The drive from Niagara Falls to Toronto on a Sunday afternoon in August during the height of tourist season wasn’t as bad as it could have been. The traffic wasn’t terrible and the lush green scenery was pleasant. But after a morning and afternoon trekking all over the Ontario side of Niagara Falls, the grown-ups in the car were nearly overwhelmed by a wave of exhaustion. It was all we could do to stay awake during our journey! As an added level of complexity, albeit minor, our rental car, which we had picked up in Buffalo, only showed us velocity in miles per hour, so I was rapid fire calculating kph to mph so Sean could try to follow the rules (or knowingly not follow them) as the speed limit varied.

As seen in Graffiti Alley

When I was originally thinking through this trip, I had thought we might stop in at either Niagara-on-the-Lake or at St Catharine’s to visit one of the local wineries and sample the regions famous wines. As everything kept taking much longer than anticipated, we abandoned that idea for this leg of the trip, thinking maybe we’d shoehorn it in on our drive back to Buffalo the following Saturday.

By the time we rolled into our hotel and relaxed for a little while, it was getting pretty late. No one was particularly hungry, so we walked to Dairy Queen and let the kids have Blizzards for an evening treat, and Sean and I shared an order of mushroom-truffle noodles from a place called Petit Potato. Ian in particular seemed astonished that he wouldn’t be required to eat “real” dinner. (I did check with him to see if he was actually hungry, and he confirmed he wasn’t.)

We discovered on our way out to fetch dinner / dessert, that our hotel had a revolving door. Over the week, we discovered that many of the other buildings had them as well. The kids LOVED them. I have a notion this will be a defining feature of Toronto for them – the city with all the revolving doors.

Before we left Texas, our week in Toronto looked like it was going to be nothing but rainy days – we even brought our raincoats along. That first evening in our hotel when we checked the forecast, it showed us rain only on Monday. With that in mind, we chose to spend the next day inside at the Royal Ontario Museum.

Day 1 – ROM, Poop Cafe, Nathan Philips Square

We started our morning with breakfast at a nearby Tim Hortons. As I understand it, Tim Horton’s is to Canada as Starbucks is to the United States. I can tell you that no matter where we were on our trip, it seemed that there was always one nearby. Sean and the kids split a box of doughnuts while I had some kind of maple bacon breakfast sandwich.

Maya loves mass transit

After breakfast, we made our way to the subway station to head further into Toronto. We had chosen our hotel in part because it was right on the main north-south subway line. When we got there, we discovered we wouldn’t even have to leave the building to board the train.  The TTC (Toronto Transit Commission) manages the subway, streetcar, and bus system in Toronto. For the days we’d be taking the subway system, we went ahead and bought the full day pass, which got us access to subway, streetcars, and buses all day long.

The kids, since they were between the ages of 0 and 12, were able to ride for free. It was never entirely clear to us how to correctly get them through the gate. If there was an agent around, they’d walk them through a special gate, while we tapped through with our day passes. If there was no gate agent around, each grown up would take a kid, tap our passes, and walk two people through when our gate opened.

Old ROM, new ROM

The Royal Ontario Museum, or the ROM as it’s known to the locals, is impossible to miss. The Michael Lee Chin Crystal, named for the man whose donation made the project possible, is an angular metal-and-glass addition to the museum. The museum’s original structure is still there, standing in stark contrast to the more modern addition jutting out from it. I get the impression the locals either love it or hate it – rarely are their reactions ambivalent about the building’s aesthetic.

Maya and dragon

The museum itself is a behemoth encompassing art, artifacts and ancient culture, science, nature, and probably more that I’m not adequately categorizing. If we lived in Toronto, we’d buy a membership and visit often, letting our interests of the moment dictate which exhibits we saw. It is too much to consume in a single day. We saw artifacts from ancient civilizations from all over the world, tons of preserved animal specimens (including hummingbirds, to Maya’s chagrin), minerals, meteorites, replicas of dinosaur skeletons, and on and on and on.

The Ian-corn

We also sprung for the special exhibit, Fantastic Beasts: The Wonder of Nature. This exhibit lets you inhabit the world of Harry Potter and Newt Scamander for a little while, with particular focus on the magic creatures that exist therein. What I liked about it is that it drew the kids in by talking about dragons and unicorns but linked those magical creatures to the real world animals they may have derived from. Magical elements were featured throughout – drawers and cabinets that moved of their own accord, bowtruckles that would defend their trees, and nifflers that needed to be offered treasure. But there were also placards warning of the endangerment of certain species and information about real animals and what traits they share with the creatures of the wizarding world.

Artful, yes, but these chairs were too slippery to sit in comfortably

My only gripe about the Fantastic Beast exhibit, and I guess I should expect these capitalistic shenanigans by now, is that to exit you must go through a gift shop. Our kids have definitely gotten better about dealing with souvenir purchasing. A lot of that is probably a byproduct of them getting older, and some of it may stem from our requirement that they largely spend their own money on them. But, and I’m sorry to be this person, I still think they’re a giant hassle. I get so distracted with what the kids want and the negotiating and the gently talking them out of silly crap that I usually leave without ever having considered whether I might like something.

We had lunch during our visit as well. And it was … fine. I don’t remember if you’re able to leave and then come back later, but if the weather is good, that may be preferable to eating there.

After a very long and lovely visit to the museum, we took the subway over to the Koreatown area. During trip planning, I had watched a few videos of locals showing things they’d recommend in Toronto. In one, I learned about the Poop Cafe. Believe me, I know, it sounds gross. But the desserts looked pretty epic, and I knew that Maya and Ian would get a kick out of it. Think of it as the kid-centric reward for putting up with several hours at a museum.

Poop Cafe – it’s an experience

We walked to what we thought was the address of the Poop Cafe, and it was all boarded up and clearly closed. So sad! But then we noticed a sign pointing us to a new address, and a passing local said, “Oh, you want the Poop Cafe? It’s moved just a couple blocks away.” Sure enough, a short walk later, we were greeted by a statue of a happy pile of poop.

Oreo Freak Shake

Inside, the decor is on point. There are commodes for seats at many of the tables, cute stuffed poop emojis tossed around in some of the chairs, and a giant kawaii poop hanging out in the back of the store. The desserts are massive, magnificently garnished, exactly the kind of thing a kid would adore. Sean and the kids ordered towering Freak Shakes, chocolate chip for Maya and Dad, Oreo for Ian. I am not a huge chocolate person, so I ordered a lychee bingsu (shaved ice), which – to the kids’ delight- came served in a miniature porcelain toilet bowl. Everything was tasty enough, but the out of this world part wasn’t so much about creative flavors and exceptional execution. It was more about bathroom theming and over-the-topness.

Lychee Bingsu

There was a funny moment when Maya needed the rest room and we hadn’t yet located it. She was completely tickled by the irony that something called the Poop Cafe with its toilet bowl seats wouldn’t have a bathroom. Eventually we did find it, down the stairs and near a pile of commodes which we were guessing were destined to become additional seating in the future. All in all it was a fun experience, especially for the kids.

We were all still suffering a bit of a Niagara Falls hangover (we did a LOT of walking), so we decided to head back to the hotel to rest for a little while. Sean wandered over to the LCBO store across the street from our hotel. LCBO (Liquor Control Board of Ontario) stores are essentially government run liquor stores. We were able to purchase wine at a retail store, but I believe liquor can only be purchased from an LCBO shop.

Sean’s haul from the LCBO store

Sean went to the one nearest us out of curiosity. I suggested he try to come back with some wine since we didn’t get to try any while we were in Niagara. He came back instead with a “build your own” eight-pack filled with interesting beers for us to try out as we chose over the next several days.

City Hall at Nathan Phillips Square

Near sunset, we again all boarded the subway and headed toward Nathan Phillips Square to see City Hall and check out the famous TORONTO sign. The kids had so much fun wandering around the square taking photos and videos to their hearts’ content. After snapping photos as we entered the square, across from the sign, at the sign, and across from the sign again but from a higher vantage point, we decided we “needed” a late night snack (we really didn’t).

Kids hanging out in one of the TORONTO Os

We walked over to a small lineup of street carts. As we headed that way, we passed some folks, presumably without homes to go to, sleeping in quiet corners. While they slept, we also startled some very large and vigorous rats. The kids were delighted by the rats and were pointing and exclaiming. We used this moment to try to show them the sleeping people and how it would be kinder to keep our voices down and let them sleep. They seemed to take all of this in stride – I expected more questions, but none came.

After the Maya and Ian enjoyed some fries and Mom and Dad enjoyed some poutine, we took the subway back up to our hotel and crashed for the night.

Day 2 – Casa Loma, St Lawrence Market, Distillery District

We had planned for Tuesday to be our big touristy CN Tower and Toronto Islands day, but then we woke up to heavy cloud cover that would reportedly last all day long. Instead we decided to visit Casa Loma. After a slowish start, another Tim Hortons breakfast, a subway ride, and a walk, we arrived.

Casa Loma

Casa Loma is a castle-esque mansion built in the early 1900s for Sir Henry Pellatt. Apparently it took 300 people not quite 11 years to build. The castle is a nearly 200,000 square feet – the largest in North America.

After taking some outside photos, we bought admission tickets, picked up our audio guides (included with admission), and wandered around for most of the self-guided tour. We’d go to an area of the museum, punch the posted number into our guides, and then hold the thing up to our ears and listen to what the narrator had to say. I honestly found it interesting. Maya lasted for part of the first commentary before she was abandoning her guide. Ian made it through about half the tour before he as well was handing me his guide. And so it was that I went through most of the grounds with three audio guides hanging from my neck.

Inside Casa Loma

The house was interesting as a period piece. One of the facts I remember hearing is that at a time when the whole city of Toronto had maybe 200 telephones, there were something like 50 scattered throughout the house. As Sir Henry is considered to have brought electric power to the city, it is unsurprising that his home sports many features that would have been considered luxuries at the time, not least of which is electric lighting through the house.

Speaking of interesting luxuries, in keeping with our theme, the kids were weirdly interested in how the bathrooms worked. I too was taken with one of the features. It seems that Pellatt was ahead of his time in having a shower that had a multi-head set-up that was designed to spray him from all sides. His study had secret passages that we got to examine. We got to climb narrow spiral staircases into the castle’s two towers, from which the views of downtown Toronto were lovely.

Prince presiding

There were a few non-period visuals in the castle as well. My favorite is the portrait of Prince in, I think, the Great Oak Room. I thought it must surely be someone’s idea of a joke, and maybe it is, but the work was specifically commissioned for placement at Casa Loma, not by Sir Pellatt, obviously. These days the City of Toronto owns and operates Casa Loma as a tourist attraction and entertainment complex.

The lower level boasts a Hollywood Film Gallery, with movie posters and placards explaining how the given movie was related to Casa Loma. More films than I’d have anticipated have had scenes filmed here. Throughout portions of the castle grounds, we also saw evidence of the various escape room adventures hosted at Casa Loma. The odd dragon here and there, various props and clues and set design were tucked into towers and hallways and nooks.

“That unicorn looks mad”

At the tail end of our visit, we walked the underground tunnel to the stables. This featured Toronto’s Dark Side exhibit, showing images of fires and illnesses and whatnot that had befallen fair Toronto over the years. Sean and I didn’t get to read too much because by this point the kids were pretty all done, and we were just trying to at least get a glimpse of the grounds. Weirdly, to get back to the main castle, we were sort of shunted through this waxworks exhibit (except I think it was silicon, not wax) showing scenes from the movies that had been featured in the Hollywood Film Gallery.

At long last we were finally through the castle and ready to breath the open air. The nice thing about it having rained the day before is that the heat wave (think 90-ish degrees at the high end) had ended and lovely cooler weather (mid 70s-low 80s), the kind we had been hoping for, had descended. We sat outside for a while and hatched a plan to head over to St Lawrence Market to eat a late lunch and check out the market.

Inside St Lawrence Market

We had a lovely lunch courtesy of Buster’s Sea Cove. Each of us got seafood dishes we were pleased with, and Ian was able to get chicken fingers. The one sour note is that Maya had decided the lobsters in the tanks throughout the market were cute, and so she spent the better part of the lunch lecturing me about the cruelty of my very delicious lobster roll.

Macarons

After lunch, we had a stroll through the different levels of the market on the hunt for dessert and whatever else we might happen across. The meat and seafood counters had us wishing we had an AirBNB, so that we could cook some meals. The produce was varied and gorgeous. St Lawrence Market is boxed in by Market St, Front St, Jarvis St, and the Esplanade and helpful street signs have been placed throughout the building, presumably to keep you oriented.

Fountain at Berczy Park

After the market, we headed back toward our subway station with a few stops in between. I wanted to see the Gooderham Building, which is Toronto’s local flatiron, and we all wanted to check out the neat fountain at Berczy Park. This fountain features a bunch of dogs staring up at a golden bone. Water arcs out of their mouths, feeding the fountain. Tucked amongst them is a solitary cat who is of course looking an entirely different direction. I’ve read that he’s looking at some birds on a lamp post a few meters away, but I failed to notice that while we were there. The kids LOVED this fountain and we spent quite a while photographing various aspects of it.

Finally, we headed back to the hotel. We let the kids partake of the hotel pool, while we hung out and split one of our fancy beers and watched them play. After a little relaxing, we headed back out to see what the Distillery District was all about. This trip would require both subway and streetcar and unfortunately the street car we thought we were supposed to take didn’t appear to be running. Eventually we took a different street car that got us a bit closer and then otherwise hoofed it. All of this figuring out took some time, and so by the time we made it, most of us were pretty ravenous, even with our late lunch.

