Canadian Summer Trip: Alberta: Day 4 Royal Tyrell Museum (Dinosaur Museum)

 On day 4, we woke up super early and hit the road at 6 am to get to the Royal Tyrell Dinosaur Museum.  It is about 3 hour drive from Edmonton to the south.  On the way, we saw the vast flat land that Canada has.  We saw hundreds of beaver dams and lakes, but we did not see any beavers.  (too bad)

Royal Tyrell Dinosaur Museum

It has many live sized dinosaur models and skeletons:

I took so many pictures, but I should not spoil it for everyone.  There are way more skeletons then these for the people who love dinosaurs.

On the same day, it was the "community day" for Pokemon Go app.  For those who are familiar with Pokemons.  There are dinosaurs in the Pokemon world as well.  On that day, it was also the community day for "Deino", one of the dinosaurs in the Pokemon world.  

Perfect timing!  We were catching dinosaurs in the dinosaur museum!

Oh, there was the cute prairie dogs in Alberta.  These cute little things are everywhere:

Alberta prairie dog

After the museum, we were heading to Calgary on a 1 hour and 45 minute drive.

Canadian Summer Trip: Alberta: Day 3 World Waterpark (West Edmonton Mall)

 We headed to the World Waterpark on Day 3 of our trip.  It is the world's largest indoor waterpark with man-made wave pool and lots of waterslides.  

World Waterpark slides

They have so many kinds of slides.  Some are fast and some are super fast.  Some are pitch black and some are just vertical with 360 twists.  My kids have so much fun, and the only downside is the line up on a busy day.  We have to wait for almost 30 minutes for one slide.  My kids really like the wave pool as it simulates the natural waves in the ocean without the dangerous depth.

They have different color coding for different "thrilled" level each person can tolerate.  I would suggest if the person is scared of height and speed, they should only go for the beginner slides.

Canadian Summer Trip: Alberta: Day 2 West Edmonton Mall

 For the second day, we walked around the humongous West Edmonton Mall.  This mall is still the largest shopping mall in Canada and has the biggest shopping mall parking lot in the world.  It has the world's largest indoor water park (World Waterpark), a theme park (Galaxyland), indoor kart racing, kids playing area, a small aquarium, skating rink, and all kinds of brand name shops.  

Aquarium area with sea lion show:

West Edmonton mall Sea Lion show

The sea lion:

They are soooooo cute!!

Heck, they even have a pirate ship inside the mall:

West Edmonton Mall Pirate Ship

They have a big Lego shop:

West Edmonton Mall Lego Shop Lamborghini

They have a T&T Supermarket, and they even have a large Asian scenery display:

West Edmonton Mall Asian Display

This mall is so big that we get tired just by walking around.  It has almost everything in there, and there is so many things for young people to do.

There is even a restaurant street with different kinds of food.

They have all kinds of wall art on display in the mall:

We planned to head to the Waterpark the next day.

Cute Duck Eating Sunflower Seeds with Cute Squirrel in Burnaby Lake

 We went to Burnaby Lake to feed the birds and to see nature on the 2nd day of January, 2022.

It is a cold day with lots of snow still on the ground.  We found good parking spot because of this.

Right beside our parking spot, there are lots of birds and squirrels already trying to find food.

There was this cute duck following us and a few squirrels:

Look at them sharing the space?  So cute!!

My son made a table for them to eat seeds.

They both ate off the table.  The squirrel waited till the duck was gone.

New Kumamon Country Ma'am Cookies in Suzuya

 

I saw this pack of this famous Japanese cookies "Country Ma'am" in Suzuya in Burnaby the other day.  In Japan, there are usually many kind of local food and manufacturers will make different taste of cookies in different regions.

Kumamon is a mascot from the Kumamoto prefecture in Kyushu region, Japan.  This box's taste is "Yakimaron".  I supposed that it is chestnut flavor...

Kumamon Kumamoto Country Ma'am

I did not buy it as all import cookies are double or triple priced in Canada.  It is tough to live away from Japan when you love the food there.

Lego Minecraft Bumble Bee Set for My Son's Birthday

Lego released a Minecraft bumble bee set, and I bought it for my son's birthday.  (One of the gifts he got) 

Lego Minecraft Bumble Bee Set

The bees look very cute and my kids liked it!  I think you get 7 or 8 bees with it.

Animal Crossing Update and Series 5 Amiibo Cards

Animal Crossing had a very large update last week, and they also released a new series of amiibo cards (Series 5).  All the websites had sold out of the cards the first day, and I finally found some on Amazon.ca.  They were 7 Canadian dollars, and as usual, they had a 2 packs per person limit.

I got a couple of new characters including Rio and Cephalobot.  It is truly a big update with thousands of new items and hundreds of new DIYs.  My kids and I were very excited for it.

New Koala's March: Pokemon Collaboration

 

I found this one new Koala's March in the supermarket again.  

This time it is a Pokemon collaboration!

The box has Pikachu and Cinderace's pictures on it.  The taste is cheese cake.

