Vacation 2013 - Niagara Falls/Toronto!

Only a month late on these vacation pictures! :)  I want to get them up because we have plenty going on that I will have more pictures of...we are in the process of buying a house and moving!!!  Things are about to get crazy (more than usual, I mean) around here, so I wanted to get these pictures up before I totally forgot about our vacation.  It already seems like way more than a month ago!

Greg and I and the kids drove out to Niagara Falls to start out the vacation.  We stayed at the Embassy Suites on the Canadian side and had a room on the 36th (I think) floor!  The view was AWESOME!

We got in on Friday afternoon...it was pretty hazy/rainy/foggy, but it cleared off that night enough to see the pretty lights!

The next day, Saturday, we went to MarineLand, which is kind of a small Sea World mixed with a small Six Flags.

Our first stop was to watch the orca and belugas...this was my favorite.  Free Willy used to be my favorite movie ever, and orcas are still one of my favorite animals.  Seeing this one up close and just watching it swim...it was awesome.  SO beautiful!

They had a deer park inside this 'castle' entrance, so we had to get a picture of our princess in front of the castle!

And our handsome prince.

Okay, and our three goofy kids!  I didn't get any good pictures of the deer on the camera, but I have pictures and video on my phone.  At first, Max was upset that they wouldn't let him pet them...then we found the lady selling deer feed and the kids about got trampled!!!

Past the animals were all of the rides.  Max and Nora LOVED this part!  Here is Max riding his submarine all by himself on "Ocean Odyssey."  He looked so little!  Greg and Nora rode together.

Nora was so sad she was too short for this ride...I think Greg would have gladly given her his place!  It went in circles...very fast!

Nora was big enough for the "Sky Hawk," though!  More circles for Greg!  The things you do for your kids, right?!!?

We watched the sea animal show at 11:30...it was amazing.  Belugas, dolphins, sea lions, walruses...and the animals actually DID things, like jumps and tricks, etc.  It seems like places in the States are all so concerned about the animals being 'abused' that all they do is swim around the ring any more.  Anyway, it was a fabulous show.

The walruses were some of our favorites.  They are HUGE and it was so funny just watching them move!

Love the dolphins, as always!

This stellar picture might be the only one of all four kids from the whole trip.  At least the big ones are all (almost) looking!

After the show, we headed to the far corner of the park where Greg wanted to ride the one roller coaster in the place.  He hadn't been on one in so long that he wanted to try it.  Well, he found out that it's REALLY been a while...he almost blacked out on this loop de loop!

I *think* he enjoyed the ride overall, though. :)  He's somewhere in that first or second car.

Next up, Max got to pet and feed a beluga whale!  Neither of the girls wanted to do it, so just Max and Greg got up close to them.  I love how it looks like this one is talking to Max!

Awww.

Gulp!  See the fish Max just threw in?  (And is "Baby Beluga" going through anyone else's head?  I bet it is now!) :)

Then we headed back to the section of kids' rides that we somehow totally missed before.  Greg, Max, and Nora rode the miniature ferris wheel.

Tirzah would have, but by the time we walked there she had totally crashed in the stroller!

This was hilarious...Greg, Max, and Nora waited in line for a while for this roller coaster.  The kids were SO EXCITED to be in the front!  Every time they came around I just held the shutter down...and in all 30 or so pictures, Nora's face is exactly the same!  They LOVED it!

Last ride of the day...this viking ship went around and up and down a bit and slung them around...Greg was NOT a huge fan of how he felt afterwards.  He was a trooper and the kids very clearly inherited his penchant for rides!

We headed back to our hotel and ate at a place called My Cousin Vinny's.  Here is where I show my complete stereotypical female ignorance of vehicles and say, "Here is this really nice car that was outside the restaurant that Greg thought was cool.  I think that's a horse on the decal, so maybe it's a mustang?  No clue."
**Ahem...Mustang?  Oh my...no sweetie...that is a Ferrari! Oh my you've just offended the Italians reeeeallly bad!" - Sincerely your not very car savvy hubby that DOES know a Ferrari when he sees one!

This was my pizza, I believe the margherita bianca...and it was the most amazing tasting pizza I've ever had.  Absolutely delicous!

I think everywhere we ate in Canada, the kids' meals came with ice cream.  Tirzy was nice enough to share with me.

