Oh, Canada!

Every two summers growing up Lincoln and his family drove 30+ hours to visit the family cabin on Essig Island in Ontario, Canada. All sorts of Essig family stories have originated from this family trip: from car engines fires and fish hooks in eyes to boat engines just about breaking off boats and sinking into the lake, and everything in between.

This year was the first year all the marrieds and their families were able to go, and the entire family (minus the missionaries) made the trek to Essig Island. Most of the family started off from Utah in the new RV, while the DC Essigs flew in from DC.

This was not only Eva's first plane ride and vacation, but her first international trip. It was Ali's first time to Canada as well. Little did we know how much you have to pack for one baby.

On the flight up we were delayed for an hour getting out of DC and missed our connection. We were put on standby for the next flight 4.5 hours later and guaranteed a spot on the flight 9 hours later. As we waited to see whether we would make it onto the first flight we quickly realized our biggest problem wasn't landing late, but not having enough diapers for Eva. Being the new parents that we are, we had not planned on a long layover and only had one extra diaper. As our stay grew longer we started looking for parents of small children and asking for extra diapers. Unfortunately, no one had newborn size diapers. Most had size 2-3 (15-25 lbs) almost triple Eva's size. To use them we had to roll the front and back of the diaper over several times to make it fit.

As the first flight time approached, we sat by the terminal door and counted the people that entered. When there was 5 minutes before shutting the doors, there were still a few seats left and we thought we might make it. Unfortunately, 2 minutes later we saw the last few passengers huffing and puffing as they made it to the gate. When all was said and done there was only one seat open and we were stuck for another 4.5 hours.

We decided we needed to get out of the airport or we'd go crazy. The Mall of America (the biggest mall in America) was only 15 minutes away and we decided to go check it out and see if we could watch a movie while we waited.

The mall was HUGE! It was so big that they had a theme park in the middle of it.

We took Eva on her first Ferris Wheel ride.

After our fun escape, we returned to the airport and arrived at our final destination without event.

Lincoln's mom was waiting for us at the airport and we rode to the island on the Essig Family boat, which is ~40 years old.

At the Island...

Eva met GG Essig

her cousins

and Uncles and Aunts.

As always there was a lot to do on the Island. While there, we...

Swam

Fished

took Family Pictures

Boated (in the 40 year old boat)

Played Games

Pretended we were Rambo

Read

Relaxed

Slept

enjoyed the Beautiful Sunsets

and the Essig men grew beards (or at least didn't shave).

We loved our time in ol' Canada and can't wait to go back. Thankfully, the trip home was uneventful.

And when we got home Lincoln played with his new facial hair.