Cars and Trucks and Things That Go

So I only told you about a few hours of our weekend yesterday, there is still another day or so to go. Also, I need to add an apology at this point. My post on Sunday was all about "Guess where we went?" with a bunch of random pictures and afterwards I realized, why on earth would you all have known where that was? I wouldn't have known from just the pictures. I think I was pretty tired when I posted that after a crazy weekend and it was an unfair blog post. So I just wanted to apologize for that. Next time I post a "guess where we went" post it will be much clearer and include things like the Eiffel Tower or Times Square or the Pyramids and then you will definitely have better clues. (And no, unfortunately we don't have trips planned to any of those places -- I was just picking easier things to guess.)

As always when we go to Toronto we went to Donny and Marika's. Dave and the kids met me there after I took the subway to their house and Dave and the kids drove in. Sam and Rachel enjoyed pretending to sleep on the stairs and Sam wore Donny's "Noogler" hat which went well with his "coat of many colours" like Joseph's which he made last year.

Marika made this really pretty display of tulips in miniature vases for their table. I really liked it. Marika also made this amazing quinoa-roasted red pepper-chickpea salad with some other things and I ate like three big bowls of it over the weekend. She also sent home an entire container of it for me to enjoy and I ate it all within 24 hours. And now I need to go get the ingredients to make some more. (For the readers I know with dietary concerns, Erika, I think it meets the standards of the Bird Food Diet and Tiffany, if you leave out the feta, I think it's vegan.)

On Sunday we had an adventure geared solely towards Sam and his interests. Although we didn't take cars or trucks we did take subways, buses and streetcars and Sam was in transportation heaven! Rachel got to walk down the stairs like a big girl with Uncle Donny (who has way more patience than Mommy or Daddy) and all of Rachel's dreams came true! Although you can't tell from the picture, Rachel giggled all the way down the stairs.

On the subway

Sam on the subway.

All of us safely at the station!

Sam wanted to sit on the seat at the very back of the bus but didn't want to cooperate for a picture. Although it doesn't look like it here, he actually was having fun.

Sam has a book called "'M' Is For Maple -- A Canadian Alphabet" and in that book "'T' is for Toronto and its tower so tall." "The Tower So Tall" is what Sam calls the CN Tower and he looks for it every time we are in Toronto. This time we thought we would take him to get an up close and personal look. We didn't go to the top because we aren't millionaires. Also we thought we would wait about five years when Sam and Rachel will get more out of the experience and I will have a job which will help pay for it. Ha!

Rachel checked out "The Tower So Tall" from the vantage point of Dave's shoulders. I love the picture on the right where she is trying to look up at it!

We went in the bottom of the CN Tower to see what we could see but it was pretty boring. Then we headed out over the pedestrian bridge and saw that they were doing construction on the tracks, which was definitely a highlight for Sam and Rachel. I think we spent about ten minutes watching these guys work.

After lunch we grabbed a streetcar to a different subway stop. Sam was enthralled and spent the whole time looking out the windows. Streetcars have been an endless fascination to him since he saw them in Toronto last summer.

Then I took some pictures of Rachel and Uncle Donny and Sam and Dave looking at the Spadina stop sign. The Spadina streetcar goes all the way underground to deposit you right at the subway station. It's pretty cool.

I just had to get a picture of the irony of the sign saying "Telephones" and the bricked up wall where the payphones used to be. With everyone having cell phones now, I guess the pay phones just weren't in high demand.

And thus ended our weekend. We all had a lot of fun and can't wait to visit Toronto with Donny and Marika again. Hopefully next time it will be warmer and we can see even more of the city.