But she kept plenty for herself, don't worry!

Max thoroughly enjoyed his spaghetti or whatever it was he ate!

My handsome man even got a cappuccino!

The view from our hotel room just never got old.  Look close enough just to the left of the middle of this picture and you can see a faint rainbow.

Canadian Falls

Oh, Max.

Lovely Nora.

Tirzy Tunks

Just awesome!

Greg had taken Max and Nora down to 'Journey Behind the Falls' on Friday night, so on Saturday night I wanted to walk down and see them so I could be up close to them once before we left.  Since it was a holiday weekend (Canada Day was the next Monday), there were fireworks Saturday night (usually they are only Friday and Sunday nights) as well as live music and LOTS of people.  It was a little hectic with the kids and Griffin wasn't a fan of all the noise, but we did get to see the falls up close and see the lights, at least.

So pretty!

Standing here made me dizzy...all that water rushing over the edge!

We took a taxi back up to the hotel (the kids' FAVORITE part!) and got ice cream.  Then we made it back up to our hotel room just in time to see the grand finale of fireworks!  Again, the videos are on our phones.

Sunday morning we went to a butterfly conservatory before leaving Niagara Falls for Toronto.

So many neat butterflies!

Lots and lots of colors

This one hitched a ride on Greg's backpack and stayed there quite a long time!

Love that green.

Apparently one liked my hair, too.

Some of them were just huge!

They also had a butterfly 'nursery' with a ton of chrysalises.  I think a couple were coming out as Greg and the kids watched.  Little did I know then that we would be our own little butterfly nursery in a few weeks!  (More on that in a later post.)

Sunday night we went to a couple of neat parks with Nate, Steph, their girls, and Katy.  Pics on the phone, I think.  Monday we got up and went to the zoo.  They had something called the Gorilla Climb which was basically a ropes course up in the air.  Greg and Max went on it...I wasn't sure how Max would do, but he did amazing!

Thumbs up...they'd already walked across a few parts here and were loving it!

Max did awesome...he held on to his rope great and was so sure footed!

Yes, they kept going higher and higher!  Greg said that a couple of them made him pause a bit!

I think Max's face is hilarious.  This is after they came back down a little lower again.

What a champ!

Last thing at the zoo...a camel ride!

On Tuesday we went to the Royal Ontario Museum to see the dinosaurs!  No fabulous pictures, but there is this one:

Max and Nora are each holding a REAL vertebrae of (I think) a parasaurolophus!  How amazing to think that it was part of a real dinosaur!

On Wednesday, Greg and I were going to go to Casa Loma and Nora wanted to go, too.

My princess! (And Griffin!)

A beautiful hazy skyline view from the castle

I'm not sure that the 'castle' was exactly what Nora expected, but she did great!

The right side of this house is what we shared with Dad and Mom Beutel, Katy, and Nate and Steph and their girls.  It really worked out pretty good!  By the end we were all ready for our own space, but to fit all of us in there for a week, it was rather impressive. :)

I don't have any pictures of the rest of the week because it was pretty much filled with barbershop.  Most of the adults would go and watch the shows while someone stayed back with me and the kids and watched it on the live webcast.  Our plans got changed a bit when After Hours made the top 10!  We got a hotel room in Toronto for Saturday night so Greg and Steph could go watch them sing.  If I remember right, AH ended up placing 8th, which is SUPER!  Then, Sunday morning, we met Nate and Steph and drove together to Warren Dunes.

Somewhere in the middle of the picture is Nate with the girls and a little farther up is Greg and Tirzah.  Max might not even be in the picture...he is up top somewhere!

The dunes weren't ideal for Griffin, so after the kids swam in the lake a bit we headed for home.  After a few tense decision making times of how to best avoid all the Chicago traffic headed home from the weekend, we ended up going down to 24 to get home.  And it was a GREAT thing we did, as we ended up stopping at Darl and Janelle's to see them, A. Diane, as well as Denver, Sharon, and their boys (one of them only a week old!)   The kids were absolutely thrilled to be at somebody's house with toys after staying in the townhouse for a week, and I was able to get the sand out of their underwear/diapers and get jammies on before heading home.  As usual, it wasn't a relaxing vacation, but it sure was FUN! :)