18 posts tagged “nikon d60”
i know it's been a few days since we've returned from our disney world trip.
but i am still thinking about it. a lot. i don't know why... this is probably the first time i've felt this way about a vacation since my amazing adventures in thailand back in 2001 (i backpacked through two cities there with my very best friends - ada, hoa, tai and arvie). even years after that trip, i still think about it with complete fondness. it wasn't just where i was and what i experienced, but it was the perfect group to experience it with.
perhaps that is why i feel similar to our recent disney trip. it has been the best, successful family trip i've had with doug and chaeli. we've been on vacation together before but this is, hands down, the most memorable and most fun we've experienced together!
i know some people can not stand disney - it's a large corporation which is so commercialized, so geared towards branding, marketing and basically, making a large profit. i know the reality behind the perkey mickey ears logo. and while i do prefer a vacation that centres around natural, scenic views and a choice to explore off the beaten path, disney world is different. they really do make a family vacation magical and i wouldn't have known how magical if we hadn't stayed at one of their resorts (which is a first for me - in the past, my parents and i have always stayed outside of disney world which now i have learned, isn't all that much cheaper now that disney opened up four value-resorts).
here are my favourte photos from our trip: http://www.flickr.com/photos/shyeyes/sets/72157622234727185/
it was by far a very good, long civic holiday weekend.
friday night, i came home and cleaned the house almost right away. i should remember to get into the habit of doing this much often because it is so much easier to get it done before my parents come home with chaeli, rather then being interrupted and then picking up where i left off at 10pm (or later) after they leave.
they stayed for three hours first to play jr. scrabble with chaeli, and then just to sit and chat with us.
i was asking them all sorts of questions about our vacation trips we took as a child - most of them being road trips.
it's amazing how much i've forgotten. or... how little i remember. but still, it was fun listening to them tell us what we did and where we went.
saturday morning, we woke up and headed off to rattlesnake point (as seen in the photos of my previous post). what a great two hour hike! i tried to pick a trail that wasn't too difficult. not only did i want to make it easy on chaeli but i haven't gone hiking along the bruce trail for quite some time. as i recalled, there were trails that required a bit of climbing through rocky and steep areas. while this trail did have a few spots of rocky areas, for the most part, it wasn't too difficult for a five year old, so long as one of us helped her.
saturday evening started off with a beverage at my aunt's patio, while we visited with then, my doctor and my doctor's wife. then about an hour later, we headed off to diane and rick's place for a bbq with the rest of the highschool gang. di had marinated some chicken and short ribs (kalbi). yum!
after dinner, the men suspiciously wanted to go to starbucks for a coffee run. we offered to go, instead, so we could leave the kids with them and get in an evening stroll but they bypassed our offer and immediately starting taking our orders. while they were gone, us wives discussed our shared suspicions. i even had to ask diane, "there isn't a golf store by the starbucks, is there?"
after all, the men were gone for a very long time.
when they finally returned, we learned that they also went to get fudge and then... the real reason why they wanted to go instead of letting us... they all came back with cigars.
which didn't bother us. in fact, it was quite entertaining to witness their logic - they bought one $26 cigar and five $5 cigar. the expensive one was passed around. which as ada pointed out, was one of the saddest things we heard.
there they were... five grown men all with good jobs (mostly professional jobs including a project manager and a VP) passing around a cigar instead of just buying one each.
anyway - it was a fun night. and we discovered how much easier it is now that all the kids are old enough to go downstairs and play on their own.
sunday morning, i woke up just after 8am with a mad craving for dim sum. i called my aunt and uncle, asking them if they were interested. and it just so happened that my aunt was also craving for dim sum as of lately so they definitely did want to join us. which is great. because unless we find a place that pushes the carts around, i'm horrible at knowing what to order from a menu. i need the visuals so i can say, "what do you got there? oh yes - that one. two of them please." we're finding that less and less restaurants are still pushing the carts around. which is too bad because part of the appeal are the carts.
for the rest of the day, we didn't do much. chaeli took a much needed three hours nap since she only slept several hours the night before (too short for a kid who needs at least 10 hours of sleep at night). doug prepared a jamie oliver pasta dish which is sort of like a spaghetti entree with some twists, including red wine and chunks of pancetta. it was definitely good, though. probably the best spaghetti i've ever had. and it was very complete with the antipasto we had before hand and the red wine during.
monday was a day of both work and relaxation. i had arranged for chaeli to spend the morning at my aunt's house while i went to the gym for a couple of hours. i called over after lunch and my aunt asked to keep chaeli there until dinner time, in which i would join them for some home-cooked chinese food. doug was at arvie's stag (a home-based stag giving some of the people a chance to join in on the fun, whom couldn't make it to vegas). the boys had some of tai's spicy, korean kalbi and i assume, beer, and then watched a movie in the backyard where tai set up a big screen.
