Trip to Canada Continued...

When we finally arrived in Buffalo, NY we had to wait for the paperwork from the attorney before we could cross the border. We arrived on Monday night and thought we would end of staying a couple nights... It ended up being 7 days! We were sick of hotels and eating out by the time the week ended. The kids swam every single chance that they had.. this meant that we had sick kids every night from the the chlorine they inhaled. 

We went to the Walden Galleria (mall) and took Skyler to Build-A-Bear for the first time. He picked out a monkey and we named him Benny.. he is a New York Yankee.

The city of Buffalo has around 1.2 million people and it originated around 1789. When you travel through downtown there is a mixture of old and new buildings, it is full of factories and old churches.  

This is the arena where the NHL team the Buffalo Sabres play. 

Red Robin

And Buffalo is where the "Buffalo Wings" originated! We of course had to stop and eat at the ANCHOR BAR, home of the original chicken wing. But the pictures were on Kennedy's Ipod which froze and she lost all of her pictures! We are not having any luck.. time to buy a new camera! 

O Canada

After a week of lounging in a hotel and sightseeing in Buffalo NY we finally made it across the Canadian Border. It took us quite awhile to find our place because our GPS apparently does not work in Canada and our smart phones are too expensive to run the internet out of the country. So we drove around for quite awhile until we arrived at this : 

I love that we do not have to move furniture every where we go.. We walk in and it is all taken care of for us. What has been even more great is the Pena's are right down the road from us. So the kids have other kids to play with and I do too! 

We did not waste anytime getting the kids in school. They had been out part of November and the whole month of December. It was really fun to get all 7 kids registered for school and started on there first day. The teachers were very welcoming and all gathered around to introduce themselves and they made sure that they were welcomed by the other students. 

Kennedy and Tyken and HP were both moved up a grade because of there birthdays. So we had Tyson in 8th grade, Kennedy and Trystyn in 7th, Tyken in 5th, Raigan and HP in 2nd, and Aiden in Kindeeegarten ( not a typo, that is how they say it here). The kids adjusted very quickly and have loved it. Canadiens spell some words differently here.. All words with O have a U added: Colour, Favourite, and Centre is spelled different as well. And a Douatang is a folder. .. who knew? 

During school the kids get to stand up and sing O Canada.. It is really pretty hearing them all sing it together when they come home from school. 

Trip to Canada

I know.. I know.. my New Year Resolution was on following through and I am just now gettting around to writing about our Trip to Canada. I am frustrated because the pictures that we took our on a disc that will not bring them up. So rather then procrasinate any longer I am going to do the best I can and hopefully post pictures later.

Cheyenne Wyoming

We started out early on Friday January 7th. Our first stop was Cheyenne Wyoming it would be a 9 hour drive. We have WONDERFUL friends Hanna and Chris Terrill who sent us with BAGS of snacks and drinks. We ended up saving a lot of money and time. And my kids are really good travelers.. I mean REALLY GOOD. They hardly ever complain and do not have to be constantly entertained. Even 2 year old Skyler can handle being in the car all day. Anyso, Dustin and I were having some great conversation and did not realize that we were out of gas and in the middle of nowhere. Little America was the next stop and it was about 26 miles away. We just kept chugging away and prayed that we would make it. We made it off of the exit and ran out a quarter of a mile away from the gas station. Dustin walked the rest of the way, we ate a quick lunch, and were on our way. We made it to Cheyenne, stayed at a Holiday Inn Express, and stopped the next morning to see the WORLDS BIGGEST STEAM LOCOCMOTIVE... Luckily, Kennedy had pictures on her ipod.

Our next stop was about 9 hours away in Omaha Nebraska.. We were really excited for this stop because Devan is on his mission here. The drive was incredibly boring.. flat land the whole way through, there seemed to be no end in sight.

We stayed at the COCO Key Resort, it has a HUGE indoor water park that we had a blast playing in. I took probably a hundred pictures that I am not able to pull up. Skyler ran back and forth to every little thing there and was constantly going down the little kids slides. I hardly ever saw the other kids because they were off on the big slides or the lazy river the whole time. 