Parents at the Distillery District

The art throughout the Distillery District was a lot of fun to see. We spent a fair amount of time taking in the sights and letting the kids run a little wild with their cameras. By the time we found a place with suitable menu items for everyone, it was going to be at least a 30 minute wait just to sit down, and even longer to get food in bellies. And so it was that we had dessert for dinner arguable for the third day in a row. We went to a place called Cacao 70. I had hot chocolate, Sean had a shake, Maya had crepes, and Ian had a waffle. You should have seen Ian’s waffle. It was so buried in dessert items, I’m not sure he even dug down far enough to get to actual waffle.

This is Ian’s “waffle”

Indulgently fueled yet again, we took a quick jaunt back to City Hall so Sean could get a street cart hot dog he’d been craving and then we headed back to our hotel for the night.

Day 3 – Kensington Market + food tour, Graffiti Alley, Monkey’s Paw (book store)

By Wednesday, we felt we had earned a bit of a sleep-in. The only thing we booked ahead of time on this trip was a Kensington Market Food tour and that didn’t start till 11. We decided to take it easy and make that our first thing of the day. We ate very lightly for breakfast, suspecting that we’d have a very large lunch to work our way through.

Yonge-Dundas Square

We took a combination subway + streetcar trip to get ourselves over to Kensington Market. The cool thing was that the walk between the subway and streetcar took us past Yonge-Dundas Square, which is something we’d been planning to make a separate trip to at some point, but hadn’t yet worked it in. It’s sort of like Times Square in NYC or Piccadilly Circus in London with its big illuminated billboard screens. It might have been fun to wander around for a while and see more of the architecture of the area, but we did get a good gander of the area even just passing through.

Some people call it the smallest park in Canada

Entering Kensington Market was almost like walking into a different city altogether – the contrast with Yonge-Dundas Square couldn’t have been more stark. Everything was a tangle of color and aroma (mostly good), a hodgepodge of architecture, a staggering wealth of small businesses. We had a little time to kill before our tour was to kick off, so we wandered the streets a bit, soaking up our surroundings. The kids found a little playground  and alternated between playing on the structures there and pestering the local pigeons and sparrows.

The beginning of our food tour

At tour time, we met our guide at Nu Bugel, the end result of a fascinating multi-cultural journey. Bagels are a Jewish-Polish food. These bagels are honey boiled like the Montreal-style bagels, but served in a larger size like the New York-style bagels. To make matters even more interesting, the shop owners are Venezuelan. Multi-cultural bagels, indeed!

Our guide’s name William (unless you didn’t like the tour, then his name was Charles). He had a deep, resonant voice that carried well, even to the back of the pack. He came around to each of us, offering a small sample of both a coconut flavored bagel and a bagel  sandwich stacked with arugula, mustard, horseradish jelly, and smoked trout. He was also kind enough to provide plastic sacks for folks who needed to carry along the things that one kid or the other may not have enjoyed.

They didn’t like everything, but they seemed to enjoy the experience

We had never done a food tour before and didn’t really know what to expect. It just seemed like a fun way to get shepherded around an unfamiliar area and get to try more than the one restaurant we may have decided upon on our own. The kids, especially Ian, seemed to get a big kick out of it.

Our second stop was a Jamaican place called Golden Patty. We were each offered either a spicy or mild Jamaican beef patty, which was first ensconced in a curry crust, and then was sandwiched into some coco bread. This was one of Ian’s favorite things. For Maya, sadly, it did not pass the sniff test. For my part I thought it was divine.

We stopped then at a place called Jumbo Empanadas. Luckily, they had made two different sample size empanadas for us to try, one with some kind of mild white cheese and the other with a sort of meaty picadillo. The kids’ favorite part were the samples of Inca Kola that were supplied to wash it down with. William explained that it looks like Mountain Dew, smells like bubble gum, and taste like banana. He was not wrong.

Canada used to have an interesting rule that only dark drinks could be caffeinated. This meant that yellow sodas like Mountain Dew, which I associate with late nights in the computer lab, had to be decaffeinated. This topic came up because the Inca Kola is both yellow and caffeinated.

Maya and her rice dog

The next place we visited on our tour was Chungchun Rice Dog, which served Korean style hot dogs. The ones we tried were served in a rice coating – corndog-style. Then they were topped with an artful squiggle of ketchup and an optional powdered flavoring of some kind. Sean and I went traditional with ketchup and sugar. Maya tried a powdered garlic thing (which I think she was kinda meh about), and Ian had powdered cheese, which he loved.

Decor at the Fika Cafe

After the rice dogs, we went to a place called Fresco’s Fish and Chips where we had some double-fried cod and some spectacular kale salad. Sean and I wound up getting the kids’ kale salad, which after the debauchery of the past few days was most welcome. We ended our tour at a place called Fika Cafe. It’s a Swedish joint where we enjoyed crispy gingerbread tail-less horses and some iced Rooibos tea.

We walked away from the food tour having had an interesting and enjoyable experience. Our bellies were very full, and I had a bag full of things that the kids hadn’t eaten to snack on later if the need arose.

Maya figures this is how our black cat Nox sees herself

From there we walked over to the famous Graffiti Alley. Get this – Toronto has a Graffiti Management Plan. Here’s what the city’s website has to say: The City of Toronto’s Graffiti Management Plan is a proactive and cooperative approach to managing graffiti vandalism in the public realm while continuously supporting graffiti and street art that adds artistic vibrancy to Toronto’s streets.

We saw brilliant examples of incredibly talented artists having decorated walls and alleyways all over town, but nowhere was it quite so dense as it was in Graffiti Alley. The kids again went nuts with their cameras snapping photos of art both bright and dark, funny and sad, light-hearted and full of political commentary. Our food tour guide had told us there are a couple of Banksy’s around Toronto as well, but we didn’t bother with trying to find them. Our days were full as it was, and there was no shortage of street art to see.

Sometimes traveling with kids is hard

We tried to visit a local record shop, and it seemed pretty amazing, but there weren’t a lot of interesting deals hiding in their bins, as far as we could tell, and our children have not yet developed the patience to spend an hour flipping through bins of records, so we didn’t get to linger long.

The Biblio-mat at Monkey’s Paw

I had read about a neat rare book store called Monkey’s Paw. Sean and I are pretty much always game to visit a book store, but the thing I thought the kids would get a kick out of is that this place had a book vending machine – the Biblio-Mat. It was kind of fun and novel, but the kids were spent by this point. Sean took them outside to let me browse around in the store a little bit before we left.

Other than making a quick jaunt across the street to the Loblaws grocery store to pick up some goodies for snacks and breakfast and to a couple places to secure dinner (the kids’ first non-dessert dinner since we arrived in Toronto), we largely relaxed for the rest of the evening.

Day 4 – Canada’s Wonderland

Thursday was probably the day Maya and Ian were most excited for – Canada’s Wonderland! After a quick breakfast from our grocery store haul the day before, we took our car out the hotel parking lot and drove slightly northwest of the city to Vaughn, Ontario,   to the sprawling amusement park that is Canada’s Wonderland. Sean and I have loved roller coasters forever, and the kids developed a newfound devotion after last winter’s visit to Walt Disney World.

Tacky souvenir photo at Canada’s Wonderland

Ian was about 2.5 inches too short to ride some of the more thrilling attractions, but we had no problem whatsoever filling our day with rides that all four of us could ride. Sean introduced the kids to the concept of “coaster credits.” For each new roller coaster they ride, their tally goes up by one. Ian in particular seems to love keeping track of things, so I think the idea appealed to them.

Canada’s Wonderland itself was unexpectedly pretty for a park full of thrill rides. It is anchored by a manmade mountain, complete with a waterfall crashing over it, and greenery and flowers abound throughout the grounds. Bearing in mind that we weren’t able to partake of the most thrilling rides, the ride queues we were in did a good job of keeping you out of the sun, and seemed to pass reasonably quickly.

Maple leaf

Maya and Ian will tell you it was the best part of their trip, and they wonder why all of our vacations don’t feature amusement parks. For me, it was a fun way to add some variety to our days. Asking the kids to appreciate museums and culture and architecture and history for five days straight may not have been too much to ask, but it was more than I was going to ask.

Waiting to board The Fly

That evening, once we got back to the hotel and got the kids into bed, we were talking through what we wanted to try to achieve during our last full day in Toronto. I looked around at the CN Tower’s website thinking we’d see about buying tickets ahead of time to save time in ticket lines. Alas, all the early timed ticket entries were gone. And there were no tickets left for the special SkyPod level, which is a few hundred feet higher up than the main observation level. We decided that we’d get there as early as we could reasonably manage and see if more options were available on site.

Day 5 – CN Tower, Toronto Islands, Beaver Tails

We let the kids sleep in just a bit after their very busy amusement park day, ate another quick grocery store breakfast, and took the subway all the way down to Union Station to see what kind of chaos we could find at the CN Tower. We were delighted to find that there weren’t heavy crowds, that within minutes we had purchased essentially immediate entry to the tower, and that Skypod tickets would be available for purchase if we wanted them from the observation deck.

CN Tower

The Canadian National (or CN) Tower was the tallest freestanding structure in the world in 1975, when it opened. Of course this is no longer true today, but it is still tall enough to dominate Toronto’s skyline. The tower itself is 553 meters (1815 feet) tall. The main observation level is at 1136 feet above ground, and the views from this floor are superb. There is also glass flooring to look down through. The SkyPod is at 1465 feet, and while the views to me weren’t much different, it allowed us the potential to feel the tower swaying (if we did, it was just barely on our clear, near-windless day), and it let us get a good look at the folks who did the EdgeWalk.

These brave souls are doing the EdgeWalk

The kids are too young to do the EdgeWalk, Sean is uncomfortable with heights, and I wasn’t going to do it if no one else was, so we contented ourselves with watching from the SkyPod. They suit you up and strap you in so you can walk along the outside edge of the tower’s main deck. And it looks like you can turn around to face outward and LEAN OUT over the city. I can’t imagine how it must feel.

Once we’d finished at the CN Tower, we headed over to the Steam Whistle Brewery Biergarten for lunch. We lucked out and only had to wait a few minutes for a nice table inside, so we didn’t really get to linger on the grounds much before we ate. The food was decent – chicken fingers, sausages, a baked pretzel. The only Steam Whistle beer they had on tap was the pilsner, so that’s what I had.

Sean **loves** heights

One of the draws of Steam Whistle is that it’s located inside an old railroad roundhouse. There are old train engines sitting around on the grounds that kids can climb around on, so after lunch, we spent a few pleasant minutes letting them bounce amongst the engines. Then it was time to hoof it over to the Jack Layton Ferry Terminal to catch a ferry over to Toronto Islands.

We took a meandering route over to the terminal so we could walk along the waterfront a bit. The kids chuckled over the mallards who were floating around in the water, many with their heads tucked under a wing, enjoying an afternoon nap.

Toronto skyline

The terminal had ticket counters, but we were greeted by a sign with a QR code that we were to scan and purchase tickets on our phone. All tickets are assumed to be round trip, so we didn’t even need to show tickets on the way back. We took the Ward’s Island Ferry on the way over so we could get some nice views back at the Toronto skyline, the CN Tower prominent amongst the gleaming skyscrapers.

The walk along the southern waterfront was so serene, you forgot you were in a huge city

My original plan had been to wander along the waterfront till we got to the Gibraltar Point Lighthouse, let the kids play a bit on the beach there, and then take the nearest ferry back. As it turns out, the walking distance was pretty far between these things. Sean’s knee had been suffering for all our walking around all over Niagara Falls and throughout the city, and it just wasn’t up to it today. Had we realized a little sooner how long the walks would take us, we might have rented a quad-cycle when we exited the ferry – it would have allowed us to pedal around and see a bit more of the islands than we managed to see.

More skyline

We decided instead that we’d walk to Centre Island Beach, some along the waterfront, some along the main thoroughfare through islands, and let the kids play there instead. I had suggested before we left for our trip that we might find time to let them swim in Lake Ontario, but we warned them its colder than the Gulf Coast swimming they’ve grown accustomed to. Apparently this idea of swimming in one of the Great Lakes took root firmly in their minds. When we got to the beach, we had them take shoes and socks off first to stick their toes in the water. Yup, they decided they were in. I took them to get swim-suited up, but they never really went too far into the water. I’m guessing it was pretty cold. Sean and I, for our part, plopped down in the sand and watched them play for a bit.

Fresh from a Great Lakes swim

After they played for a while, we all took a mosey down the Centre Island Pier to let the kids dry out a bit and to let the grown-ups cool off in the fresh breeze off the lake. Once everyone was again properly clothed, we took the long walk to catch the Centre Island Ferry back to the city. Centre Island is vastly more popular than Ward’s Island. That coupled with the fact that it was now late afternoon and most people were heading back into the city by this point culminated in a very lengthy line at the ferry terminal.

Ferry Boat ride

Astonishingly, after maybe 30 minutes of waiting for it to arrive, we managed to get on the very next ferry boat! Evidently, these things can hold a lot of people. The ride was again pretty. I’m sure a harbor cruise would have been lovely, but for less than $10 a person, we had a couple of nice boat rides across the water.

After disembarking the vessel, we headed straight over to the BeaverTails restaurant to have … Beaver Tails! These are doughnut like pastries that are flat and paddle-shaped like a beaver’s tail. The pastries are loaded up with any of a variety of toppings for your dessert pleasure. For example, Sean had brownies on his. Maya had some kind of Reeses Pieces peanut butter chocolate insanity that we probably shouldn’t have let her finish. Ian had a sort of cookies and cream one. And while I was eyeing the Pou-tail (a beavertail with poutine on it), I settled on the original cinnamon-sugar topped one. These were all tasty enough, and after dealing with Maya’s very messy hands, face, clothes, etc, we headed back for our last subway ride back up to our hotel.

