the heywoods come to town...

yesterday morning i tearfully said goodbye as mom, dad, uncle ken and auntie heather headed off to the airport. they arrived on monday, feb 4 and spent the past week and a half spoiling me rotten! it was wonderful.

some of the highlights of the trip included an overnight stay at the Grand Hotel Pupp. if anyone here has seen the movie, "the last holiday" (not to be confused with "the holiday"), then you know what i'm talking about. lets just say i didn't leave quite the mark queen latifah did on the hotel and staff, but it was a blast nonetheless. we went to the spa and saunas, had a fabulous meal at a local german restaruant and walked around the breathtaking city. apparently, the nickname for karlovy vary (where the pupp is located) is called 'little russia' since almost half the people that live there are russian. the pupp is almost 300 years old and in 1701 was the biggest hotel in europe. not bad, eh? considering canada wasn't even a country yet!

we also toured around prague, seeing the old clock tower, the castle and cathedral, getting the best view of prague from the top of petrin hill and hitting up a ton of great restaurants. thankfully we did so much walking or we'd all be on the lettuce diet right now! the crew also got a taste of regular life for me, coming out to practice and seeing two games on the weekend. the games were both blowouts, but the second game was a bit of a gong show, so at least that was entertaining! apparently there's some bad blood now between our team and plzen, the team we played on sunday. next game with them should be interesting.

dad and uncle ken also got to show off their hockey prowess by joining us on the ice for two practices. it was great to have them out there - kind of weird for me though as my two worlds came together. i'm glad my team and coaching staff got to meet some of my family and vice-versa.

we also spent some quality time playing cards, which i never seemed to be able to win. another interesting passtime was watching dad and uncle ken learn to drive in prague - definitely an acquired skill!

already, i miss them, but i'll be home before i know it and there's still so much for me here! but such a blessing to have them here in my new home across the world. :)