Koala's March Pokemon with Cinderace

Koala's March and Pokemon

The interesting thing is that on each snack, not only it has different koalas on it, it has different Pokemon's drawing on it.

For example, it has Pikachu, Cinderace, Pinsir, Bewear, Marill, etc.

Koala's March and Pokemon collaboration

Taste-wise, I don't think it is anything special.  The characters are very cute though if you are a pokemon fan.

New Koala's March in Canada Review: "Bitter Chocolate" and "Milk and Cheese"

 Recently, I found two new Koala's March snack boxes in the nearby supermarkets.

There are two new kinds of tastes:  "Milk and Cheese" and "Bitter Chocolate".

Koala's March Milk & Cheese and Bitter Chocolate

Milk and Cheese:  It is tasty but I taste more milk than cheese.  It is good but I don't feel as much impact.

Bitter Chocolate:  I actually like this one better.  It feels like a thicker chocolate, different than the original taste.  It tastes more luxurious and mature.

Conclusion:  I think I will try the bitter chocolate again.

New Super Mario Bros Products!

I have always been a big super mario bros fan since I was small.  I have always wished we had as many toy selections as the kids now.  They are lucky!

We had nothing like these new toys.  The one below emulates the mario game scenaries:

Super Mario Game Toys

It was kids' dream back then to have these ones to play with or to at least display on desks.

back of mario toy package

I actually bought a few of these to let me kids play and display in the room.

There are also constantly new mario kart toys coming out like these ones:

New Mario Kart Pull back kart 2014

I have bought many mario kart toys, so I don't think I will be buying these full price.

Mario and Yoshi new karts 2014

Again, lucky kids nowdays, but I guess things continue to progress, my kids will say the same thing to their kids.

Easter 2014: Coca Cola Bunny

...This is a late Easter post...

While I was shopping during Easter this year, I saw this huge Coca Cola wall display in a supermarket (Save-on-Food).  It is rare to see this kind of display in Canada.

I thought this looks really interesting, so I took a picture:

Supermarket Easter Bunny Coca Cola

The supermarket displays in North America are usually uniform from branch to branch.  They don't have interesting displays as much as Asia.  I thought this is rare.

Lego: Valentine Heart House with Mushrooms in the Garden

We brought the kids out to Lego Store in Surrey's Guildford Centre.

It is actually our first time in Guildford Centre and could not believe how spacious it is.
I was not familiar with the mall and had a hard time navigating through the crowd.

Anyway, we got some pieces through the "all you can stuff" can.  (about 20 dollars plus taxes)

My wife built this small beach house with heart on top....just in time for Valentine's Day. haha

Lego Heart Valentine Beach House Garden

We also bought a monthly mini build set that includes a gardening family, trees and 3 mushrooms.
The mushrooms looked cute,and that is why we got it.

It is hard to spot the mushroom in this picture.

I think I want to go back soon because we don't have enough basic pieces.

Lego Sorting Trays for Special Parts

People say kids would like what parents like.  My kids started to get a taste of Lego's basic sets.

We found these sorting trays in Fred Meyer's in Washington State, and they are very useful in sorting all the basic and special Lego parts.

Lego Sorting Trays for special parts

Twinkle Toof for Kids Losing Teeth

One thing happened during the first 3 months is that my older kid is losing his teeth.

To celebrate this event, I have order the Twinkle Toof box for him from the US.

It looks very cute, glows in the night, and I have always wanted it.

I remembered that it was about 10 to 12 dollars including shipping.
However, it beats drive down to the US just to buy this....even though it would save me 5 dollars...

Christmas House Light in Burnaby, BC, Canada

There is a famous house in Burnaby that has been in the newspaper and has visitors visiting.

Fortunately, I live very close by and could bring my family and visitors to take a look!

All you need to do is to drop by and take pictures and donate a couple of dollars for Children's hospital.

The person spent about a week of his own vacation time and hand crafted some of the light designs.

He put up about 20,000 lights in and around his yard.

When I counted, there were about 11 snowmans all around the house and yard.

Even the garage, roof and drive way are heavily decorated with thousands of lights.
Amazing!

They had Santa, Angel, Penguins, everything you can think of for the Christmas season.

I hope they do this every year because it is neat sight to see!
I am not sure how they can pay the hydro bills or sleep in these lights. haha

Christmas Gifts: Innotab and Mario Kart 7

I bought my two kids Christmas gifts that they have to learn how to share.

They are loving these gifts.  It is still a little early for my 2-year-old to play the kids tablet.

Inno Tab and Mario Kart 7

They are loving the tablet, Innotab 2, right now because they can buy different learning games such as Mickey Mouse or Cars or all kinds of other children animations.

My older kid loves to play Mario.  I try not to let him play during the weekdays though because I know it is not good for kids to play that much.

I hope this has been a good Christmas for my kids, and I think they had a lot of fun!

H&M Kids Star Shirt

My son's class has a Christmas concert this month, and we needed to get him a shirt for that.

We found a nice kids' shirt in H&M.

H&M Kids dots shirt

It has nice cute little stars on the shirt which can be used in formal or semi-formal occasions.

H&M Kids star dots shirt 2