Beaver tail

We saw lots of maple syrup in every souvenir shop near every tourist attraction. In the end, we did buy some syrup to bring back home, but it was in a liter-sized jug from the Loblaws across the street. We went to our now regular Petit Potato for dinner and had some kinda crazy omelet rice creation dubbed “omirice” that in this case came topped with a brightly seasoned pepper steak. We did most of our sorting and packing that evening while the kids relaxed and either played with their iPads or watched TV.

Our flight home on Saturday wasn’t till the evening, so we didn’t rush leaving our hotel. The plan had been to take the 90 or so minute drive back to St Catharines and eat lunch at one of the wineries since we hadn’t gotten to do so on the way up to Toronto earlier in the week. We were on the road before 10:00 and traffic was clunky, but we figured it would thin out once we got away from the main knot of Toronto. Nope. It was pretty horrible for the entire drive. Couple that with a few pitstops for our children and we first abandoned the plan to stop at a winery for lunch, and then we abandoned the backup plan to find an interesting joint in Buffalo to have lunch. (Sean’s comment about Buffalo, “I’m sure there are nice parts of Buffalo, but we didn’t see any of them on this trip.”)

Our Canadian food souvenirs

At least the border crossing back into the United States was faster. This time we crossed in via the Peace Bridge. I don’t know if it’s standard procedure, but our border crossing guard left you with the impression that he wasn’t a fan of Toronto. He grilled us about how long we’d been there, was it our first time, etc. Then he looked at Sean and said, “Why Toronto?” in a tone that suggested he didn’t not see the allure. Sean was caught so off guard that he shrugged and said, “Why not?” Eventually the guy waved us through.

Our flight out of Buffalo was fine. But then, our one hour layover in Chicago grew into a three hour layover. Our late but tolerable 10p arrival in Austin wound up being a 1a arrival. At least this time all our baggage arrived with us. We were all so relieved to be home. It had been a great trip but wow were we tired.

Bye Toronto

We loved our Toronto trip. I would have liked to see either the Art Gallery of Ontario or the Aga Khan Museum, but taking the kids to Canada’s Wonderland and seeing Toronto Islands and letting them swim in Lake Ontario were probably worthy tradeoffs. The city is clean and the people were friendly – there was never a moment we felt unsafe, and we did plenty of wandering around after dark. The subway system was efficient and not redolent of urine or spilled booze, a marked difference from what I’ve come to expect from certain types of mass transit.

The city, for us, was less about seeing particular attractions and more about going to different neighborhoods and wandering around. It’s the kind of place you might like to just live for a few weeks so you could try a different ethnic restaurant every night, make time to go see a play or a ball game, visit the ROM about six more times. The kids are excited that they got to visit a whole different country (wait till we get them to a whole different continent!), and they’re particularly enamored with their Canadian money, which they both agree is much prettier than American money. And we are excited we got to take them there.

  

For our final summer hurrah before the rigors of formal education set in, we took our overheated selves up north to the wilds of New York and Ontario. Our first destination would be Niagara Falls, NY, but first, we had to get there.

Connecting through Chicago-O’hare

On a quiet Friday evening, we flew into Buffalo, NY, retrieved our too-large baggage and headed to our rental car pickup. As has become our norm, we waited for something like 45 minutes to get a rental car. By the time we had finally made it to our hotel and settled in for the evening, it was around 1 in the morning, Eastern time.

Never mind the late arrival, we had vacationing to do! I had read over and over that the secret to Niagara Falls success on a weekend during the busy tourist season was to show up early. Given that, we drug our dead asses outta bed around 7, ate breakfast, and headed right over to Niagara Falls.

Maid of the Mist – this boat was just leaving as we got in line.

There are two boat rides you can take to get a little closer to the roar and spray of Niagara Falls. There’s the Hornblower, from the Canadian side, and the Maid of the Mist, from the American side. Both of them take you past American Falls, Bridal Veil Falls, and Horseshoe Falls. We had read that Hornblower used newer craft and that the Maid of the Mist, which has been in operation since 1846, was more historic. Ultimately, I think it came down to us wanting to have that experience on day 1.

Observation Tower from below

We stood in line to buy our Maid of the Mist tickets, and we couldn’t have spent more than 5 minutes in that line. We then spent another 10 to 15 minutes in line for the elevator, during which time, we could chill out and listen to the waterfalls and photo the boats and the Rainbow Bridge. Once we were down the elevator, we were outfitted with our fancy blue ponchos and basically only had to wait for the next boat to arrive. It saddens my little EE soul a bit, but we just missed boarding the Nikola Tesla and would have to settle for the James V Glynn instead. (I just looked it up. Apparently James V Glynn started at Maid of the Mist in 1950 as a ticket seller and bought the whole dang thing in 1971.)

I had had the presence of mind to pack along the kids’ glasses cases, so before we even really got started, I had their glasses and any unprotected electronics in my shoulder bag and under my poncho. The kids have waterproof cameras and Sean had his iPhone in a case as well as a GoPro for capturing the mayhem.

A little bit of American Falls and Bridal Veil Falls

It started out leisurely enough as we smoothly and quietly (electric motors, FTW) passed by the American Falls as they crashed down on rocks and boulders. Bridal Veil falls is barely separated from the American Falls. From out in the river, it seemed so small relative to the other two – more on that later.

A light mist from Horseshoe Falls

Then it was time to dive into the giant Horseshoe Falls. It’s poetic to call what was happening “mist.” It brings to mind gentleness and tranquility. But I’m gonna be honest here – as a contact lens wearer, I could have stood to don a pair of goggles. That “mist” was more like a steady rain carried on waterfall-generated air currents. I could literally feel my contacts trying to swim away. Sean was attempting to document through all the swirling water, Ian was kind of hunkering down (though he seemed to be enjoying himself), and Maya was trying to get as wet a she possibly could. I wanted to lean into it a bit and really feel the waterfall – and I did that – but I did it all with my eyes shut, so I wouldn’t lose my means of seeing.

After our journey

Once out of the main fray, I was able to squeegee enough water from my face to open my eyes again. We were all drenched. Luckily my bag had remained dry under the poncho, and it was warm enough out that none of us minded the soaking. It’s a good thing too, because we weren’t done yet! We walked up a little trail to what I think is called the Crows Nest.

Drenched blue ants, lining up to get more drenched

When we were trip planning, we had seen a photo of the American Falls that showed a string of blue poncho-ed people lined up on stairs just in front of it. I loved the perspective – you could see just how huge it was. Those people were heading up the stairs to the Crows Nest viewing platform. By this time, Maya had gone full fuck-it mode and ditched her poncho entirely – by the end, she was soaked through several times over. As we got nearer and nearer the waterfall, we were misted and sprayed again and again.

Rainbow in the foreground, Niagara Falls, Ontario in the background

As the light was diffracted through the ever-present mist, we got to see partial rainbows, full rainbows, even double-rainbows. Before we arrived, Sean kept telling me he would NOT be crossing the Rainbow Bridge into Canada – he intended to survive! However, having seen the prismatic effect of all that mist, it became clear where the bridge had gotten its name.

This girl – pure joy! (Not sure what Ian’s thinking about here)

After our soaking, we hung out at the top of the Observation Tower for a while, letting the cool breeze dry us a bit and taking photos. We were amused to find that we had arrived in New York in time to be sent a heat advisory. Yup – it was around 90. We came to cool off guys, what the heck? Also, we failed hard and didn’t pack sunscreen. Future travelers, you will be spending all day outside in the beating down sun. Let us be your cautionary tale! Wear sunscreen! Reapply!

After an unremarkable lunch that sadly cost more than our Maid of the Mist journey, we walked over to Goat Island, which is also part of Niagara Falls State Park. We wanted to take part in the Cave of the Winds adventure. You can only purchase tickets for this at the booth on Goat Island, and your tickets are for a timed entry. We got there around 1p and the earliest we could get in was 3:20! Were I to do it over again, I’d maybe pick up those tickets and then find food.

Horseshoe Falls from Terrapin Point on Goat Island. Note the boat barely visible through the mist.

We wandered over to Terrapin Point to get right up close to the top of the Horseshoe Falls.  The sheer volume of water moving over especially that part of Niagara Falls is incredible. After relaxing a bit and drinking in the sights and sounds, we decided we had plenty of time to kill, so we got some ice cream for the kiddos and lemonade for the grown ups and hung out for a while. A nice lady hanging out in the park overheard that I was having blister troubles and she gave me a bandage! Hooray for nice people.

We wandered over to see the American Falls from the Goat Island side as it crashed and splashed in all its glory. Bridal Veil Falls from the top is deceptive. It would be the most likely to kill you, I think. You’re wandering down a little stream and you barely notice it; then the stream just abruptly ends.

Bridal Veil Falls, from the top

By this point, we had gotten close enough to our 3:20 time slot to enter the attraction. It started with a small museum (which was delightfully air conditioned) and a small six-minute video providing a bit of history. And then we were ushered through a set of doors to wait for the elevator down (175 feet down, in fact) to the start of Cave of the Winds. Here we are in New York out in the full mid-afternoon blazing sun, waiting for 45 minutes for that elevator.

American Falls, from Goat Island

Once we finally made it down the elevator, they handed out yellow ponchos, but Maya didn’t even bother this time. As you’re reading reviews and things, you may see that they give out shoes to wear as well. That is no longer accurate. I believe to reduce waste, they’ve stopped providing footwear.

Cave of the Winds – as I understand it, they take down that decking and scaffolding each fall and rebuild it each spring

After baking in the sun for a while, we were quite content to let the waterfall douse us again. We walked along Niagara River for just a bit before climbing stairs up along Bridal Veil Falls. No longer did this waterfall appear slight. Now it was crashing down right next to us. Ian bent down at one point to just straight up stick his arm into actual Niagara Falls (he was so proud). We were again misted and sprayed as we worked our way up to the main attraction.

Hurricane, indeed – I think I heard up to 68 mile an hour winds can be experienced here. That’s Maya, without her poncho, by the way.

We finally made it to the Hurricane Deck. Between the water you’re lashed with and the falls-produced hurricane-force winds you are buffeted by, it’s definitely an intense experience. Maya could be heard giggling and squealing above the roar of the falls. Sean photographed himself leaning back into the water as it crashed down around him. Maya tells me it feels like rocks hitting your back but that she loved it anyway. Ian tried to stick it out and seemed to enjoy himself, but before long, he was asking if we could walk back down and stick our hands in the waterfall again. I again was wishing I had packed swim goggles so I could keep the water out of my contacts.

Sean enjoyed the Hurricane Deck as well.

Sean and Maya soaked up a little more hurricane. Ian and I walked down and played in the waterfall a bit more. And then we all met up and headed back to the top, make the long walk back to our car, and finally drive to Canada.

Our hotel was only about 2.5 miles away from where we were parked at Niagara Falls, but crossing the Rainbow Bridge into Ontario took up around an hour and 15 minutes. It was well past 7 before we arrived at our hotel, and it was even later before we had settled in a bit and chosen a place for dinner.

Glowing falls, as seen from our hotel

By the time we were done with dinner, it was dark. They light up the falls at night, and we wanted to walk along the river and see how all the glowy mist looked. We wandered along Niagara Parkway (I think), trying to see if there was a walkway down to the path that skirted the Niagara River. Alas, we found none, and by the time we worked out that there was no easy way down, it looked like the funicular (the inclined rail and cable system that runs up and down the side of the gorge) wouldn’t be open long enough for us to ride down, take our walk, and then make it back again, so we decided that we were too pooped to party, and we headed back to our hotel and called it a night. I will say, the view of the falls from our hotel room was beautiful, and we got to watch the lights a bit from there.

I always fuss about wasting money on a hotel we barely stay in, but it did not suck waking up to that view

We were again up and at ’em at 7. Today’s goal was to see the falls from the Canadian side. Everyone had told us the best views were from this side of Niagara Falls, and it kind of makes sense. You’re looking back at the lush greenery of the state park in New York. In Ontario, you’re seeing lots of hotels and a casino and other development. Also, in New York, you’re kind of *on* the falls, whereas in Ontario, you’re looking back across the Niagara River at the falls.

We started out with a lovely breakfast at our hotel’s restaurant. I got to try one of the Canadian specialties I had read about: peameal bacon. It’s essentially cured pork back / pork loin that’s been rolled in cornmeal (though originally, it was rolled in ground dried yellow peas, which were thought to extend shelf life). Mine were part of a lovely eggs Benedict. Sean and the kids’ food looked really fantastic too, and it was a relaxing way to start what was sure to be a busy day.

After breakfast, we took the funicular down to the pathway along the Niagara River. We entered the Table Rock Visitors Center – a touristy behemoth from which we were able to purchase our tickets for Journey Behind the Falls. This is pretty much exactly what it sounds like. You again queue up to take an elevator down to a series of tunnels that take you behind Horseshoe Falls and lead you to portholes looking from behind. It’s sort of unremarkable from a picturesque standpoint, but it’s pretty cool to be looking out from behind that vast volume of water crashing over the edge of the falls.

Woods family photo with the *back side of water* in the background

After a couple of porthole views, we eventually came out at the base of Horseshoe Falls, where we again got a proper soaking. Today, Maya had decided she didn’t feel like getting wet, and so her reaction to this experience was more subdued. Ian may have been getting tired of the waterfall action by this point; he kept asking if it was time to go up yet. Sean and I soaked it all in – the atmosphere, the natural splendor, the water.

Journey Behind the Falls

We did eventually meander our way up. We picked up a few drinks and snacks and wandered along the Niagara River for a little while. Our destination was Skylon Tower. I had noticed that if we dined there, we wouldn’t have to pay a separate admission to the viewing deck. And so it was that while the kids ate maple lollipops, I booked a 2:30 lunch reservation at something I normally would categorize as tourist schlock.

