Last Days in Calgary

The last several days in Calgary turned out to be quite action packed. First, a friend of mine from Taiwan introduced one of her roommates named Yoyo (Yuan Jia Shi) to the gospel a year or so ago. Between then and now, we had the opportunity to have Yoyo in our home many times for her lessons with the missionaries, and right before we left, she was able to be baptized. We have felt very blessed to have had that experience with her. Yoyo is from Suzhou, China and returned home June 20th. It was great to practice Chinese a bit. Pretty rusty!

Elder Hansen, Elder Ferguson, and Yoyo out to eat sushi with us.

Secondly, June 21, the Bow River, just a short (but very downhill) walk from our house flooded and destroyed a lot of High River, parts of Canmore (which is near Banff) and flooded a very large portion of downtown. My friend Wynne had come for one last visit during that time. We were able to walk by the river and survey the situation.

Too bad I only have a picture of me and not Wynne.

Prince's Island Park gone under.

Curling Club. Why is there an abandoned police car in the lot?

Notice the submerged Memorial drive between the Curling Club Building in the foreground and the pedestrian bridge.

Crowds gathered in on the bluff at the top of "our" bluff.

Lower deck of the Centre Street Bridge almost submerged.

No biking today!

Across the river, you can barely make out the flooded China Town.

Our street was PACKED with the cars of observers. Our house is the brick one on the left.

As we were organizing our things just a few days prior to the movers coming, the boys were outside in the back yard playing with Lucy. Next thing we know, Bennett is yelling that Lucy has something in her mouth. Turns out it was a baby jack rabbit. She didn't noticeably harm it. She was just playing with it, but it may have had some internal injuries. We took "her" (Lincoln was determined it was a girl) to a vet, not knowing what else to do with it. Such a sweet little thing.

The day before we left, Lucy escaped the yard. We spent 3 hours looking all across Calgary for her. Turns out a neighbor picked her up from the park and called animal control. We were just passing this woman's house when animal control came. We were SO happy to see that dumb dog!! Can't imagine leaving the country without her.

Random photos from my Blackberry before I ended my plan:

Taken in Feb 2013, Eldon about 5 months

Lincoln on his Bday at Chuck E Cheese's

Pizza face at the park

Sleep Fest in the Car

"Look at my shorts hat, mom".

Biking by the Bow River in late May

Sleepy Head Biking Companion

Lincoln's first ride on a school bus to the Science Centre. His buddies were Oliver, Obinna nand Obinna's mom.

Lincoln, Obinna, and Oliver

Lincoln with his class at the Science Centre

Lincoln's Rosedale Playschool Friends at the Science Museum.

Lincoln's artistic pictures of his Toy Story friends:

Calgary at dusk.

Beautiful scenes near Millarville where our friends Tom and Natasha live:

Benny with his 3D glasses on at the movies. Love that guy.

Still a thumb sucker.

By Lincoln.

One double jogger plus a Baby Bjorn = a triple jogger.

Lincoln was happy until Bennett took his orange.

First swing ride at the park. Poor guy had been eaten by mosquitos. 

Hopefully Lincoln will learn to pump on his own soon. It's tough to keep these 3 going. And yes, Bennett is wearing pajama pants in public.

Some last shots of important places and people:

Eldon's hospital. Foothills Medical Centre.

Our church on Crescent Road at the top of McHugh Bluff

Tom and Kyra Miller with the kids.

I served with Cynthia Dahl (wearing blue in the middle) in the primary presidency. This is her husband, Ryan's birthday party just before we left.

All the rascals. Lincoln is licking Ewan's head, and sweetie Finn is in the foreground.

Didn't get a picture of Laura and Joel Harding, so had to snag one from FB.

The girlfriends, Chloe and Hannah Caballero. Lincoln is hoping Hannah will be his future wife! I think Hannah's answer is "no".

And last, but certainly not least, Roberto, Mary-Ellen, Hannah and Chloe Caballero, our first friends in Calgary.

Canada was good to us. We will miss it and all our friends there!!!

We flew out on Canada Day.