It took a bit of planning but the trip happened without any problems. Obaki was an angel and slept almost the entire drive from Vancouver to Seattle. We had about a 30 minute wait to cross the border – but that worked out well because Grace got out of the car and walked around with Ryan as I slowly inched up the line at the border. It was no problem to cross the border – we all had passports including Ryan (who got his passport at 5 weeks old).
After crossing the border we drove straight to Bellingham to do some shopping at Target and Macy’s. I hate to sound like I get excited about shopping because I really don’t but when you save as much money as we do when we shop in the US – it is hard not to get at least a bit excited.
After a brief stint in Bellingham (about 50 miles from Vancouver) we continued to the outlet mall (the true American shopping experience). We were shopaholics but in the end we didn’t buy as much as we thought we would. This trip wasn’t all about shopping though -we planned to visit Grace’s grandmother’s husband’s brother (Frank) and his family. The last time we visited we stayed with Frank&Jennifer but this time we stayed with their daughter Mi-Jung and her family (Yong Chae, Mi-Jung, and the kids Julianne, Josh, John).
From the moment we arrived Julianne (19) was awesome with Ryan – she held him almost immediately and played with him for a while. She was so good with the baby! We had dinner and got caught up with things – Ryan was a bit fussy but we weren’t complaining because he was such a good boy for the whole day.
The next day I had a chance to play some golf with Frank. I shot a 92 and Frank shot a 97. I was +7 on the front nine and +14 on the back…talk about a collapse of the game. Regardless, I was happy with my score. I did waste about 6 shots on some pretty bad chips but I hadn’t practiced my chipping in a few weeks.
For that afternoon we had lunch at Frank & Jennifer’s place and then went out for more shopping. Of course, before we left for shopping Obaki decided to spice up our afternoon by shooting modge all over Grace. She wasn’t paying attention and was lifting Ryan’s butt and turned away for a second just to give him the perfect aim for her dress. The sad thing about the entire situation was that she didn’t have a change of clothes. Grace tried to clean up but I think that put a bit of a damper on her shopping mood. Our afternoon shopping was pretty successful – we did find a great high chair for Ryan for $50 and bought him some toys. On the way home to Mi Jung’s place we got caught in some pretty nasty traffic which sort of tested our patience. We finally made it back for an awesome dinner and time to hang out.
The next morning we were off after a quick and yummy breakfast with Mi jung & Josh. (Mi Jung gave me her recipe for some awesome pancakes if you are interested). For the trip home we had planned to stop at the outlet for some mad shopping again but in the end we had to get to the border for our Nexus interview at 3:00. We made it to our interview (barely!) on time. We really wanted a Nexus pass for all of us so that we can take the express lane to cross the border. The interview was pretty simple and now we all have Nexus passes!!
Both Grace & I looked kind of tired in our photos but Ryan looked really cute. We have applied for so many things for Ryan -he had his American Citizen interview, and now has a Nexus card, Canadian passport, Social Insurance number, Social Security number and soon to have an American passport…he’s already got daddy beat.
After crossing the border we found a great farmer’s market and went nuts and bought a ton of fresh local fruit and veggies. (I also have an incredible recipe for Strawberry Rhubarb Pie Crumble which I found and I rank it as the best pie recipe in the world – if you want that too.) Then we got stuck in some serious traffic. It seemed to take us forever to get home as Ryan was fed up with driving and we were fed up with sitting in traffic. Unfortunately, in situations like those you have to take your baby out of the car seat to fix some issues such as poop or to feed him. We don’t want him getting used to being held in the car but sometimes you have to make exceptions.
We finally made it home and it took us 5 trips to carry everything up. In the end we didn’t buy as much as we thought we would but when you can find awesome Banana Republic pants for $14 and Bostonian shoes for $50 you can’t commplain….that’s shopping in the US!