Mom and Maya in the Skylon Tower

The walk to Skylon Tower from Table Rock Visitors Center was manageable and very pleasant, at least while we were on the riverfront. The heat kicked in as we made our way up to the actual tower. When it was time for our reservation, we rode an elevator up to the restaurant level and were promptly seated. The restaurant makes one full revolution each hour, so over the course of our roughly hour-long lunch, we were alternately treated to views of the fall and views of the city. Food was … fine. Ingredients seemed fresh and of decent quality and the dishes were serviceably prepared. But, in the end, it was nothing to write home about. I loved being able to sit and watch the beautiful scenery slowly glide by, but ultimately the revolving restaurant at the top of a tower pretty much exactly met my expectations of mediocrity.

Panoramaaaaaah

After lunch we checked out the observation deck to take in those amazing Niagara Falls vistas for just a while longer. Then with a deep sigh, we made the long, hot trek to our car and loaded up for the hour and a half long drive to Toronto.

Ian and Dad ate there too

In conclusion, we loved our trip. There are tons of activities that we didn’t partake of and could still easily fill a couple days with Niagara Falls goodness. Is the area over-touristed? Probably, especially during the summer. Are services around the area overpriced? Of course. Is it worth visiting? Yup. Did we take too many photos of the same three waterfalls? Yeah, probably.

July has been a busy month – at least by our standards. And it’s been horribly hot and dry, even by Texas standards. It has been 100+ nearly every day this month and with no real rain to speak of. We had the tiniest spit of rain late last week, but I swear it was like the sky sneezed. It was over in moments, and any evidence evaporated almost immediately.

Missouri sunset

We were pleased to escape to more verdant surroundings for the first week of July. It started with a 12 hour drive to Missouri to see my family. I was worried since we were driving the Saturday of a holiday weekend that traffic would be wretched, but nope – it was smooth sailing pretty much the whole way.

Grammy and Ian – there’s always a craft around!

Dad and Carol always gather up their children and grandchildren (when they can) for Fourth of July celebrations. This year, the logical date for this to occur was actually on Sunday, July 3rd. Carol cooked an absolute mountain of food, and we spent the day eating, drinking, playing in the water, and messing with fireworks. And of course the cousins spent some quality time together.

Not gonna do fireworks, but she’ll hang out with Grandpa

There were bullfrogs to catch down at the pond. Both Maya and Ian seem to get a big kick out of them. A variety of daytime fireworks were available for the kids to practice lighting, with varying degrees of help from the bigger kids and grown ups. Ian was all in. He really liked the fact that he could do it on his own. Maya was 100% not all it. Fireworks do not smell good, and so she largely kept her distance. At one point, she put a covid mask on to try to reduce the gunpowdery aroma.

Ian loved the fireworks freedom

Later that evening, they put on a big fireworks show. I was worried that Maya wouldn’t want to participate at all, but she and I settled on sitting up on the screened porch, far away from the fireworks launch point. No debris fell on us there, and she was far enough away that the smell was diminished. The noise was still a little bit of a bother for her, but she handled it pretty well and seemed to genuinely enjoy the show. Her favorite part, I think, was some of the funny names that were given to the fireworks. I wish like crazy I had been smart enough to write some of those down.

Big bullfrogs

The next day – actual July 4th – was more laid back. The kids puttered around in the giant yard, playing with water balloons and catching frogs at the pond. Maya wound up having a bad headache, so we spent a fair amount of time resting (which was probably good after their late night on the third). Finally in the afternoon, she felt well enough that they could go play at the creek, and to stop and feed the fish on the way back. There are now several generations of catfish in that pond, and they’re all hungry. There are turtles and bluegill in there too, as well as some really fat bullfrogs. When we drove up, the big frogs were all lined up, gazing into the sun. Once Ian walked down to see them, they launched in rapid succession into the water with a big YERRRP to announce their departure.

Playing in the creek

Grammy was off to a concert the next day. It was at Busch Stadium, so they’d be outdoors, and it started in the afternoon, so they’d be in the hot sun during one of the hottest days of the year. The kids spent some time with Grandpa cleaning up the mess leftover by the water balloon debauchery the day before, and then we all rode the side-by-side up to the Circle U Bar and Grill in Sedgewickville. We ordered food, and then the kids went to play some video games in the little arcade area. Since they’d been good helpers in the morning, Grandpa loaded them up with quarters for the games. Lunch was good, and the kids had ice creams the size of their heads for dessert.

After lounging around for the afternoon, doing some laundry and making some hotel reservations for our big August trip, we again hopped in the side-by-side and headed to West End Tavern for dinner. The kids were delighted by the Christmas tree hanging from the ceiling, and they seemed to enjoy their chicken and fries and root beers. It was a much cooler ride back home, since the sun was setting.

The kids wound up watching an episode of X-Files and really liking it! It was about a sea monster or something, so I can see the appeal. They may be less interested in some of the other unexplained phenomena, and even less interested in government conspiracies. But who knows, maybe we can have family X-Files nights. Sean would be thrilled.

The next day was all about packing up and getting ready for the next leg of our Grandparent Triangle. Sean and I loaded up the car, and we hung out long enough to see Grammy for a little while before we left town. Then it was off for a roughly seven hour trip to Homewood, AL to see Sean’s parents.

Old man Hubert

We hadn’t been to their house since probably Christmas of 2018. We had warned the kids ahead of time that the house with all the kitties was now the house with only two very old cats, and that they would have to be very kind and careful with at least one of those old cats. Poor Hubert, old man that he is, is on his last legs. Luckily, he seemed to enjoy all the attention the kids lavished on him. They colored pictures of him and petted him endlessly, loving the fact that he’d walk around on them from time to time.

Ian and Gumball

They also met the outdoor cat. Their cousins AP and Steele had been to the house just before our visit, and had dubbed the outdoor cat Gumball. This may be because he is <ahem> an un-neutered male kitty. Anyhow, Gumball was extremely sweet and seemed to genuinely love kids. It seemed that he timed his visits for when Maya and Ian were outside to pet him. If Sean and I went out by ourselves, he was less likely to make an appearance. The kids have so many photos and videos of Gumball walking, talking, flopping, eating, and generally being a cat. It’s also important to note that despite the fact that Lolli and Pop have decided to leave food and water out for Gumball, he is not their cat. They aren’t sure whose cat he is – does he belong to someone, or should they seek a means to get him adopted?

The kids did a pretty good job of entertaining themselves while they were at Lolli and Pop’s house. It didn’t hurt anything that they were completely in love with Gumball and spent lots of time with him. We did walk to their creek one day to see if we could spot any snakes. We didn’t, but we did see a bluejay and what may have been a blue grosbeak (unconfirmed).

Lolli and Pop took the kids to the Patriot Park pool for a little while in the afternoon. Sean and I worked on boring grown up things while the kids played with their grandparents. We hear that they loved the slide at the pool but hated the courtesy breaks.

We had pizza at a place called Slice that evening, and it was really good. The kids enjoyed their “beers” (root beers), and their plain boring pizza. Harry and Helen had vegan pizza, and Sean and I had something with Calabrian chiles on it, which was divine.

Llama – looking menacing

The next day we headed south just past Montgomery and went to the Alabama Safari Park. This is the sort of deal where you buy buckets of feed and drive around a park full of exotic creatures, letting them eat from your bucket as you go.

But before any of that, we got to visit the sloths. You can purchase a special sloth encounter, and Lolli and Pop did just that. At our specified time, we got to enter a room with Flash and Lima, a pair of Linnaeus Two-Toed Sloths. We got to spend quite a while with them, feeding them carrots, zucchini, and summer squash. They can’t see well, so you have to hold the food where they can smell it, and then, in slow motion, they creep their lethal looking clawed arm up to steady the morsel while they munch. Fun fact (or at least our kids thought it was fun): those sloths only poop once a week. I feel for the poor caretaker that has to work on pooping day.

Lolli, Pop, Maya, and Ian, with Flash the sloth

It was interesting and weirdly relaxing to watch our perma-smile sloth friends lying idly about or climbing amongst the rafters with the slow clink, clink, clink of huge claws on metal. They seemed to enjoy back scratches, though I’m not sure they’re capable of frowning, so how would you know, really.

After our time with the sloths was over, we headed over to the bird enclosure to feed the budgies (which I recently learned is short for budgerigars). They weren’t really in an eating mood, so only one or two visited the kids for nibbles of what looked like millet on a stick. Maya, bird girl that she is, was completely in love.

After taking a few minutes feeding the giraffes some Romaine leaves, we wandered through the rest of the on-foot part of the park, getting sweatier by the minute. Before the drive and feeding part of our adventure, we decided to have some snacks and sodas (and to cool off in the gift shop’s air conditioning for a moment). While there, we kept seeing T-shirts talking about the Llama Mafia. “Ha ha – what’s that all about,” we might have wondered. We would find out soon enough.

Check out those antlers! Fallow deer.

We purchased a couple buckets of food for the kids and a couple more for us and headed on our merry way, Lolli, Pop, and the kids in the first car, and us following behind. The llamas saw us coming. They parked themselves right in the roadway till we had no choice but to stop. Then they sauntered up to the car window and without a moment’s hesitation stuck their heads inside the car. As we proceeded, they would cheerfully shoulder smaller creatures out of the way to get to you. Especially toward the beginning, it seemed they were the only creatures we’d get to feed.

Before too long, zebras and gazelles and little fallow deer visited the car for nibbles directly from the bucket or to silently request that we chuck some food their way. We had a few emu come to the car for a nibble, but the ostriches we had seen were tucked back in the shade.

Bucket thieves!

The camels were funny. They are huge and have absolutely no compunction about stealing your entire bucket of food. Harry and Helen and the kids were in the car in front of us, and we watched not one but two buckets deftly wrested from hands and greedily upturned before being discarded. When we drove up to the camels, I was so busy trying to photograph them that I nearly failed to notice them leaning into the car for our food bucket as well.

The most fun animal to watch eat though may have been the ostrich. Finally toward the end of our journey, we encountered one who seemed willing to come out and eat. By this point, I think Sean and I had donated both our buckets of food to the kids, but we thoroughly enjoyed watching the jackhammer pecking as the ostrich ate relentlessly from Harry’s bucket.

Eating with the regularity of a piston pumping

Later that evening, the kids hung out with Lolli and Pop while Sean and I met up with his long-time friend Jeffery. Thanks to COVID, it’s been a really long time since we’ve seen him too, and there was a lot of catching up to do.

On our last full day in Alabama, the kids got to go to Homewood pool with Lolli and Pop. We got to eat a vegan feast for dinner (well, the kids had some chicken fingers), and we all went to see the new Minions movie at the theater that evening. I heard lots of kid and grown up giggles throughout, so it was a nice enough way to spend some time.

The drive back to home felt so long, but we eventually made it. With a roomier car, unlimited iPad time, and kids who are older and more in control of their bodies, these long road trips aren’t as rough as they used to be. Jury’s out as to whether we’ll take more of them.

We got back to Texas and the kids had a week with last summer’s babysitter, Oriana. After some difficulties with the summer program we had originally signed the kids up for, we decided not to send them back and had to scramble at the last minute for coverage. They love Oriana. She’s very patient with them and is really good at art projects, so they were excited to see her.

That very next weekend, Holly and family offered to meet us at Cidercade. Cidercade is the antidote to the pain of a “normal” arcade, in my opinion. The kids love arcades, but when we take them, it’s always kinda painful. They have their tokens or game card or whatever, but they’re hesitant to spend their money because they don’t know if they’ll like a game. Then, probably because it’s a known quantity, they become overly obsessed with claw machine games, and then with getting enough tickets for the acquisition of cheap shit from the prize counter. They’re disappointed constantly. I truly want them to have fun, but I’m not sure those situations are it.

The boys

Enter Cidercade. For a $10 flat fee, you can play as many games as you want, and they have something like 150 of them. For an additional $4, you can outfit a kid with a soda cup that they can refill as often as they like. We joked that Maya’s favorite game at the arcade may have been the soda machine. No bullshit claw machines. No prize counters. Just game-playing fun. Ian could play a game as often as he liked to learn the rules. Maya could continue her Batman adventure over and over again, till her mission was complete. No crying about needing more quarters. No sadness that they got nothing from the claw machine. And as if all that weren’t enough, their pizza is pretty good, and they have hard cider on tap. This place is a solid 10/10 for kid entertainment in my mind.

The next week, the kids had their Encanto camp. It was a week-long all-day camp during which they and 20-ish other students and two teachers worked to put together a modified version of the Encanto musical. When I picked them up after the first day, Ian was nearly in tears because he didn’t get one of the solo singing roles. Then when we went through the scripts and he realized how many lines he had to memorize vs how many lines those characters had to memorize, he seemed to feel much better.

Ian was assigned the role of Chispi, the capybara that lived in Antonio’s amazing room after he received his give. Maya specifically requested the role of Pico, the toucan who accompanied Mirabel into Bruno’s cave. They both (along with a couple other animal characters) served as narrators for the story.

Pico and Chispi

We got to attend their production at the end of the week, and it was GREAT! All the kids did a wonderful job. Maya and Ian both did a great job of delivering their lines clearly and loudly enough to be heard. They didn’t let their stage fright get to them (though you could tell they were both feeling it a bit Friday morning). And they’ve both told us they’d like to do something like that again.

Our friend Missy was in town for a couple weeks for some teacher training. Several times during her visit, we hung out, ate together, plied her with cocktails. It was such a good visit! We had a weekend where Holly, Chris, Ruby, and Herbie came over and hung out. And just for fun, Anna came over too! I regret that none of us thought to photo the five college friends together, but we did have fun eating barbecue, drinking, and talking.

Missy’s came to visit!

