Homeward Bound

Yikes – it’s been a really long time since our last blog – how can you tell that we are on our last leg of our journey!

When we left the Windsor area, we decided to head west via the USA. After a long wait at the Detroit border crossing and a construction detour through the ever scenic downtown Detroit, we finally got on the road. We went through Michigan, Indiana, Illinois and Iowa without a hitch. Lot’s of corn that is for sure! Ray really wanted to stop at Gary Indiana (Michael Jackson’s childhood home) but the girls and I talked him out of it.

We stopped for a couple of days just outside of Minneapolis, Minnesota at the fanciest ``cashino` that we have ever seen! The Mystic Lake Casino is a huge, new casino that not only has a fancy hotel, great campground, rv gas station, etc, etc – they even had fireworks in the early evening each night. But sad to say Ray didn’t hit the jackpot!

Of course, we spent a day at the Mall of America shopping up a storm. We went to an American Girl store – wow that was something! Dolls galore – can you believe you can take your doll in to the Salon and get their hair done for $20! Emma has a Mall of America story to tell :
(Emma now talking)
Well let me tell you all, on how I got attacked by a sales lady! You know those annoying people in the middle with little stands trying to sell you crappy stuff that no-one wants. It was insane in Mall of America! It was just as bad as Mexico! There was this European lady trying to sell us a fancy dandy hair straighter. She literally grabbed me and pulled me to her both seated me down on the chair and started doing my hair. Mom keep saying on how she wasn’t interested and we had to get going but she wouldn’t listen. Then she started curling my hair with the straighter. Then finally dad came to my rescue and pulled me away. So we are walking throw this busy mall and all of a sudden Mom and Leah start laughing. I ask what they were laughing at and then I looked in the mirror. The lady had only curled one side of my hair!!!! So all day I was walking around with one side of my hair curled and the other side not! It was horrible!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

We zipped through North Dakota with a stop at the Cabala’s store and then we finally were back in Canada!! We decided to pop in at our long time Delburne friends – David and Anita Brandt and family for a visit. A couple of years ago, they moved from Red Deer to an acreage outside of Winnipeg. It was great to visit and catch up with them all!

Our next stop was Grandpa and Grandma’s at the farm in Hamiota. We seemed to be busy doing various things:
*Checking out Grandpa's new tatoo!

*Fishing with cousin Ron at Sandy Lake. Although no fish were caught we still were able to have a yummy shore lunch!
*Spending a couple of days with Aunt Maggie in Brandon *Leah modeling a new Bobcat/Amazon Witch Doctor look
*Visiting a haunted house and picking wild flowers

*Emma visiting her friend Kira in Souris

We’re now on the road again and planning to stop in Regina for a visit with Uncle Ted and Aunt Lois.

Then home………….

Ontario Falls, Fireworks, Family & Friends

YIKES - It's been a long time since our last blog entry.

Since our last blog entry, I returned from Manitoba on Canada Day, to find Ray and the kids surviving in my absence. It was great to spend time with my family, unfortunately, my uncle passed away the very day I returned to Vermont.

Onward to Ontario - we travelled through the US with a stopover at the magnificent Niagara Falls. We actually lucked out and were able to see some fireworks at the falls which were very impressive.

Our next destination was Guelph (technically Ariss) to visit Aunt Sandra and cousin Randy, Nikki and girls. Emma and Leah were thrilled to spend time playing with their cousins and to have a brief visit with cousin Ian!

We took in some of the local sights such as St. Jacobs and Aunt Sandra arranged some impressive photo opportunities like watching the Old Order Mennonites travel through Ontario's only covered bridge with their horse and buggies and of course checking out the Pilkington Overlook! Thanks for the great hospitality!

Next was a visit to friends Mark & Julie and kids in the Windsor area. Dealing with the infamous Ontario heat and humidity was a breeze, since the Vickers' have a beautiful outdoor pool!

We were busy checking out the sites like Point Pelee on Lake Erie which is Canada's most southern point. We also got to watch Abbey's soccer game, Geoffrey's baseball game, see Mark at work at his pharmacy and Ray and Mark managed to get in a few games of golf and relive their "glory days".

We are now slowly heading back home, we are going to go back to Manitoba to visit the family via the US with a few stops along the way - like the Mall of America for one!

Bye for now!