For Shannon’s birthday, we went to West Edmonton Mall for a night at the theme room. Their theme rooms booked up really quickly, but we were able to reserve the Train Car theme which also had a bunk bed type sleeper with curtains that we thought would be good for Everett, since they do not have a separate bedroom for the kids.
The trip there and back were pretty good, as both kids slept the entire way. The first day, we went to the waterpark as a kind of a “beach vacation.” I have not been to the waterpark for years and it was a lot of fun. I managed to ride almost all of the extreme slides, the ones that go straight down and have a countdown before the shoots drops you into the near vertical slide. The one that went upwards was closed unfortunately, which would have been the most interesting one.
Everett however was a scaredy-cat. (Everett says “scary cat at Mae Mae’s” and is referring to the Halloween decoration that Maebyn had in her front yard). There were these little tiki statues around the area which he thought was “scary” and so needed me to hold them. Unfortunately, there were a bunch of these statues surrounding the warmer shallow kids pool, so he did not go in that at all!
There was a more intense kids area with water shooting all over the place and a big bucket that would pour over and splash over the entire park intermittently. This was a little too scary for Everett as well. He did like hang out at hot tub however. We also went down two of the waterslides where I could go down with him (there only two), and he enjoyed the “juice” that was freely dispensed through the Coca-Cola machines.
We did have fun at the beach, and Everett enjoyed jumping when the wave came down. Sierra got her feet wet, but mostly enjoyed the warm tropical temperatures with mom.
That evening, we watched the movie Arrival in our hotel. We put Everett to bed, after reading a book. He could see the TV flicker through the curtain, and he told Shannon that he was “watching TV.” What a little turd! There was not much we could do, and eventually of course he fell asleep.
In the middle of the night, of course he fell into the crack between the bed and the wall. Fortunately, he was easily extracted and repositioned back in his bunk bed. He slept the rest of the night uneventfully, and actually slept in till about 830 in the morning. Everett is definitely getting to be a big boy now, sleeping in a real bed with a pillow and blanket.
We also enjoyed eating at T&T. Shannon and I caught the evening sale of sushi, and Everett had a cha-siu bao.
The next day, we played at Galaxyland. Kids under two were free, so we did not have to pay anything to go on the rides… not that there are that many rides to go on at Everett’s height. We rode the train that went around the park a couple of times which he enjoyed. He also liked going on the balloon, which we called the “Mayor’s Balloon” in reference to Mayor Goodwin from the Paw Patrols. The other fun place was the little park where they could just run around in socks and slide down into ball pits. At first, Everett was tentative, but after going around the park with Everett, he was leading the way with Shannon in tow.
Overall, we had a fairly nice outing and family trip together out to West Edmonton Mall for the two days. I cannot say was completely relaxing due to the intense playing and activities, but it was really nice to get away with the family.
