Tis the season of flowers and cute animals! We were lucky to have an extended season because spring came early while we were still in Canada and [*tear] that time has come to an end. But, we still managed to squeeze all the delicious juices from our last bit o’ time in the northern rockies and get to continue to enjoy it in the southern rockies; better known as Colorado.

You can see from our last post, Canadaventures, that we were busy little bees this winter. I took up two new hobbies, one of which is caking. I’ve become obsessed with anything and everything that has to do with decorating big fancy cakes. That includes watching every cake competition on TV, signing up for a couple semi-professional courses and loads of practice making different styles of cake, and more importantly, decorations. I’ve been commissioned to do a very special cake for my aunt and uncle’s 50th wedding anniversary, so now I’m really kicking it in gear. Every social event that we attend is guaranteed to come with a side of cake.

I’m planning to a 2-tier cake with sugar flowers and a custom topper on a pedestal stand, and wrap it up in some classic and modern decor. The recipes are all completely from scratch, including two different types of cake and two kinds of fillings, topped with a homemade SMBC (swiss meringue buttercream), marshmallow fondant and a design that’s probably way over my head. Making gum paste, fondant and buttercream flowers is fitting for spring, don’t you think?

My second hobby was the construction of a DIY mini-house that I got for Christmas. Its a greenhouse that has about 100 different miniature pieces of furniture, plants, and of course, the house. I even had to wire the electrical elements so the little light would turn on. In all, I spent over 40 hours constructing over the course of 3 months. The most tedious bits were the teeny tiny flowers and plants that were meticulously fabricated.

Early spring brought perfect weather to spend time outside. There were loads of animals all about the property including elk, a great gray owl, and two juvenile moose that would often greet Jake on his daily runs. Ekho and Radar were cute as ever, helping us with our chores and spring cleaning. Old Blue even got a complete detail outside and in (with Radar’s help).

Our final days’ in Calgary were loaded with activities: a climbing competition at our gym, the Calgary zoo, a World Heritage site and natural wonder and lots of parties and social gatherings.

We really enjoyed the Calgary zoo with tons of animals, as you’d expect. It is very spread out with many walking paths, gardens and really gorgeous views of the city skyline (complete with prehistoric dinosaurs). I was in total-photo-mode and can’t resist sharing all of the cuteness with you! Our favorites were the red pandas and Asian pandas, which we’d only ever seen in Edinburgh.

One of our goal’s in life is to visit every World Heritage Site on the planet, and there is one only a few hour’s drive from the house! The Royal Tyrrell Museum (no relation to the Tyrel’s from Game of Thrones) is the center for paleontological research and has the largest collection of fossils in the world! I mean, who doesn’t love dinosaurs? We chose to wait for decent weather to make the 3 hour drive to Drumheller, home of Canadian Badlands natural geologic wonder and a mecca for dino-fossils. Its amazing how the landscape shifted from mountains to flat plains to long deep gorges and canyons reminiscent of Arizona and New Mexico in such a short span of time.

The museum is absolutely massive, laid out in chronological order from the time before, during and after the dinosaurs. Its split up into different “galleries” about the earth, evolution, geology, fossilization, a full working lab where technicians work on newly discovered fossils (which take an extraordinary amount of time) and a walk through a dino-landscape that’s very realistic. Its always hard to choose a favorite, but mine was Dinosaur Hall, featuring over 40 full-scale fossils that made this exhibit one of the largest in the world.

Black Beauty is the largest T-rex found in Alberta as well as the most complete fossil found of the T-rex in the world. Crazy enough, it was discovered by a high school student! Jake and I loved it so much so that we created a family crest in honor of this glorious beast (also in honor of G.O.T.)

As we were leaving a bunch of kids came in with roller bags and pillows. Apparently you can spend the night in the museum AND sleep under ANY EXHIBIT YOU WANT. I’d choose the T-rex all the way.

The Badlands trails were nearby and we couldn’t resist a little walk through time, or back in time. Hoodoos are a prominent feature in this type of landscape; totem-pole-shaped spires that protrude up from striped sedimentary and volcanic rocks. I still couldn’t believe that such a place exists so far north, yet here we are!

The last few days flew by in a whir of parties, packing and playing with animals. Since her parents were home, Ekho the dog wasn’t keen to spend as much time with us. She was happy being back in the mix upstairs with her humans, but still enjoyed when we’d take her for long walks or visiting when her parents were gone. Radar on the other hand absolutely loved us. He had very little interest in his humans other than feeding time. He followed me everywhere. He slept right next to me (or on me), sat on the table right next to my computer, even followed me on walks around the property (which he had NEVER done before). It was so adorable and flattering. How could we resist this cuteness?

Saying goodbye is always hard, especially because Don and Fiona feel like our family. Its weird to leave Ekho and Radar whom we love to bits. Our journey must continue back down the U.S., to Colorado, where we have a few more housesits to partake on top of visiting friends and taking care of business. We have met some super cute new animals, Ginger and Layla (dog and cat) and are now watching the sweetest little girl, Maizee up in the mountains. Spring is still in full-swing which means lots of hiking and exploring, despite the snow in the higher elevations, we are seeing tons of flowers poking their heads out of the ground.

The next several months are going to be cram-packed with adventures, vacations and a brand new country; actually a couple new countries! I’ll be posting all about it while we are en-travelle-modus, so that the few of you who still read our stuff can continue to be entertained by our crazy life. Happy Spring!