Niagara Winter Wonderland

Hola!

We had our "February Break" last week, so the kids were out of school.  Lots of people go skiing that week, and many of their/our friends went someplace WARM for the break.  I was hearing "Puerto Rico," "Mexico," "Florida..." Peshaw!  We stayed in the frigid north :)

We left town and stayed cold.  We went for the Winter Wonderland Niagara Falls Tour: February 2014! (remember, you can double-click on the photos to see them bigger.)

CROWDS...NOT. The most surprising part was how empty it was!  We had a lot of the touristy things to ourselves.  We have been there in July, and we know how you stand in line for even a good "photo op" along the railing by the falls.  People everywhere.  (And some of them are a little oblivious to...everything.)  So we walked up to the windows for tickets to the many touristy attractions, it was already our turn!  It was awesome.

SkyWheel, temperature controlled

SKYWHEEL.  They have a huge ferris wheel, where you can see the falls from a helicopter-like view, since you are so high.  There are 40 cars to fill.  The 2 times we rode it, maybe two other cars even had people in them, besides ours.

GUINNESS MUSEUM.  Sometimes these museum displays can be very unpleasant.  People do pretty ridiculous things to get their name up in lights, or whatever.  But curiosity won, and we went in.

GLOW GOLF.  This whole mini-golf place was painted in florescent paint, so when they turn on the black lights, everything glows. Plus some of our clothing, plus our teeth when we smiled.  Very entertaining, and a little creepy at the same time.

BUTTERFLY CONSERVATORY.  It's always fun to visit the butterflies, especially for me when they keep it 84 degrees inside, even though it's 25 degrees outside.  Here are some of our fluttery friends. And a tropical frog.

NIAGARA FALLS. The falls themselves are magical!  It's like looking at a Real-Life Wintery Wonderland.  Of course the water is flowing underneath the ice, but one person who works there said 2 weeks ago, the whole thing was frozen over!  Wow.  I'm giving you lots of pictures because A) I love pictures, and B) my guess is, most of you won't be visiting Niagara Falls in February anytime soon. Only the lucky ones :)

thick ice on all of the railings!

from Canada, viewing the American Falls

from the American side, Goat Island, viewing Rainbow Bridge

will this bus never come??

on top of the world

colored lights on the American Falls

Now, you have been on vacation to Ontario in February!  And you did it from the comfort of your own home, and it cost you nothing.  Can't beat that :)

Back to reality...we did miss another major snowstorm while we were gone (happy-happy-happy about that!), and in 2 more days it will be...drumroll please...the LAST DAY of FEBRUARY!

Have a good rest of your week,
Kari

Skype, Cyst, Snowday

Hola!  Just watching the evening disappear.  This weekend has gone by pretty fast!  Here are some highlights of last week or weekend.

SKYPE.  What a great invention :)  It's better to "see" your college student every week, instead of only "hearing" him.  David's wisdom teeth holes in his mouth are all better now -- none of them are bothering him.  So nice to have that ordeal behind him!  When he's on skype, he gets to interact with his sisters, and us, and we can show him things around the house.

Or Teresa can wave frozen mice in front of the laptop camera as she prepares to feed Komodo (corn snake, now 5 1/2 feet long).

TINY CYST GONE.  Teresa got to be the "hospital patient" this week, getting a little cyst removed from the back of her mouth.  It has come and gone about every week for the past 2 months, not awful but annoying.  So it was really tiny, but the location of it made it so they had to give her anesthesia, and make a whole big deal out of it!  Sigh.  The hospital is a type of Twilight Zone, with time...you walk in, and suddenly the whole day is gone.

(Home Depot is the same way.)

So here she is, in full hospital uniform!  And she is a trooper but really does NOT do well with needles and the IV they put in.  So she got a special "Fall Risk" band for her wrist, to alert nurses that she gets light-headed with that stuff.

The rest of the week at school, she left the waterproof wristband on...she supposes it gives her license to randomly walk around bumping into walls? Better keep that wristband.

SNOW DAY.  We also had a storm dump maybe 10 inches of snow on us?  Maybe close to a foot, depending on where you measured.  Timing was such that it steadily snowed hard, pretty much all day.  So they used another snow day.  Another big sigh.  One more day we go to school, further into the summer :(

BEST NEIGHBORS.  I've said it before, but we really do have the BEST neighbors!  And the grateful perk occasionally is that when there's a snowstorm, they pull out their snowblower, and they clear our driveway too, up to where the cars are parked.  It is SUCH a relief to not have to shovel that part.  (We still shovel the sidewalk, deck, porch, and Frank also rakes the roof, but the driveway is a big deal.)

Hope your week has started off well!  Go Olympians :)

Kari

Groundhog Day

Hola!

Well Punxsutawney Phil saw his shadow yesterday--supposedly that makes it official, hmmm?  There will be 6 more weeks of winter.

SIX WEEKS.  Of course, in New England, six more weeks of winter would be a real treat. Yes, I'm wishing there would only be six more weeks of cold!  Ha.  But I'm dreaming now.  I always reminisce of the good old days of year-round good weather in California! Never mind the traffic, pollution, inner-city school problems, or politics that drive you crazy.  None of that matters at all.  My mind has created a harmonious, peaceful, ideal zen there, where the sun always shines and people live happily ever after.  In other words, utopia. :)

END of JANUARY.  This week we finished January!  HUGE accomplishment.  Really.  That means... drumroll... we made it through January!  Congratulations, Everybody.

JR. DISTRICTS. Kara tried out for "Junior Districts" on Saturday.  It's a regional music weekend where students gather from many different schools, with voice or with an instrument, and practice one whole day together (a Friday in March) and then they perform the next day, for families and friends.  Auditions were yesterday, and they tallied all scores and sent out "the list" last night.  She made one of the choruses!  Very cool.  Congratulations, Kara :)


MIDTERMS. Teresa's semester finished 2 weeks ago, so now she's into Quarter 3 of her Junior year.  She started her test prep for the SAT, to be taken in Early March.  She has quite a few senior friends and a cousin in "wait mode," who have applied to colleges for this fall and are waiting to hear back.  Hard to believe that in a few months, she herself will be filling out college applications.  Whoa!  Not there yet.

NEW PRINCIPAL.  Our high school is undergoing a principal search right now.  We are all crushed that our Principal was snatched away by another school district.  He was stellar.  The committee of parents, teachers and community members went through 43 resumes, narrowed down to 8 they called in to interview, and that came down to 3.  They had Tour Days this past week where they toured the school, had a meeting with parents, had a meeting with students, and then interviewed with the Superintendent last.  We should know in a week or so who our new principal will be.

INTRIGUING BOOK. Frank and I read "Proof of Heaven" by Eben Alexander.  It was incredibly thought-provoking, about a neurosurgeon who went into a coma for 7 days.  His intense and life-changing NDE, or Near Death Experience, completely changed his outlook and belief system.  I found myself nodding over and over again, because his insights made so much sense.  This, coming from a very educated, scientific former non-believer in any kind of afterlife.  It was an amazing book.  I've also just read a handful of reviews on the book: people either love it or call it ridiculous!  For me, it confirmed many things I already felt to be true of the afterlife. I highly recommend it. :)

MORE SNOW. We'll get some more snow this week, I hear.  Today was a little 'dusting,' that amounted to about 2 inches.  It's okay though...it's February! (We made it through January, remember?)

Have a good week :)  Kari