The next week, Sean had again secured a reservation at Tiki Tatsu-ya, so we could take Missy to this wackadoo Tiki bar (where Sean desperately wishes he could be a regular). So that we could get responsibly knackered, we decided to book a Lyft to take us down and bring us home again. The adventure began already with our Lyft driver. Since there were three of us, we had half-jokingly pointed Missy to the front seat, since she’s such an extrovert, and Sean and I, well, we aren’t.

Dude had a dashboard full of rocks and minerals, which Missy commented on. I, perhaps unhelpfully, pointed out the Missy loves rocks! I’m going to guess that our driver didn’t need much encouragement from me, but I still regret my participation. Right out the gate, he wanted to know why the scientific community was so bent against acknowledging and studying the healing properties of crystals. Yes, really. And it just went on from there. Another highlight for me – why won’t the US put more kids into ketamine-induced “death” in order to reboot their brains and cure them of childhood disease? WHYYYYYYY??!!

Tiki Tatsu-ya

I gotta say, I’d have been a deer in headlights; sputtering speechless. Missy handled it all brilliantly. She responded as carefully as she could to his questions, demonstrating an open mind while still trying to quell his more outrageous theories. And as we crossed the river, I thought we were home free, and then Missy volunteered that she’s also a physics teacher. Fresh lines of inquiry were now available! Now our dude wanted to discuss black holes, but the way he said it was, “What do you think about black holes?” Errrr – that’s pretty open-ended. Luckily by then we were at our restaurant, and could exit the vehicle before Missy was grilled further.

Tiki Tatsu-ya was all you could hope for, as usual. This time we got to try some of the food, which was incredible. We also got to try one of the large-format drinks – a rum barrel. It was quite good, and the fiery theatrics were top-notch. If I’m being honest though, I enjoyed our individual drinks more. Thankfully our Lyft ride back home was a quiet one.

Rum barrel!

Missy was around a couple more days. We had dinner together. She let the kids play in her hotel pool. It was too hot to be very active. We later learned that it was central Texas’s hottest July on record. Good timing, Seattle lady!

On the last few days of the month, Sean went back to Alabama to attend his 30th high school reunion. The kids and I held down the fort, trying to keep the house un-wrecked while also taking care of things for back to school, home maintenance, and our upcoming vacation. We were pretty successful, and thanks to a surprise flight cancelation, Sean made it back home Sunday night earlier than expected. Now to decompress for five minutes before what promises to be a hectic August as well.

June started on a high note with the tail end of our fun Florida Keys trip. We of course arrived back from Florida to near constant 100 degree temperatures. It did rain once in June, a couple inches even (yay!), but we’ve seen little moisture or relief from the heat since then.

Pride of Barbados is one of the few things thriving in our yard.

As seems to happen sometimes with vacations, we arrived back to a string of small difficulties. The RAID array where we store our photos, music, movies, and other important information died. We’re guessing a combination of old age and cat fur was the culprit. Then we woke up one morning to the hose leading to our washing machine spouting a little fountain of water onto the floor. Thankfully that didn’t happen while we were gone for a week, but it clearly had been going on for a while because there was a lot of standing water on the floor, and some had traveled to our garage as well. We wound up taking part of the day off to replace the hose and get all the water and water-damaged things cleaned up. Both these things were relatively manageable fixes.

The other mess revolved around our trees. We knew we needed to get them trimmed and I had been communicating with our normal tree service for a while, trying to get on their schedule. Several trees are still sporting limbs that died during the Snowpocalypse of 2021. Many of the trees are simply at the end of their lifespan. We needed them taken care of. Since it’s 100 effing degrees every day, I wind up spending time each morning watering some quantity of our plants. One morning, maybe a minute or two after I had just been out watering, Sean and I heard a massive whump sound in the back yard. One of the trees dropped a huge limb right where I had just been working. I am not sure I’d have died, but I betcha I’d have ended up in the hospital had I lingered out there a bit too long.

Not visible here is the big thick trunk of the branch.

Our tree people will be removing that tree entirely; it’s an ornamental pear that’s probably a decade older than anyone had any right to expect it to live. We’re hoping the other trees are watching and see what happens when you try to kill April with your branches.

Maya painted a little birdhouse years ago, and it has hosted at least one round of wrens and their babies in the past. Sean and I popped the top off of it earlier in the year so I could clean it out properly and then he could glue it back together. The wrens must have enjoyed a clean house because we got to see another little family of wrens come into being. We watched the diligent nest building and later the furious feeding after the eggs hatched. I loved walking by the house hearing the little peep-peep-peep sounds emanating from it.

Red-eared Slider

One morning around mid-month, we were astonished to find a turtle in the back yard. The kids checked it out a bit before photographing it and letting it wander on its merry way. Ian looked in his reptile and amphibian book and discovered it was a Red-eared Slider. There are no ponds near us (that I know of) but everything says you shouldn’t try to relocate them, and so we left it to wander.

Note Sean’s ingenuity on the floaty-front.

Father’s Day weekend was full of activity. On Friday, we took the kids to the Alamo Drafthouse to eat dinner and watch Lightyear. On Saturday, since the only acceptable outdoor activity right now is swimming, we took the kids to Blanco State Park and spent a few glorious hours submerged in water. We had lunch afterward at Redbud Cafe, which turned out to be quite pleasant.

Metal straws!

On Sunday, much like Mother’s Day the month before, we kept things low-key. We did our best to let Dad sleep in. Once he was up and about, the kids were too excited to wait for long. We opened gifts fairly early on. Sean received some tiki head shaped glasses much like the ones we had used in Key West to consume Mai Tais. He also got some metal straws which we thought might be fun for cocktails and mocktails.

Serpent Swirl!

As I mentioned in the Florida Keys post, the kids got really into making their own mocktails one afternoon while sitting at a restaurant, using ingredients from their flavored water and our cocktails to craft their own. After that, they had spent a few glorious sessions chatting over ingredients and writing down their creations in notebooks and on sticky notes. They pulled all of this out for Father’s Day. The kids each made him their own specialty mocktail, and it sounds like he enjoyed both of them.

Ian made a Serpent Swirl. To a base of Sprite, he added the juice of half a lime and half a lemon. Next he added an ounce each of store-bought apple juice and homemade grenadine. He added some ice and stirred until the sides of the glass felt nice and cold.

Maya made a Sea of Snowflakes. She combined a cup of soda water and a quarter cup of coconut water. Into this, she smashed about 8 chocolate mint leaves and left them in the drink. She wanted to add a tablespoon of sugar, but we ultimately decided on a tablespoon of simple syrup instead, so we wouldn’t obliterate our bubbles in trying to dissolve the sugar.

Breakfast for lunch!

Sean tells me he loved them both, and I was impressed with just how different and unique the drinks were. Well done, children!

The kids each tried their own drink and all of this was served with breakfast-for-lunch, a family favorite. Later that evening, I made a Sean-friendly dinner as well: Philly cheesesteaks and Brussels sprouts roasted in bacon grease.

The rest of our month was kind of a non-event. The kids were attending a summer program that they seemed to dislike. I was annoyed because it didn’t seem to live up to what we were sold. Field trips! Projects to stimulate their brains but still have fun! Even more projects announced in class! A couple of these things materialized, but mostly it was just show up, play, go home. We made a mad dash to find alternate care for July and early August, and we’ve mostly succeeded. Guess we’ll have to try a different approach next summer.

I managed to cut my finger AGAIN. This time, I took a nice slice off the end of my left index finger. It bled a lot but there was no point going to emergency care for that one. I kept it covered and treated regularly with antibiotic ointment, and after a couple weeks, finally started going around without a bandage on. It’s still very tender, but it doesn’t slow me down as much now that it’s not an open wound that I need to keep clean.

Nox may have been the only one who liked cleaning

Since it was too hot to go outside and my finger was too wounded for me to do much yard work or cooking, we went on a bit of a going-though-old-stuff bender. Maya and I collected up and reorganized the art supplies. The four of us went through the kids’ shelving and took a lot of stuff to the Salvation Army, with another load needing to go soon. I think we intend to continue that trend a bit here in July, since it’s still way WAY too hot to do anything useful outdoors.

Things are looking a lot better and the kids are starting to know where to look for their stuff and where to put it away, which is a positive. The Big Bad is going to be their rooms. We’ve probably given them way too much autonomy over the years, and we’re reaping the rewards now. Maya can’t bear to part with anything. Ian’s version of cleaning is to shove everything into a drawer, cabinet, or closet as quickly as he can and hope the door still shuts. It should be a traumatic experience for all of us.

Our kids sometimes have too much free time

True to my word, I’m done posting COVID stats. However, it’s still lingering in my mind, impacting at least some of our decisions still, causing concern. I’m sure it’s only a matter of time, but to our knowledge, none of us has caught it yet. With each fresh variant being more contagious, I’m sure our day is coming soon. We still hear about coworkers and family members getting sick. And still, the symptoms and severity are pretty variable. All in all though, we plan to move cautiously forward.

Toward the end of June, the Supreme Court overturned Roe vs. Wade. With family members falling fairly wide on either side of the fence, I’m not sure how much I feel like spouting off about my particular views. But no matter my opinion, it’s fair to say that the decision is historic. And I think it’s also fair to be concerned about how this might impact marriage rights and privacy rights and contraceptive rights. With reports of hospitals doing things like letting ectopic pregnancies rupture before they’ll intervene and Texas suing over the federal guidance that abortion must be an option if the mother’s life is at risk, I can’t help but worry about the direction things are going.

May was kinda crazy. But like normal crazy, not pandemic crazy. In fact, maybe it was a little bit of pandemic aftermath. Like 2020 and 2021 were so screwy that this year, they were packing in all of the end of year fun they could in an attempt to make up for the things that were missed at the end of the previous two school years.

Flowers for their teachers

Teacher appreciation week for Maya’s class meant a new fun way to celebrate teachers each day of the week. Ian’s was a little more subdued, but because Maya was doing stuff, he wanted to as well.

Also to celebrate the end of the school year, the school did an A-B-C Countdown to Summer. Each day in May, they did something fun with a letter or two of the alphabet as their guide. A – Art day, B – Bubble day. They kids dressed up for H – Hawaiian day. Maya is now big enough to wear some of my shirts, so that’s what she wore since she had outgrown all of her aloha clothes.

Hawaiian Day

Maya had two days of STAAR testing. Ian’s class did a special thing for Mother’s Day. Maya’s class had a pop it party toward the end of the month. There were a lot of things to keep track of, and if I’m being honest, I’m not sure I got all of it. For instance, I nearly forgot Maya’s end of the season soccer picnic. Here’s a photo.

She was so excited to get a trophy.

Partway through, Sean and I did the only reasonable thing you could do – we had a date night at a cocktail bar. We had been trying to get a reservation at Tiki Tatsu-ya for a reasonable time of day (11:45 at night would be the only slot available, if there were openings at all) that coincided with sitter availability. Finally a 9:45p reservation opened up on a night when Anna could watch the kids.

Sean is in his happy place

That place lives up to the hype. The drinks are delicious and each is presented in a different and interesting vessel. We *need* to go with a larger group so we can order the drink that is served in a giant boat much fanfare and flourish from the waitstaff. Music would thud and lights would flash, and the Tiki gods, while briefly angered, were eventually satisfied with the sacrifice of brain cells, I guess.

They served interesting looking finger foods too, but we were too full from our dinner to check those out. Sean was mesmerized by the rum selection behind the bar and spent several minutes trading notes with the bartender. Tiki Tatsu-ya is Sean’s happy place.

Gulf coast toad, we think

My Calabrian chili plants were finally large enough to put in big pots. In doing so, I found this year’s first toad (a Gulf Coast Toad, we think). He apparently had been hiding in an empty pot, and when I moved it, he essentially jumped at my face. We’ve also seen a great many Texas Spiny Lizards this year in addition to a number of butterflies, birds, and (to Maya’s chagrin) bees.

Maya made me breakfast tacos

Because we were dealing with so much end-of-school stuff and last minute vacation planning, Mother’s Day was a pretty subdued affair. I was gifted with a new shoulder bag and a lovely new cookbook. Ian made me a very nice Aperol Spritz way too early in the day (at my request, thank you very much), and Maya made me breakfast tacos. Otherwise, by and large, it was like any other day.

Ian made me an Aperol Spritz

May was horribly hot, even by Texas standards, and with almost no rain to boot. It is going to be a long and difficult summer here.

Sean and I had a weekend event planned mid-month to go to the Cruel World music festival in Pasadena, CA and were very much looking forward to the milder weather that area generally enjoys. Alas, we brought the pain. It was so, so hot while we were there. Coated with sunscreen and chugging water almost as fast as we could find it, we watched very committed goths and other costumed folks sweating it out in full black and heavy leather regalia. I personally don’t know how they did it.

At Cruel World

The shows were great, even with the heat. We were disappointed when Echo and the Bunnymen backed out of the show, but it’s probably for the best. Since we’ve seen them a few times, we might have had to skip their set to choose a different act to watch. The bands were spread across three stages, and even when waiting in line for food or the obligatory t-shirt, we were able to at least listen to one of the shows.

I think we dealt well with the heat, but the sour spot for me was the “merch” line. It was long and slow and there was only one of them. We hopped in line after the English Beat set, hoping we could snag our stuff before Missing Persons went on. Luckily, we were in a good spot to hear Missing Persons, because we were still in line. Sean kindly let me pop out of the line so that at least one of us would get to see PIL. He caught the last couple songs. We estimate the line took two hours. Unacceptable.

When a problem comes along …

An astonishing bright spot for me was watching Devo! They sounded great and their show was really fun to watch. And the age range of the audience was something to behold. Several people were in energy domes and a few souls made of sterner stuff than me were in full jumpsuits.

The end of the night, after all the heat and all the standing and walking, was the killer. We had decided against renting a car on this trip, since it was just a quick show up, see the concert, go home kind of thing. Trying to find an Uber or Lyft after that concert was all but impossible. People would keep letting us book our ride and then moments later they’d cancel.