i have to admit that i was a bit jealous that i couldn't go - it sounded like so much fun!
anyway, for monday afternoon, i did laundry but also just chilled out in bed while watching my will & grace dvd's.
saturday morning, we headed out to a part of the bruce trail called rattlesnake point. of which had no rattle snakes. so really... i don't know why they called it rattlesnake point...
we woke up early to head down to high park. doug met up with hoa and our former dragon boat team for an intense run (high park is not a flat piece of land - the hilly landscape draws runners who are looking for a good training ground). while they worked their butt off, chaeli, ada and i went to visit the high park zoo.
what i love about ada (chaeli's god-mother) is her ability to sneak in little tidbits of very untrue facts. for instance, we were viewing bisons and chaeli wanted to know what the huge trough of water was for. we explained that it was just there for the bisons to drink water from. we could have left it at that but of course, ada also added, "and when they have baby bisons, that's where they take a bath."
great. thanks auntie ada. :)
when the boys were done their run, we met up at the restaurnant within the park for a very nice brunch. yum. haven't done that for awhile but it was definitely something we use to do almost every week after our team practice. not a bad way to start the weekend.
a part of me misses that type of lifestyle. it's not so much the competition that i miss. in fact, i don't miss that part of the dragon boating world at all. i miss, though, just being part of a team. and having the ability to train with people that have a common goal. mostly, i sometimes want to get back into that type of group setting where i had to remain more disciplined in getting up early on a weekend and working out outdoors.
after breakfast, we followed ada and hoa over to MEC (Mountian Equipment Co-op). the sale there was pretty good. doug bought three quick-dry t-shirts. i bought chaeli a couple of hats - one which is a quick-dry type material that also has UV protection. and for myself, i bought the bruce trail hiking maps (contained in a tiny 3-hole binder - each trail has a decription plus a fold out map that you can take out for the individual day trips). i've wanted to get one for years and only recently have felt that chaeli is old enough for us to get back into hiking.
finally, we went to about cheese and bought ourselves some very nice cheese for next week's easter weekend (we will be having a wine and cheese luncheon with my family). what i love about this cheese store is how amazing the customer service is. they are there to provide you a load of information and sampling. plus, i haven't been the LGBT community in such a long time. i love it there - there's always people walking about and just enjoying the sunny city on such days. too bad we didn't have time to stay a bit longer. i would have wanted to visit some of the shops around the area.
we had an extremely busy saturday but a very good one.
at 8am, we headed out to the horten farm for their annual maple syrup festival. it was a tad chilly but we definitely got educated about tapping sap out of the tree and then processing it into maple syrup.
after a tractor-wagon ride to the main log cabin, we started our morning off with some freshly made pancakes, drenched in the farm's own syrup. i also bought a litre of it - it happens to be cheaper then buying at the grocery store.
we hadn't told chaeli our surprise - all she knew was that we were heading downtown for dinner. she asked who we were meeting up with (i guess most times, we do meet up with some of our friends when we head downtown - love my city!) but we told her that it would just be the three of us and she'll just have to wait and see where we end up.
i watched her on the subway - she could hardly contain herself with all the suspense.
after making our way through the underpath from union station, we went outside and approached the roger's centre. while inside, she finally clued in from her memories of last year, when we took her to see disney's princesses on ice. except this time, she got a chance to see the characters from cars, little mermaid, lion king (which was spectacular) and the biggest star, tinker bell and her faerie friends. she was beside herself! i stole ada's photos from when she went earlier this week with her niece and nephew (i was too lazy to lug my nikon all the way downtown with us - i did regret it later):
on the way back, we decided to by-pass the crowd and walk a little more north to the next subway station.
the night air was much more still with less wind compared to our morning adventures. the sky was clear and we were able to enjoy the city all lit up and very much active and alive. chaeli felt it was a big deal - rarely do we ever go out walking at night. if anything, anytime we're out that late, we're in a car going or coming home from somewhere.
it felt good to be strolling in the evening in my city. i felt a touch of nostalgia as i passed by certain landmarks, each reminding me of a special moment in my past. even a park bench in a city park had its stories from years ago.
we arrived home around 10:30pm. chaeli was in bed by 11:15pm and fell fast asleep.
i wonder if she dreamt of faeries skating across the ice?
we went to the zoo on family day (this past monday).
what a great decision - the sun was out for most of the time. i asked doug if he was up for the challenge. he said he was so we headed down the very long and steep hill towards the canadian domain. of course, the decline wasn't the hard part. coming back up, we could feel the burn in our quads. we took it slow, though, stopping at the exhibitions along the way.
anyway, here are two of my favourite shots of chaeli and one cool, green foliage from one of the pavilions:
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