Officially an Ex-Pat

Well, we made it to Canada - and so did almost most of our things. I have to say that Bugga was a champ through all the changes, far more so then we expected. We lived in a hotel for a few days in Texas as they packed up our house. Then we had a day of travel that included a 4 hour flight and an hour in Canadian Immigration to get our residency. Then we headed to another hotel until our new home was ready.

A fun little wrench in our plans: a few weeks prior to our arrival into Canada, Calgary was inundated with flooding throughout the downtown areas and many other places along their main rivers. Downtown also happens to be where most of their hotels are, like any other city. Oh, and Stampede (Calgary's annual 2-week rodeo event) was also in full swing once we arrived so the city's population was abnormally inflated. So of course, we pull up to our hotel at 8pm at night (already past my daughter's bedtime in OUR time zone) and it is completely closed. No phone call, no rebooking to another hotel - nothing. Awesome.

Apparently their computers were in their flooded basement and therefore they had no way to know who had reservations to contact for rebooking. So, oh well for us! I'm still not sure how this International Hotel (literally their name) had the only electronic records in their specific building, but hey, what do I know.

So we scrambled, and drove down to the Westin and checked into their only (and smallest) available room for one million dollars a night (well it was a lot). Oh and no bathtub - which is great for a toddler. This was going to be a long 10 days.

Fortunately my husband's relocation contacts felt horrible enough about their mistake (not checking on our reservation before our arrival) that they found us a corner suite at our preferred hotel and we happily moved over there the next day.

And there we lived for 10 days. It was fortunately near a few parks, playgrounds, and even a splash pad (which Canadian kids will still play in during much colder weather than us!) and the little routine we established worked for us. I also brought along several of Bugga's favorite toys, a couple colors of homemade play dough (post coming soon), and even a basic plastic cup and spoon would be treasured at times (especially near water!).

So we have now moved into our new house and are getting used to the Canadian life. The house is still a hot mess, but we'll get there!

*Our dilemma from the floods is absolutely nothing compared to what many Calgarians have gone through, and are still going through. If you would like to donate to the Alberta Flood Fund through the Red Cross, please click here.