Thanks to some very good advice from a former coworker of Sean’s who was also at the show, we opted instead to walk 3/4 of a mile to the train station and for just a few dollars, took the train to a stop just a few short minutes from our hotel. We joked the whole way that we were walking in LA, just like they sang it in the Missing Persons set that we missed while waiting to buy frickin’ t-shirts.

Thank you, Harry!

Sean’s Dad came to stay with the kids while we were out of town, and by all reports, the kids had a fun-filled time of eating lots of takeout and spending lots of time at various parks. This was officially the first time we’ve been away from them overnight, if you can believe that.

Maya and her friend Maclin finally set up a play date. He’s the first person I’ve heard her describe as her “best friend.” They enjoy the same iPad games. They are both critter people. And Maclin has been in Maya’s class multiple times at elementary school. Sadly, Mac will be out of town for the summer, so Maya is working through ways to stay in touch with her friend. So far, she’s a little sad, but we’ll figure it out, and of course summer won’t last forever. She did get to stop by Mac’s house just before the end of school to meet Lemon, his Leopard Gecko and his family’s various dogs and rats.

Mac and Maya (it had been pajama day at school)

The month did get weird toward the end. On May 24th, the shooting happened at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, TX. I’ve always felt a wave of sadness when mass shootings happen. What a horrible waste of life. Those poor families. Why did this happen? But I’ve never had one hit me this hard. I’m assuming because it’s geographically close to us and because the kids that were slaughtered were the same age as our kids, we’ve felt the scab ripped off with each fresh news story. Some of the kids could only be IDed via DNA testing. Some of the kids played dead to avoid being shot. Some of the kids called 911 and begged for help. Rip-rip-rip. It was hard for the shooting not to occupy our minds as we sent our 1st and 3rd grader to their elementary school those last few days of the month. It’s hard for it to not occupy our minds now as a solution (or more probably a set of solutions) continues to elude us.

At the very end of the month, right after school let out, we left for our big Florida Keys vacation. It worked so well with Disney World last year, that I’m actually gonna write up a separate post for that vacation and link it here. I tried (and failed) to avoid reading the news, but even with the dark Uvalde cloud and the threat of a tropical storm, we managed to have a lovely vacation.

I think I’m done posting COVID stats. It’s not that I think it’s over, necessarily. In fact, we rushed the kids in to get their COVID boosters about a week before our vacation. It’s just that I don’t know how complete and useful the data are at this point. It seems like the death toll isn’t rising quite so horribly. Hopefully that’s a positive sign that between vaccine adoption and reduced severity in the most recent strains, we’re moving past the worst of the pandemic. And truly, deeply, honestly, I’m just so fucking sick of thinking about it.

This year, after the long COVID-inflicted travel drought, we decided to maximize our vacation days by lining up our trips with holidays wherever we could. This has had the unfortunate side effect of increasing our travel costs, but those have (so far) been somewhat offset by the various airline credits we have left over from all the cancelled travel these past couple years.

Sunset at Mallory Square in Key West

We thought we were being smart. The kids’ last day of school was the 27th of May, right before Memorial Day weekend, so we booked flights for that evening at 6:45, thinking we’d have plenty of time to fetch kids from school and load up and head to the airport. Over the weeks leading up to our vacation, we’d been hearing horror stories about huge waits at our airport here in Austin. At one point, traffic was so congested that apparently people were abandoning their rental cars and just walking to the airport. Even our airline emailed us just before our flight warning us about delays at our airport and suggesting we’d need to arrive 3 hours before our flight.

And so it was that we wound up fetching our kids an hour early from school on their last day and hustling everyone down to the airport. We arrived about 3.5 hours early. We spent maybe 10 minutes getting our bags checked, and then it took only maybe 20-30 minutes to get through security. And then our flight was delayed by a half hour. We had some time to kill.

Our kids, who are now 7 and 9, handled traveling really well. They carried their own backpacks containing iPads, notebooks, and whatever loveys they couldn’t live without for a week. Maya no longer needs a booster, and for Ian, we just packed along the mi-fold for the rental car, so in that regard, our traveling was easier than it used to be. We did however pack along snorkel gear and beach towels for four people, so that took quite a bit of extra space.

We arrived in Miami late at night. The airport there is much larger than Austin’s so it took us a while to collect bags and make our way to the rental car place. And then we had to wait probably 45 minutes in line to pick up our reserved car. All told it was around 1:00 in the morning eastern time before we got our kids into bed.

Guess where we are?

Morning arrived before any of us were ready for it. Bleary-eyed, we belted down a quick hotel breakfast and hit the road for Everglades National Park. Our visit began at the Shark Valley visitor center. We had a morning reservation for a tram tour through this part of the park. Technically you can walk or bicycle over the path as well, but with free-roaming alligators, that didn’t seem like the option for us. Maybe we can try that when Ian grows beyond alligator-snack-sized.

American Alligator

Our tram tour was great! Us four tired people got to sit and relax in an open-air tram as we spent a couple hours being carted along the Everglades Loop, listening to a naturalist narrate what we were seeing as we went. The lady driving the bus was also a top-notch wildlife spotter, and the family sitting behind us was full of bird enthusiasts! We had so many experts at our disposal! I am guilty of thinking of the Everglades as a swamp, but it’s actually a very wide, very slow-moving river. The diversity of wildlife, both seen and unseen is impressive, and the ecosystem is unique.

The kids enjoyed the trip. I was worried they’d be fussed about the long ride, but we saw so many creatures, and they were busy firing away with their cameras, I don’t think it occurred to them to be too bored. Halfway through, our tram stopped and let us out for a while to climb the observation tower and take a good long look at our surroundings. Everglades National Park is immense and largely flat as far as the eye can see.

Double-crested Cormorant!

Each year, the kids’ elementary school has what they call a MARE week. Each grade level gets a different marine ecosystem to study, and third grade studied the wetlands (it was a pure happy accident that we scheduled a wetlands vacation this year). Maya had just done a project on the Double-Crested Cormorant toward the end of school, and we were fortunate enough to get to see one in during our tour. They have the weirdest little blue eyes, and the poor one we saw was panting in the heat. Maya was ecstatic, and couldn’t wait to tell her teacher all about it.

We saw lots of American Alligators, so Ian was happy about that. He was hoping to spot the invasive Burmese Python, but if there were any out and about, we never saw them. He had carried his reptile and amphibian identification book along, but it’s a North American guide. Our naturalist told us that for Florida, we’d be better off with something that focused more on sub-tropical species.

Florida Soft-shelled Turtle

Here’s a very incomplete list of the other critters we saw: Florida Softshell Turtle, Yellow-bellied Slider, Wood Stork, Anhinga (spreading its wings out so they’d dry), Black-Crowned Night Heron (who we shouldn’t have seen at all since they’re nocturnal), Great Blue Heron, and a Florida Red-bellied Turtle.

After a very successful tram tour, we drove down to the Ernest F. Coe visitor center, catching a fast-food lunch en route. The kids checked out the exhibits, listened to animal sounds, and viewed birds through a “scope” as a recording explained what they were seeing. From there, we drove first to the Anhinga trail and took a walk there. That’s actually where we saw the Florida Red-bellied Turtle. It was a nice walk, albeit a very hot one. And we were fortunate to have seen the anhinga earlier during our tour, because we didn’t see any along the trail named for them. We also drove on to the Pa Hay Okee overlook trail. On the road between these two trails, we passed over Reef Pass, elevation 3 feet. Yeah, if three feet of elevation is noteworthy, this is not your park for mountain vistas.

Happy Anniversary!

With that, we decided we had seen enough of the Everglades for one trip, though of course the park is massive and we barely scratched the surface. We loaded up our sweaty carcasses and made the drive down to Key Largo. We got ourselves checked into our hotel and washed a few layers of sweat off before finding a place to eat for our anniversary. We settled on the Bayside Grille. It was close to our hotel, on the water, and the seafood and cocktail offerings hit the right buttons for our first Keys restaurant. The kids (and the adults) were all pretty tired by this point, so waiting for things like order taking and food delivery was a little tough, but otherwise it was pleasant enough. We tried to hustle back so the kids could get some pool time before bed, but we only managed to play a little while before lightning cut our visit short. The kids were a little disappointed, but between abject tiredness and the promise of more pool time the next day, they crashed with little protest.

The next day started with a lovely breakfast at Harriette’s Restaurant. We ordered what I’d call regular breakfast food here: bacon and eggs and that kind of thing. But we noticed our breakfasts all came with muffins, and there was even a separate muffin menu full of interesting flavors. Evidently the local specialty is (go figure) a Key Lime Pie muffin. I chose a guava and cream muffin. Maya and Ian chose orange blossom muffins. They were all absolutely delicious and maybe a little larger than I was really up for eating. Our kids couldn’t even finish all of theirs, which is a rarity for them. We loved the muffins so much, we placed a to-go order for another muffin apiece for later on.

Check out my feet!

On the docket for today was our Big Deal vacation experience. We were going to be swimming with dolphins that afternoon at Theater of the Sea. Sean had apparently been wanting to swim with dolphins for ages, and the kids are both old enough now that they would be allowed to take part. Even though the cost was a bit on the eye-popping side, we went for it. As I’ve said in previous posts, it’s hard for me to resist an opportunity to interact with any animal I might otherwise never encounter.

Our dolphin swim wasn’t till the afternoon, so even after a full breakfast and a 15-20 minute drive south to Islamorada (pronounced EYE-lamorada, not EES-lamorada), we still had a few hours to see the what else Theater of the Sea had to offer. The way they arrange their shows is to have only one show going on at a time, and when that one’s over, they kindly point you in the direction of the next one. The circuit of shows runs a few times a day, so you have ample opportunity to see everything you might want to see. We didn’t have to make choices and it felt very relaxed.

We arrived just as the parrot show was kicking off. Maya loves ALL THE BIRDS, but she is particularly fond of cockatoos. One of the birds in the show was a Moluccan Cockatoo. We also got to see what I think was a Military Macaw show off his zygodactyl feet (two toes forward, two toes back – woodpeckers evidently share this trait). We watched a Blue and Yellow Macaw demonstrate his ability to recycle a plastic bottle and do some basic addition and subtraction. The birds were beautiful and Maya and Ian were both highly entertained. They even got to have their photo taken on the way out with Oscar – one of the blue and yellow macaws.

Biiiiig jump

We were next directed to the dolphin show. Here we got to watch two Atlantic bottle nose dolphins named Sherman and Kimbit perform all manner of tricks, ranging from the silly to the breathtaking. These creatures demonstrate amazing physical strength and remarkable muscle control. They launch their trainers’ high above the water in epic pushes and lifts. They make it look easy when they jump up through one ring on the water, arc, and then come back through another ring floating next to it. They “walk” upright on their tails across the water. Their vocalizations were fascinating as well. They showed us two (that I can remember), one that sounded very much like a child crying and another that had the clicky sound of an angler reeling in his or her catch.

After seeing all of this, I think the kids were REALLY excited about getting to swim with the dolphins. They may have gotten the wrong idea about which tricks they would be performing later on. They wanted to dive in and get tossed around in the air too! They also wanted to play with the toys with the dolphins. We had to reset expectations a little bit.

Jett the sea lion showing off his balancing skills

Our next stop was to see sea lions Bella and Jett. Poor Bella is a rescue sea lion who has a neurological condition that keeps her from being able to hold her head steady. However, that apparently doesn’t stop her from making friends in the sea lion world. Nor does it keep her from learning a few performance tricks of her own. Her friend Jett didn’t appear to be encumbered by any disability and was able to show us what a neuro-typical sea lion was capable of. He was able to balance a ball on his nose (using sensory feedback from his whiskers) while also balancing himself on his front flippers.

After the show, we took a very brief little bottomless boat ride (we were seated around an open center), during which one of the dolphins joined us in the open area in the center of the boat and showed us a couple of jumps and left many of us soaked to the skin.

Hyacinth Macaw

After the “tour” on the boat, we wandered over to the other end of the park to watch the stingrays and nurse sharks get fed. The walk over was nice – we got to see all the pretty parrots hanging out in a non-show environment. Sean fell in love with a beautiful deep-blue Hyacinth Macaw. As we walked, we checked out the fish, turtle, and alligator residents before arriving at the feeding area.

At midday in the full sun, it wasn’t as pleasant to watch the stingray and shark feeding as it had been to see some of the other shows. My favorite part was the Snowy Egret who was hanging around the cooler of food used to feed the sharks. Apparently he visits regularly hoping for some food, and the employees have named him Willie.

Willie’s trying to steal the sharks’ treats. Seems unwise.

After a stop to cool off and have some drinks, it was time to get swim-suited and sunscreened up (reef safe sunscreen only, please) so we could get in the water with the dolphins. There were six participants in total, so it was definitely not a crowded affair. I don’t know if it was the promise of fishy snacks or if they genuinely enjoy playing with people, but our pair of dolphins kept swimming near the dock, seeming eager for us to get in the water!

Woodses and Krystle

Our family of four went out together to meet our dolphin friends, Krystle and Trooper. Krystle was about eight years old (if I’m remembering correctly) and Trooper is her son. He’s was only ten months old and still learning the ropes, but he seemed so excited to be playing along. They started by swimming past us, letting us pet them as they skimmed along. We received some very splashy flipper waves, and then Krystle sort of posed in front of us, so we could get a photo with her.

Maya’s kiss from Krystle

After that, we went out in pairs. Maya and I went out together. We had a pose where it sort of looked like we were dancing with Krystle and Trooper, and we received some very sweet, if forceful, kisses from the dolphins. Maya struggles some with impulse control, and her hands kept finding their way to the dolphins when they weren’t supposed to. In situations like this, we shouldn’t forget that we’re in the water with large animals who would be more than capable of hurting us if they chose to do so. We also can’t forget that these dolphins don’t need any damage, however unintentional, from human hands. And so it was that I kind of had to hold Maya’s arms while she received her dolphin kiss, lest she forget and touch its face.

