts.

Finding a place to eat there was a complete joke! Like wait times of two hours, crazy! We figured that if we didn't want to wait, we'd have to pony up some extra dough so we dined at Griffins at The Fairmont Hotel. Wouldn't recommend it to anyone. SO not good.

We were cutting it close to game time, so we high tailed it on over to Canada Hockey Place for the Germany vs. Belarus game. Since we were both still hungry, I kept myself entertained by the Zamboni protected our seats while Rob waited in line for some rink food.

Turns out he must have gotten in the German line or something...everything he ordered came with this weird onion-y sauerkraut-y stuff on it. We each took a bite of our stuff and gave it the big toss...right into the bin. Not good either!

Our seats, however, were awesome!! Right up on the ice. Two rows back, to be exact.

Next to us was a huge group of empty seats, which we thought was weird. Turns out, these German guys a few rows back bought out that section in front of them so that they could put a German flag out in front of them. They ended up tying down the ends and waving it madly all throughout the game. It was really funny!!

We also had an older guy sitting behind us dressed up in a Pokeman-esque onsie type thing. I snapped a few shots, but thought it fair to include the one without his face...although the face part was the funniest...there was a mask that pulls down off the hood. I figure since he went out like that, he was looking for some kind of attention, right?

Final score Germany 3, Belarus 5. Good game, good game. The German players were bigger and more aggressive while the Belarus players were smaller but more agile. Made for a great game. There wasn't a lot of fighting, but I guess they save that hype for the NHL.

This would be where our pictures stop because someone...probably the same someone who forgot our tickets...forgot to charge the camera battery, so the rest will just have to be committed to memory.

We saw many more sights, met some great people, fit in some good shopping and much much more, but due to our lack of photographic evidence, you'll just have to take our word for it. ☺

Quick Trip up North

We headed up to Vancouver, BC for the weekend to pick up our tickets for the Olympics while there was a short wait, rather than spending hours in line the day of.

Throughout the weekend we:

• grabbed a tasty dinner where they brought finger bowls with the buffalo wings instead of handi wipes - 1 for Canada, 0 for US
• saw From Paris with Love (funny!!) at $15 bucks a ticket...eek!!! - that's 1 for Canada, 1 for US
• had brunch in a quaint, heated, outdoor, covered cafe - 2 for Canada, 1 for US
• got caught up in the Olympic countdown hype - 3 for Canada, 1 for US
• enjoyed some lovely Vancouver sites...and their wannabe Space Needle a.k.a. Harbour Centre - 3 for Canada, 2 for US.
• loved seeing how excited Jackson was to see us come home - 3 for Canada, 3 for us

Looks like a tie!

Canada for Christmas

We are trotting up North for a few days to do Christmas Canadian style.

This will be our second take at celebrating a holiday together in Canada. Our first 4th of July together we thought we'd take advantage of the day off and head up to Vancouver, BC for some shopping and then evening fireworks.

It wasn't until we were waiting to get through the border that in donned on us...Canada probably doesn't celebrate the United State's Independence Day. Oh well, you can't call us stupid, we were still in the lovey-dovey-clouded-from-reality phase.

But this time we've got our heads on straight and are certain that they celebrate Christmas in Canada.