In September, Dave's parents and niece, Lily, came to visit us. The visit coincided with the Jewish holiday of Rosh Hashanah.
After arriving and settling in on Wednesday night, everyone headed off to the synagogue for Rosh Hashanah services the next morning. It gave Dave's family a glimpse the Reform Jewish community in Edmonton. That evening, we went out for dinner to meet a friend, Deb, from Dave's religious school days. We all ended up hanging out back at home, catching up and eating ice cream.
After a visit to the library -- which has an excellent children's section -- on Friday morning, we took advantage of a beautiful fall day and visited the Parliament grounds, which are about a fifteen minute drive from our house.
A nice garden near the buildings.
We wandered around the large green space in front of the buildings, and hung out at a bandshell for a while. That evening, we had a nice Shabbat dinner to mark the beginning of the Jewish sabbath, and enjoyed a dessert of honeycake, apples and honey, which are traditionally eaten on Rosh Hashanah. We used the pottery from Natasha's care group at Waterloo North for the first time.
We took Dave's family along on our Saturday morning routine -- going to the market, visiting the library, and then going to our violin lessons. A clown even made Lily a balloon palm tree with a monkey, at the market.
Lily also spent some time playing with Kessler, our landlord's 9-year-old son, which was a good infusion of kid time for her.
That afternoon, we finally caved in to the unwritten Edmonton rule that "all out-of-province visitors must go to the West Edmonton Mall", and trekked down the Whitemud to West Ed. Despite not being mall people, we had a really good time; Natasha and Dave's mom got facials (at one of the many spas in the mall) while Dave, his dad and Lily hit the waterpark. We met up in time for dinner, and finished the day with a nice meal at The Spaghetti Factory.
Finally, Sunday arrived and it was time for Dave's family to fly home. We saw them off at the airport on Sunday morning, waving as they went through security, and then headed back to town in time to catch (most of) the service at First Mennonite Church. All in all, it was really good visit, and gave Dave's family a much better sense of his new home.
After arriving and settling in on Wednesday night, everyone headed off to the synagogue for Rosh Hashanah services the next morning. It gave Dave's family a glimpse the Reform Jewish community in Edmonton. That evening, we went out for dinner to meet a friend, Deb, from Dave's religious school days. We all ended up hanging out back at home, catching up and eating ice cream.
After a visit to the library -- which has an excellent children's section -- on Friday morning, we took advantage of a beautiful fall day and visited the Parliament grounds, which are about a fifteen minute drive from our house.
A nice garden near the buildings.
We wandered around the large green space in front of the buildings, and hung out at a bandshell for a while. That evening, we had a nice Shabbat dinner to mark the beginning of the Jewish sabbath, and enjoyed a dessert of honeycake, apples and honey, which are traditionally eaten on Rosh Hashanah. We used the pottery from Natasha's care group at Waterloo North for the first time.
We took Dave's family along on our Saturday morning routine -- going to the market, visiting the library, and then going to our violin lessons. A clown even made Lily a balloon palm tree with a monkey, at the market.
Lily also spent some time playing with Kessler, our landlord's 9-year-old son, which was a good infusion of kid time for her.
That afternoon, we finally caved in to the unwritten Edmonton rule that "all out-of-province visitors must go to the West Edmonton Mall", and trekked down the Whitemud to West Ed. Despite not being mall people, we had a really good time; Natasha and Dave's mom got facials (at one of the many spas in the mall) while Dave, his dad and Lily hit the waterpark. We met up in time for dinner, and finished the day with a nice meal at The Spaghetti Factory.
Finally, Sunday arrived and it was time for Dave's family to fly home. We saw them off at the airport on Sunday morning, waving as they went through security, and then headed back to town in time to catch (most of) the service at First Mennonite Church. All in all, it was really good visit, and gave Dave's family a much better sense of his new home.
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