Ian’s kiss from Krystle

Sean and Ian did all these same things during their turn. He received his kiss from baby Trooper, who apparently doesn’t linger when he gives out kisses. The trainer was really nice about it though and asked Ian if that was too short of a kiss. After he emphatically agreed that it was waaaay too short, mom Krystle came out to kiss him properly.

We each got to swim the circumference of the little lagoon area with the dolphins. This time Ian and I went together. Ian kept telling me how much he loved it, but then at the same time, he kept racing forward like a little speed demon. I tried to get him to slow down a little and enjoy the experience.

Dancing with dolphins

The last thing we got to do was either a foot push or a dorsal tow. Ian, Maya, and Sean all went for the foot pushes. The trick is to hold your body as straight as you can, and look in the direction you want to go. The dolphins each push a foot and propel you forward through the water. Sean commented on the immense power he felt behind him as he was pushed. Sean and I both worried it would be scary for Ian and we tried to talk him out of it, but he insisted, and I’m so glad he did. As he made it to shore, he gleefully yelled, “I did it!” as he climbed out of the water.

I was not comfortable with the foot pushing situation and so I chose to hang onto Krystle’s dorsal fin and let her haul me in that way instead. And Sean is right, the sheer strength of that dolphin is astonishing to feel. It was all I could do to hang on!

More dancing with dolphins

As we were leaving, the dolphin trainer thanked us for being dolphin playthings. Everyone loved the experience. The kids will tell you that swimming with Krystle and Trooper was their very favorite part of our vacation. And Sean and I wholeheartedly agree.

My weather app had been predicting rain all day long, but thus far, all we had had was relentless sun. As we were getting out of our dolphin swim though, it looked like the skies were ready to open up. We hastily showered the salt water off of us, changed into dry clothes, and hurried to the car. We drove to lunch in a fairly heavy downpour.

Local beers

We went to Keys Bite for lunch. All of us had interesting beers or sodas and a fried seafood basket. This was the lunch during which Ian discovered he liked fried mahi-mahi. During our whole trip, he was never quite committed enough to order that instead of his usual chicken fingers, but if anyone else happened to order it, he was happy to have some of theirs.

Maya, being Maya

After putting the kids off and getting thunderstormed out the night before, we let the kids have all the pool time they wanted. Sean and I hung out and sipped local beers while the kids played and played and played.

Ian has gotten over any apprehension he has about the pool – as long as it’s warm enough

Finally, on Monday, Memorial Day, we relaxed. We slept in and moved at a leisurely pace for the first morning since our vacation started. The kids are older now and seemingly more tolerant of some mealtime flexibility. Because of that, we had been experiencing a paradigm shift in our meal consumption. Our normal three-meal day had shifted to a two-meal with maybe some snacking here and there. Think late breakfast, early dinner, and maybe a snack midday or evening.

Lobster and grits at Ms Mac’s

Anyhow, we rolled in for a late breakfast at the original Mrs. Mac’s Kitchen. The grownups had lobster and grits (which I highly recommend) and mimosas to start our day. Ian had waffles and Maya had French toast and they both had bacon. It was a delightful breakfast! The food was really good and the waitstaff were all so friendly. The place looked kitschy-cute and felt dive-bar comfortable.

In the interest of being laid back, we then spent a while playing at our hotel beach and our hotel pool before packing up for that day’s adventure – a snorkel trip at Pennekamp State Park. We decided to go with Sundiver Snorkeling Tours, and thought their service was solid. Communication was clear. They were helpful in teaching beginners how to operate their equipment. And in the end, we had a nice, safe time on the water.

The Florida Reef is the third largest coral barrier reef in the world

Maya especially was exited about this one. “You mean we’re going to take a boat out into the ocean? And then we’re gonna jump of the boat and snorkel???!!!!” She was thrilled at the prospect. She was maybe less thrilled with the execution. Drive to the place to check in. Drive to another place to meet the boat. Ride the boat for a half hour. Futz with adjusting snorkels, vests, and fins, and then swim away from the boat a ways before finally, FINALLY getting to the coral reef. I also think Maya may have been slightly seasick. Once the kids were out there though, I think they really enjoyed it. They have cameras that are able to be taken into the water, and they both seemed to enjoy paddling around trying to snap photos of fish and pretty coral.

Ian did a great job, but he got really tired of tasting salt water

My only frustration was how crowded it all felt. I was constantly either avoiding flippers or checking for the kids, and so it was hard to just relax and enjoy the experience. On a next snorkel trip, I might look into how much more it would cost to be part of either a smaller group or a charter. Frustration aside though, it really was beautiful around the reef. The corals themselves were colorful and texturally varied. Fish in bright silvers, blues, yellows, and blacks darted around them, and if I could have relaxed, tranquil is how I’d have described it.

It started raining toward the end of our time in the water. Ian had been begging to go back to the boat, and of course it was Mom, not Dad, that he was begging. Eventually I gave in and helped Ian and Maya back to the boat. The captain had kindly pulled our bags in out of the rain, so we had a nice dry towels to wrap the kids in. They shared a soda to get the salt water taste out of their mouths and then shivered as we zipped back to shore.

Trying to behave at Blackwater Siren

For late lunch / early dinner, we tried out a joint called Blackwater Siren. They aren’t fancy, and we couldn’t find a direct website, but none of that mattered. Service was efficient and the food and drinks were so good. Everyone, including Ian, ate our calamari starter. I had the best dish – blackened grouper w jalapeño tartar sauce. Sean had the best drink – he’s a mojito guy, and apparently they make a really good one.

The kids had been getting pretty brave about visiting restrooms on their own on this trip. Ian, with his flowing blonde hair, occasionally gets side-eye and even openly questioned about whether he has gone into the right bathroom. We have coached him over and over again to not get angry – to calmly explain that he’s a boy and move on. Well, he came back from the bathroom at Blackwater Siren all excited because he was asked if he was a girl. He explained to us that he told them he was a boy and that he liked his long hair. He said that the guys then told him that when they were younger they had hair “down to here” as Ian gestured wildly at his waist. Our server overheard him relaying this story, chuckled, and said she had just heard the exact same story from the fellas over at the bar.

Relaxing at the beach

We made it back to our hotel in time to watch the sunset. The kids played in the pool for a while as mom and dad stretched out on beach chairs, drank beers, and watched them play. (Have I told you how incredible it is that we no longer have to get in the water with them if we don’t want to? They are pretty good at taking care of themselves in the pool at this point.)

Sunset

The next day, we made the drive from Key Largo to Key West. After showering and packing, we headed to The Hideout for our late breakfast / early lunch. Everyone’s food was really good, don’t let me tell you otherwise, but I did learn a sad truth. While lobster and grits is much like shrimp and grits in that there is a lovely tomatoey sauce and the grits are often cheesy. Fish and grits, at least at The Hideout, was just a piece of fish and a side of grits, and I know I disappoint my southern spouse every time I say this, but I am not a fan of grits on their own.

On our way out of Key Largo, we stopped at Harriette’s to pick up yet another batch of muffins to enjoy later on. As Sean was leaving with our takeout muffins, the Harriette’s check-out person told him that they hoped we wouldn’t see too much rain from the hurricane. What? We really hadn’t been keeping an eye on the news or the weather, but we were now! Sure enough, there was a weather pattern heading our way that was set to make landfall as a tropical storm or tropical depression later in the week.

We traded photo-taking responsibilities with another family. Apparently I didn’t get the memo on the tie-dye.

We continued down the Overseas Highway / US Hwy 1 to Islamorada to the Rain Barrel Village to do some souvenir shopping. We were greeted by Betsy, a 30-foot tall, 40-foot long sculpture of a Florida Keys Spiny Lobster. After having our photo taken with that crazy thing, we wandered through a few of the shops in the village.

We drove straight through the rest of the way to Key West. It was an interesting drive. If you look at that string of islands / keys off the southern end of Florida, that’s what we were driving along. We hopped from island to island, some large enough to support small towns and plenty of tourism, others not much larger than the roadway. Following alongside us was the old railroad that used provide the only overland access to Key West, until a hurricane demolished it in 1935. It was apparently the nation’s first recorded category 5 hurricane.

This is Fred the Tree. I happened to notice him marked in Google maps. He’s growing out of the old Seven Mile Bridge. There’s no soil! He survived Hurricane Irma! And they even decorate him at Christmas time.

It was overcast as we drove, and while it was a lovely drive regardless, I expect that if the sun had shone, we’d have seen more turquoise in the seawater sprawling to either side of us. To our kids’ intense irritation, we made them put their iPads down and look around for a while. I wanted them to see the 7-mile bridge and the vastly different landscape around us.

We drove into and through Key West around mid-afternoon. It’s a tiny island, and I’m just astonished how much they manage to cram into it. We drove along the northern side of the island along the ocean and pulled into one of our hotels few parking spots right around check in time. This would be the last time we drove our car till it was time to leave the island. We wasted no time getting settled in and letting the kids play in the pool while Mom and Dad lounged around enjoying happy hour pain killers (the cocktails, not the over-prescribed opioids).

Pool!

Once Maya and Ian swam out some of their long-car-ride energy, we meandered through town to a restaurant called Kaya for dinner. The jerk chicken appetizer was absolutely incredible. I would have been quite happy to eat it for dinner. The kids shares some fried mahi-mahi. Sean had rasta pasta, and I had a fish sandwich.

It was all done really well, but the thing that provided the most entertainment value were the drinks. Sean and I had really excellent Mai Tais, which we hadn’t even planned on ordering since they’re made with Rhumbero (some kinda flavored wine product) rather than proper rum. But when offered a sample, who can refuse, and I’m maybe slightly ashamed to say that these drinks were delicious! They also brought water that had sliced up lemons and limes in it. The kids spent an enjoyable several minutes mashing different citrus and mint leaves and fruit from Sean’s and my drinks to create their own mocktails. They had me jot down notes in my phone about how they constructed their drinks so they could add the recipes to their notebooks later.

Mai Tais!

We walked from the restaurant down to Mallory Square in time to watch the sun set and see a little of the action around the square. The kids made friends with a wire artist named Ryan who discussed what sorts of sculptures he could produce and in various price ranges. Maya had visions of an octopus with a hummingbird flying around it and Ryan didn’t even bat an eye, urging her to be more and more daring and creative. We left so Maya could ponder whether this was truly going to be her souvenir or whether she might find something else she wanted more at all the places we would be going.

Since we were worried about the incoming tropical storm, we tried to cram as much into the next day (Wednesday) as we could. We were up bright and early to grab breakfast from Old Town Bakery. We had learned before we ever left Texas that Key West had a traffic problem – or more specifically, a parking problem. And so, we looked into our mass transit options. Turns out, there’s a free bus loop – the Duval Loop – that passes within reasonable walking distance of just about everything we were interested in visiting. And there was a pickup spot basically right across the street from our hotel (we stayed at Eden House, and loved it – comfortable, unpretentious, had a pool, had parking).

End of the road

We wanted to head toward Hemingway museum, but it is a cash-only establishment, so first we had to hit an ATM. This turned into a 45-minute ordeal during which we hit two different locations and called the bank multiple times. The kids were pretty antsy through all this, but they held it together pretty well, all told. Cash in hand (finally), we stopped by for obligatory photos at US Hwy 1 mile marker 0, either the beginning of the road or the end, depending on your point of view.

We made our way to the Hemingway Home and Museum, site of typewriters, taxidermy, and six-toed cats. When we were explaining about Ernest Hemingway to the kids, they were clearly of the mind that they would be tolerating this museum for our sake. And then they saw all the cats, many of whom were quite content to be petted by tourists.

So many toes!

Hemingway was apparently gifted with a six-toed cat called Snow White by a ship’s captain, and at least some of the cats that live at the property now are descendants of Snow White. Many of the resident cats are polydactyl (meaning they have extra toes) and some are not. All of them look to be at peace with their well-traveled, tropical surroundings. The cats even have their own little miniature Hemingway Home to sleep in and a vet comes and looks after them regularly.

Hemingway’s writing studio

Hemingway lived in this house from 1931 to 1939, and the house was interesting to look through as a period piece as well. The rooms are well appointed with furnishings Hemingway collected during his travels. The grounds themselves are lush with tropical growth. We tried to listen to the tour guide a bit, but our children were too disruptive. We attempted to read through the tour information as we went, but again, it was hard to keep an eye on the kids and read about what we were seeing. One of the plaques informed us that he wrote 70% of his works while living at Hemingway House – I’m guessing a strict write in the morning, rum in the afternoon regimen helped him to be this productive.

The kids are thrilled.

After we left Hemingway House, we made the obligatory stop to take a photo with the Southernmost Point buoy, which marks the southernmost point of the contiguous United States (90 miles to Cuba!). And much to Maya and Ian’s chagrin, we also had to wait in the obligatory line. Have I mentioned the Key West chickens yet? Some postulate that many residents used to keep backyard chickens but then got sick of them and let them loose. Others believe populations swelled when cockfighting became illegal. Regardless, all over Key West, we’d see random chickens strutting around. The locals apparently call them “gypsy chickens.” Sometimes a rooster or two, other times a hen and her chicks. In alleys, in yards, wandering around in front of bars and nightclubs. The kids LOVED them, but even the charm of random chicken-spotting wore off as they stood in that hot, boring line.

