So as of right now, my son Traven is officially a citizen of the United States of America!

We woke up bright and early this morning, hopped in the car and off we went on a 3 hour road trip to Calgary for our appointment with the U.S Consulate. Why the consulate isn't in Edmonton, the capital city of Alberta, I'll never know. It would've been easier and less expensive for sure, but it is what it is. It was an adventure at least.

My poor kiddo was pretty overwhelmed right out the gate. Being on a busy downtown city street with cars flying by got him all out of sorts sensory wise so he was pretty miserable once we arrived at the consulate but overall I'm proud of him! He managed to re-focus himself and calm down and then he was pretty patient through the whole two hour and a half hour ordeal. Which isn't easy for any kid, let alone one with autism. So I'm proud of him!

Luckily I had all the forms filled out properly and didn't forget any of my documents. So everything went smoothly. And now my kiddo is a dual citizen and can live in either Canada or the USA if he wants! Something I always wished I had. But I'm happy to be able to give him that little perk. It'll give him endless opportunities and freedom when he's older and he won't have to deal with the immigration bs that I've had to, so that makes me happy. :)

I wanted to take my kiddo to the Calgary zoo when everything was all said and done with but by the time we got out of the consulate it was already almost 4pm and the zoo closed at like 5:30, so to pay $80 for us to get in for an hour and a half didn't seem like a wise choice. So we had to opt out this time around.

So to make up for the lack of the zoo, I decided we would stop at this place called Glenn's Family Restaurant on Gasoline Alley in Red Deer for dinner. I've drove by this place millions of times growing up but never had the chance to stop at it. I always just remembered it as the teapot place because their sign is a giant teapot. So I figured what the hell, lets have a nice dinner.

And boy was I disappointed.

I ordered a 3 egg western omelette for dinner since I'm not eating carbs and it was underwhelming. For $14 I got a rubbery piece of egg with no seasoning and no cheese with a couple mushrooms (that I paid a dollar extra for) and a little bit of ham. Talk about disappointing. I didn't even eat the whole thing, no amount of ketchup could make it better. My kiddo was happy with his mini pizza though! Which was good.

But on the bright side, this restaurant was also a tea shop, hence the teapot. With over 220 varieties of blends and flavours. And me, being the tea junkie that I am, had to buy a couple samples to try! It was a difficult decision. But i ended up walking away with a fruit herbal tea blend called "Peach Ice Cream" and a flavoured black tea blend called "Ciao Amaretto" which has hints of cherry and almond in it. Yum.

I'm hoping they taste better than that omelette did. They smell incredible, I can't wait to try them!

But now I'm finally home and relaxing for the evening. I meant to take more pictures but most of my time was either spent away from my phone while in the consulate or I was in the vehicle. So not many fun pictures to be taken. Lol.

Until next time!

-Chelsea