Weekending: Happy Halloween!

For the majority of our past Halloween's, we have always travelled to Red Deer (save for the year I was pregnant), to spend it with our nephews. Gone are the days of wanting to dress up and go to house parties, and I truly believe Halloween is way more fun with kids. This year though, now that Sully is a bit older, although still unaware of what Halloween really is, we thought it would be nice to spend it in our own home. I decorated for the first time in ever, even making some of the decorations myself, and we had a blast taking Sully trick-or-treating around our block.

But let's back up for a minute…Friday was spent picking up some last minute Halloween supplies, and then Sully and I popped into Kayben Farms for one last visit before they close for the season. It was fantastic because we practically had the entire place to ourselves. We got to jump on the big pillows for as long as we wanted and without the chaos of other children around, went down the slides a few times - Sully even insisted on going on his own! - but the best part was getting to pet the baby goat. When we were leaving the farm animals area, I noticed the small goat had snuck out of the pen and was digging around in the storage shed. I alerted one of the workers and then she let us hang out with the goat while he ate some feed from a bucket. Sully didn't wasn't that interested in petting him, but he was pretty excited about getting to stand next to him while he ate!

We headed home shortly before having to pick up Jim from the train station and then I dropped the two of them off at home as I had a movie date at the mall with Leigh. We watched The Intern, a really cute and touching movie and ended our evening with some browsing around Old Navy and chatting in the mall hallway. A movie and girl talk is always a great night!

On Saturday, we had my Aunt Max and Uncle Barry over, along with Barry's daughter, Kate and her husband Dan, and their daughter Gwendolyn. We ate a quick supper and then took the kids out trick-or-treating. Sully was pretty shy at first and then one house scared the crap out of him, but we wanted to end the evening on a happy note, so we continued on to more friendly-decorated homes. It didn't take long for Sully to catch on to what was going on, and eventually he was even saying "trick-or-treat" when prompted. I'm kicking myself for not getting any of it on video. I also failed to take any pictures of him in his costume in the daylight so of course, amateur photographer that I am, all of my pictures are pretty terrible and inconsistent, but I'm quite confident that his cuteness factor makes up for my shortcomings.  And yes, we totally let Sully dig into his trick-or-treating stash!

Once Sully was bed, Jim headed off to watch the hockey game with Dan and I spent the evening on the couch with candy and a horrible movie. Seriously, don't watch And So it Goes. Boring and an hour and a half of my life I'll never get back.

Sunday, we spent a good part of the day organizing and cleaning the garage in preparation for my new vehicle that arrived two weeks early! We won't be picking it up until the end of the week, but I'm so excited that it came ahead of schedule. We ended the evening with a few episodes of The Walking Dead and stomachaches from too much candy and chocolate eating. I'm not sure if it's impressive or embarrassing how fast two adults can get through a big bowl of Halloween candy!

How did you spend your Halloween? 

If you dressed up, what was your costume? 

Weekending: Book Club, Wine Festival & Kayben Farms

Can we talk for a moment about how Calgary is just killing it with the weather this fall?! We had temperatures in the high teens again this weekend and it just further confirms my love for October. There's not much I enjoy more than fall days where you don't even need a coat. I'm not sure how many more weekend like this we will get, but we definitely made sure to make the most of it!

Friday, Sully and I didn't get up to much during the day, but that evening I had my very first book club meeting with a book club that I joined on meetup. This book club meets once a month and each member gets a turn picking the book and the restaurant to go to. As someone who is pretty new to the city, it's a nice way to get to experience some new-to-me restaurants. This month's book was Go Set a Watchman by Harper Lee and was a great book to be able to discuss. I was a bit nervous when I showed up, but everyone was really nice and welcoming and it was easy to get lost in the conversation. It also helped that I wasn't the only newbie. No pictures, because I'm not that brave in a new group of people!

Saturday, I hopped on the train and met up with my Aunt Max at the Rocky Mountain Wine & Food Festival for their afternoon tasting. I had never been to a wine tasting event before, so when I won tickets from Laura I was pretty excited! My original game plan was to stick to champagne and white wine, but eventually I just had to taste some of the beer too. Probably not my wisest decision as the rest of my afternoon and evening was a bit of a write off if you catch my drift.

It's hard to remember everything you taste, but I did take pictures of the ones I really enjoyed. I'm a huge bubbly/prosecco/champagne lover and these were my favourites. The beers I tasted, while not bad, were not noteworthy enough to include. I did make sure to sample the Uber Caesar as I love me a good Caesar! This was so delicious and something I would definitely buy. Under a blind test, I would never have guessed this was a Caesar from a bottle. It puts the Mott's Clamato Caesar's to shame. And fun fact: did you know the Caesar was invented in Calgary back in 1969?

{clockwise from top left: rosalia giusti//anna de codorniu//lamarca prosecco//bolla prosecco}

Of course, some food was sampled too! The Bernard Callebut Dark Chocolate Cream Cheese Brownie was just the perfect amount of sweetness. The Pulled Pork & Red Cabbage Cornbread Slider (with a Signature Double Chocolate Pecan Cookie on the side) from SAIT Culinary Campus was so, so tasty.  The highlight was definitely the gelato from Fiasco's. The servings were generous and the flavours we chose (Bourban Vanilla Bean and Dark Chocolate Caramel Sea Salt) were to die for.

On Sunday, after a lazy morning, we decided to head out to Kayben Farms in Okotoks. I had heard good things about it and I wanted to go before they close for the year at the end of the month. We couldn't have asked for a nicer day to go, or a quieter one. It often felt like we were the only ones there, so it was pretty cool to do the corn maze all on our own! Sully had a great time riding the tractor train, jumping on the pillows, seeing the farm animals, going on the slides, and leading the way through the corn maze. They had a deal where if you bought a 2016 season pass (only $35), you can use it for admission all of October. So that's exactly what I did because I know we will be back next year (and possibly one or two more times before the end of the month!).

Hope you all had a great weekend!

Have you ever been to a wine tasting festival? 

Tell me something fun you did this past weekend!