The next morning we got up to leave and found the only spanish speaking church in Omaha. It was a Sunday so we were pretty sure we would run into Devan there. Dustin went in by himself and found him. He was pretty shocked to see him.. and if you see from the picture below, Dustin did not look like himself so it took awhile for Devan to realize who it was.

Because of my lack of direction and of planning I did not realize that we were so close to Winter Quarters  until we passed it. We are definitely going to make a stop on our way back.  We made it to Tindley Park, IN.. really close to Gary Indiana. We stayed at the Hilton Garden Inn. Skyler threw up in the middle of the night, we thought he was fine, but at the Cracker Barrel he threw up his chocolate milk EVERYWHERE. We had an amazing waitress who insisted on cleaning everything up. She even took my food and kept it warm for me while I was in the bathroom cleaning Skyler up. 

We had a change of plans and went to Port Huron, MI instead of Buffalo to cross the border. When we were almost there the Dome Office called and said they were having problems with the attorneys and we might not be able to cross the border. 4 DAYS OF DRIVING AND WE MIGHT HAVE TO GO BACK! We grabbed a hotel and actually slept in until 9:30. We were now headed to Buffalo, because that is where the attorneys are. Another 7 HOURS OF DRIVING! That may not seem like a lot but when you have a mindset that you are done driving for awhile 7 hours seems like eternity. 

Well 7 hours turned into 9, because we got to drive through the worst blizzard of the season. It was a very intense drive. I am extremely grateful that Dustin was driving and we were able to get there in one piece. We stopped in a town next to Buffalo called Hamburg. 

The attorneys would not be ready for us until Wednesday. So we were ready to stay in the hotel for a couple nights and then be on our way to cross the border. 

Well.... It turned into 7 nights in a hotel with no kitchen. It was a long 8 days. The kids pretty much swam in the pool all day, every day. They ended up with rashes and sick to there stomach every night, that was great. 

This is turning out to be a really long post, pretty much like the trip. I will continue our Buffalo sight seeing and the actual border crossing on the next one. 

NeW YeaR ThEmE: FoLLoWinG ThRouGH

Over the past few months I have been thinking about the way my family and I function. I have noticed a unhealthy pattern developing over the last few years that has got to change. Just like every New Year we make goals and are really motivated to change but we end up with a million excuses as to why we don't. Eating healthy, getting rid of the rolls on our stomachs and thighs,  reading the scriptures together, family home evening consistently, budgeting better, saving money, are all things that we always have good intentions of doing but we never FOLLOW THROUGH! I start a new workout, or make a new scripture reading chart, and as soon as I miss a day, I stop, frustrated with myself for not being disciplined.

The great thing about Dustin's job is that every 6 months or so we get to go to a new place. A fresh start, a new beginning. When we found out that we were going to Ontario, Canada, we were really excited. I have always wanted to live in a big city and the surrounding areas will be a great cultural experience for the kids.

The beginning of the year is an excellent time to move to a new place. I have been excited to implement all of my New Year's resolution and to get my family on track. So we set out on our journey from Idaho to Ontario Canada... 1938 miles. It ended up being 2400 ( I will explain that in a later post). And we are in Buffalo NY, we have been for 6 days, waiting for our Resident Visas. We have been in hotels for 10 days. Now that has kind of put a damper on my goal of FoLLoWinG ThRouGH.

Needless to say this week has been a little frustrating. The kids NEED to be in school. Dustin NEEDS to be working, and I need to be working on getting the family to function better.

Today being Sunday, and it feels like we havent been to church forever, I took the kids down to swim, again. I opened up the Gospel Library to read the scriptures (since I packed all of ours) and I listened to some amazing Mormon Profiles on mormon.org.

As I sat there and watched my kids play with each other, occasionally hit or push or yell, and then start playing again like nothing happened, I realized how content I really am. Yes, we are ready to go back to organization and structure. But instead of being discouraged because things have not gone they way we have wanted them to, we are having fun, and enjoying the journey.

My goal and our family Motto for the NEW YEAR is to Follow Through and ENJOY THE JOURNEY. To show my kids that hard work pays off, that it is important to always do your best, but it is just as important to relish in the moment and take time to smell the roses. And that no matter what circumstances we find ourselves in to find the good in everything.

New Blog for the New Year.....

Happy New Year!