vancouver love

thatcher and i have returned from our 5 day trip to vancouver, bc. if you don't remember, i was sent there for a conference for work, and thatcher decided to tag along as it was one of his top "must visit" cities. we enjoyed vancouver so much...such a beautiful place. i'm so glad we were able to go. azalea enjoyed her grandma and grandpa time while we were gone. i'm almost positive we missed her a lot more than she missed us. haha.

the morning i left for vancouver was classic chaos. first of all, i had a ginormous banner display case to take to the airport that would only fit in the back seat, so the plan was to leave azalea with our neighbors, so thatcher could drive me to the airport. welllll 10 minutes before we were going to leave, azalea threw up all over herself. i knew something wasn't right with her earlier that morning when she refused to eat her breakfast and was being sort of clingy. seriously...having to leave town when your baby is sick = torture :( but i had no choice, i had a plane to catch. we decided that instead of sending her to the neighbors' when she was sick, that we would ask our neighbor to give me a ride, so thatcher could stay home with her.

that worked out fine and i was on my way (not without a few tears shed about leaving my sick little hunny). i met my boss karen at the airport. the airport was crazzzy (tons of families going on spring break trips), but we made it to our gate with 10 minutes to spare.

flying over pretty snow-capped mountains

 after arriving in vancouver, karen, myself, and my other boss chris took a taxi to the vancouver convention center to set up our exhibit booth (the conference didn't start until the next day). we took a little break to have lunch at a brew pub across the street, then went back to the convention center to finish up.

the view from the convention centre. unfortunately not from the exhibit hall where i spent most of my time.

when we finished, we had the rest of the afternoon to do whatever we wanted. unfortunately it was raining, so we spent most of it at the hotel, but the free wi-fi was awesome! karen and i did go for a little walk around the area by our hotel, but it was short-lived because of the rain.

we decided to recruit chris to get a pre-dinner drink with us. we found a tiny little place called oyster that was having good happy hour specials. i'm pretty sure they thought we were strange for not ordering any oysters since that's what they're known for. ha! after drinks, we joined karen's brother in law, his wife, and son (who live in vancouver) for dinner. we went to an awesome authentic japanese place. i ate sushi, which i don't do all that often. it was good! we went out for gelato after. so much food, but it was worth it!

we retired to our rooms about 9:30 and i tried to get some sleep before thatcher would arrive in town around 12:45 am. (he took a super late flight out to save money). despite my worries about thatcher taking the train from the airport so late at night, he showed up right on time! we chatted about his journey and then went to sleep for the rest of the night.

luckily the conference didn't start until noon on sunday, so thatcher and i got to explore the area near our hotel for a while that morning. it was sort of chilly walking around (40 and rainy).

...but it was nothing that a yummy, warm mocha couldn't fix :)

 i worked in the exhibit hall at the conference from 12-5. it was slow at times, but pretty good overall. thatcher spent the afternoon checking out the gorgeous scenery:

 it doesn't even look real, does it? 

that night, thatcher accompanied me to a networking dinner hosted by the minnesota chapter of the organization that put on the conference. we met some nice people and had some yummy food at a brew pub down by the water. 

then we enjoyed a rainy walk back to the hotel

stayed tuned for part 2...