A chicken walks into a bar …

Eventually we got our touristy photos and meandered over to the Key West Butterfly and Nature Conservatory. This place was small, but really neat. The crowd impacted the serenity vibe some, but we could feel it nonetheless. There was greenery all around us, the sound of trickling water filled the air, and between butterflies and birds (and the odd turtle), brightly colored creatures provided endless movement and visual appeal. Maya was completely taken with the vivid tropical birds living there: Paradise Tanager, Orange Legged Honey Creeper, Australian Diamond Dove, and a poor rescue Turaco who had only one leg, but seemed to get on just fine regardless. We also saw the resident Flamingo couple, Rhett and Scarlett, fishing and preening in the water.

Atlas Moth

One of the coolest things we saw there were Atlas Moths. Just a couple days before, a friend had posted about them on Facebook, and I made a point of showing the photo to Ian because he’s a reptile guy and part of the Atlas Moth’s wingtips look astonishingly like snake heads. We had no idea what we’d see in the conservatory, but there were multiple Atlas Moths (and even a caterpillar), larger than life and equipped with the aforementioned snake head coloring. Ian was particularly good at spotting them and grew frustrated that I couldn’t always find what he was seeing.

Brown anole?

Speaking of Ian being a reptile guy … the variety of lizards we encountered in the Keys was amazing! We couldn’t identify all of them, but one prevalent type looked like it was tip-toeing across the sidewalks with its tail curled up. We had been calling them “the curly tailed lizards,” but it turns out, that’s actually what they are! Both Northern Curlytail Lizards and Red-sided Curlytail lizards, while not native, call Florida home. We saw a number of anoles. We saw a few red-headed lizards that may have been Common Agama. We managed to see only one iguana during our entire trip, though Ian was sure on the lookout for them. It seemed like everywhere we looked, a lizard was darting away from us.

The sun was still shining, so we hopped the Duval Loop bus line back to our hotel, changed into our swim clothes, and took the bus right out to Fort Zachary Taylor Park. We had read that you could snorkel near the shore here (unlike at Pennekamp where you had to take a boat a few miles out to get to the reef). But before that, we made our poor, mistreated kids walk through the historic grounds, which were quite interesting. There were cannons all around, and I think Ian at least had a passing interest in that.

Cannons at Ft Zachary Taylor

We then further delayed getting in the water by eating our customary late lunch / early dinner. We grabbed burgers and hot dogs at the Cayo Hueso Cafe and ate at a picnic table right there near the beach. And then finally, we got all snorkeled up and hopped into the water. Sean and Maya swam out to some rocks out a short distance from the shore and apparently the fish were plentiful and active there, but even near the shore, the water was clear and we could see colorful fish darting around beneath us. Eventually Ian grew sick of salt water and so he and I sat out on the shore a while. It started to look like it wanted to rain and we even saw a water spout, which is a little alarming. Almost as soon as we saw it, it was gone, so I wonder if it’s what the meteorologists would call a “fair weather waterspout.”

Nice snorkeling at Ft Zachary Taylor

Once Sean and Maya were done, we packed up and headed back to the hotel to drop off our gear and clean up a bit before heading back out to Mallory Square. Sean and I had tied a couple of key lime pies thus far on our trip, but we had not yet had frozen key lime pie … on a stick! A place called Kermit’s is where we picked up these crazy snacks. Sean went with the traditional flavor, but I chose strawberry key lime pie for mine. The kids weren’t sure they cared for key lime pie, and so they went for the standard ice cream at Häagen-Dazs next door.

Properly fueled, we visited our friend Ryan the wire artist so each kid could formally request their wackadoo creations. Maya stuck with her octopus with a hummingbird idea from earlier. Ian settled on a snake playing a guitar. They both turned out brilliantly, and they were packed well enough that they survived the trip back to Texas!

Maya and her wire art

Sean was hungry, so at the advice of Ryan, we swung by a trailer called Garbo’s, where he ordered some Korean barbecue tacos. They were huge! Ian and I got to eat some of them too, since Sean wasn’t really *that* hungry. The trailer was at the back of a bar, so we had to hustle and eat before they kicked us out so the rest of the crowd could be grown-ups in peace.

Ian’s wire art

The next day’s big event was going to be our kayak trip through the mangroves. Thanks to the incoming tropical storm, we were keeping an eye on the weather. It didn’t look like the rain would start till maybe noon or so, and our trip was at 10a, so we figured we might get a little wet toward the end of it – no big deal. We hustled the kids out to Old Town Bakery again for breakfast and started to gather our supplies for the trip. At around 9:30, just as we were finishing up our food, the kayak folks called to let us know they were cancelling the trip due to weather. Sigh. I’m sure they’re accounting for the unpredictability of weather patterns, but I felt comfortable enough that I’d have gone out, and I’d have taken the kids. From everything I had read, the storm wasn’t really supposed to pick up till Friday. Oh well.

The kids were disappointed too but got over it quickly when they got to spend extra time playing in the pool. This lasted until lunchtime, when we decided to go to Sloppy Joe’s bar. This place has history. Hemingway drank there; heck, he met one of his wives there. I was ambivalent about our mojitos, happy with our smoked fish dip, and thought the shrimp tacos were a bit of a joke. We did have live music, which was kind of fun. The singer and guitarist claimed he could turn anything into a Johnny Cash song. And then, bless his tortured heart, he proceeded to Johnny Cash-ify a little tune called “Baby Got Back” by Sir Mix-a-lot. I am forever changed.

Key West First Legal Rum Distillery

We stopped by a small operation called Key West First Legal Rum Distillery. This was a small operation. They allowed us and our children to take a brief but free tour of the distillery. While going through the tour, the adults were allowed to taste a tiny amount of the undiluted spirit. I wish I had jotted down the proof, but my brain is remembering 160 proof or so. The trick is to take very small tastes, let it evaporate on your tongue. The raw spirit isn’t harsh at all, if you’re careful. It’s light as air (well, nearly) and almost buttery. After the tour, we tried a few of their bottled rums, and the ones we tried were fantastic. One of their rums is called Bad Bitch, and Maya was supremely unimpressed that we wouldn’t let her buy a hat emblazoned with that name.

Picking Papa’s nose at Papa’s Pilar

We had seen and enjoyed the scrappy upstart. Now it was time to visit the corporate rum – Papa’s Pilar. Obviously they’re trading on the Hemingway name here. Their facility was sprawling, interior designed and well-lit, and for all the reasons anyone with a bit of a subversive streak might have, we didn’t want to like them. But, here’s the thing – their rums are really good. The drinks they made for us were spectacular. The bartender even did us a solid and made mocktails for the kids. We left Florida with a bottle from each place, and I’m happy we did so. Hopefully there continues to be a place for both businesses on the island.

Bookstore dog

From there, we wandered (slightly drunkenly) to a bookstore so I could browse for local cookbooks. The man at the shop had his dog behind the counter so Ian was thrilled, and I think the doggo was pretty happy with the extra attention. We each left with a book. We got to visit with a sweet dog and his very helpful human. And said human, after overhearing us poking through cookbooks for smoked fish dip recipes, pointed us to a nearby grocery store and instructed us to buy a container of Smilin’ Bob’s Original Smoked Fish Dip.

Smoked fish dip from the grocery store – so good!

We went back to our hotel and hit the pool. Did I mention that it hadn’t started raining yet? By this point it was happy hour, so while the kids swam, we had drinks and smoked fish dip and crackers. After a while, we got the idea that we should be responsible adults and feed our children dinner. We took a bus ride and a rainy walk to El Siboney for some Cuban food. We had brought ponchos, and they worked really well, except that we discovered that Maya needs to be in a grown up sized one at this point – she’s just so tall! We had a lovely dinner, and after a rainy walk back to our hotel, we crashed hard and fast.

We didn’t let the rain stop us

Then it was time to pack up. We had breakfast at Azur Restaurant, where we all ate entirely too much food and regretted it not at all. Maya’s French toast dish actually included a slice of key lime pie. After loading up the car in the rain and checking out, we drove back around the north side of the island, stopping here and there to watch previously very calm seas (Maya was disappointed in the lack of waves crashing against her) crashing against and over barrier walls. Water that had appeared blue previously now looked brownish gray with churned up ocean floor. A crew was pumping standing water from the roadway down into a storm drain to help mitigate flooding.

The drive out was rainy and windy, but not alarmingly so. It seems the storm was more mild than originally anticipated. The real danger was flooding. We tried to stop and take photos of the old railroad in its state of interesting decay, but it was tough-going in the wind and rain. Further north in Tavernier, we did stop in at Blond Giraffe for Key Lime Pie. This was easily the best rendition of Key Lime Pie that we had during our trip.

Old railway

Our slow trek to Miami in the rain was uneventful. Once we arrived in the Miami area, it was interesting to drive through some of the swank neighborhoods and the not-so-swank neighborhoods. Several of the yards and roads were in some state of “flooded,” and we saw several partially submerged cars here and there.

We got to our hotel in the afternoon, and Ian was sad to find out that we probably wouldn’t be able to avail ourselves of the pool since it promised to rain during our whole stay. After relaxing for a bit, we again donned our ponchos and took a soggy walk to Old Greg’s Pizza. After an agonizingly long wait under a very drippy awning, we were treated to some truly delicious pizza. We had ordered just a pepperoni and basil pizza for the kids, but Sean and I had a side of hot spicy honey we could drizzle onto our slices. I strongly support this practice – so good!

First contestant for Most Inappropriate Souvenir

We had booked a hotel right in the city with hopes of walking around and playing tourist the next day. However, given the endless rain, we figured this was a poor choice, so we hatched a plan to spend the rainy day at Frost Science Museum instead. Most of it was indoors and there was parking and a restaurant on site, so it seemed like a good fallback plan.

We woke the next morning, ate breakfast, packed and checked out of our hotel. It wasn’t till we were in the car and working out the logistics of getting to the museum that we happened to notice they had closed for the day for the tropical storm. Sigh.

Second contestant for Most Inappropriate Souvenir

After a little more poking, we decided to kill some time by going to the movies. We took the kids to see Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, which they both seemed to like. After the movie was over, we wandered out of the theater to find that it was sunny out! We weren’t really in a good spot anymore to walk the city, but Sean drove us around for a while (wherever flooded streets and parking lots didn’t stop us) so we could take in the sites. When I think of big cities, for whatever reason Miami doesn’t pop into my head, but it is huge and heavily populated and the architectural variety is interesting to witness.

We were both worn out of planning and replanning. It didn’t help that we had received EAS alerts about the flooding in the area once an hour since around 4 in the morning, so our brains were a bit foggy. We eventually just stopped at a park to let the kids play for a while before the airport shuffle. We had booked a late flight home to give us a decent amount of time to explore the city, and of course, once we got to the airport, our flight was delayed again and again. Ian actually slept for a good amount of the flight home, but even with that we were so tired when we got in. And then one of our checked bags didn’t make it in. Luckily, after talking to the baggage agent, we learned that our bag was accounted for and still sitting in Miami. They would deliver it to us the next day (and they did). We were so happy to finally get home that evening, see our cats, sleep in our own beds.

The “exoskeleton building” in Miami (I guess it’s actually called One Thousand Museum)

We loved our Florida Keys vacation. We dreaded the forecast upon leaving Texas because it showed rain every single day. Except for those last couple days, if there was rain, it was a quick shower in the afternoon and then back to sunny skies. We had maybe a ten degree temperature swing during our whole trip – 75-85 degrees. Sure, it was hot in the afternoon sun, but we spent so much time in the water, that wasn’t too big of a factor (unlike the relentless 100 degree heat we’ve had in Texas since we’ve been back). The kids learned they loved snorkeling, swimming with dolphins, and eating fried mahimahi (ok, that one was more Ian than Maya). They learned that things don’t always go according to plan, that you have to adapt, and that you don’t have to let it ruin your fun. Food was more expensive than we were expecting, and while we enjoyed our meals, we might on a future trip elect to prepare a few more of them ourselves to help control costs. All in all though, we had an excellent family vacation.

The month of April, while busier than we might have liked, felt borderline normal for a change. Sometime around mid-month, we made the choice to allow the kids to go to school without their masks if they wanted to, with the stipulation that if COVID case numbers took a turn for the worse, we may have to go back to wearing them. On the first day, Ian chose to wear his, but by the time I picked them up after school he had ditched it and was roaming free.

Taking Grammy and Grandpa to Freddy’s.

The very first weekend in April, Grammy and Grandpa came to visit! They have it figured out – you come to Texas in the spring time. It’s cold still in Missouri, so they get a break from the last bit of their winter, but they sweep in before Texas gets miserably hot. Solid plan.

Because Maya’s first soccer game was canceled for weather and then she was sick for her next game, she didn’t get to play her first soccer game till Grammy and Grandpa were in town. It was a beautiful day, and Maya seemed to enjoy herself. Her favorite position is goalie / keeper. She readily explains to her coaches how much she doesn’t like running, and we have a notion the relative stillness of this position is part of why she enjoys it.

Goal keeper at work

There was a lot of discussion over several soccer practice sessions about what the team would be called. Maya, being Maya, was full-tilt on octopus being in the name somewhere. After much deliberation, the team was called Octo-corgis. And one of the coaches even bought a stuffed corgi and dressed it in an octopus costume so they’d have a mascot. Maya was very pleased.

Maya’s soccer team is called Octo-corgis. This is their mascot.

We went for a post-game lunch at Freddy’s, which is probably the kids’ favorite restaurant. After the success of Dr Pepper floats in Waco last month, they had yummy root beer floats after lunch.

Dad and Carol have been on a distillery visiting kick, so after a quick dip in the pool at their hotel, we drove everyone out to Garrison Brothers Distillery in Hye. The property is really nice, and after purchasing cocktails for the grownups and Dr Pepper slushes for the kids, we relaxed in rocking chairs and let the day while away for a bit.

Maya in her new Garrison Brothers hat

The flights of whiskey we worked our way through convinced us we needed to go home with a bottle of the small batch. And while the kids were in the gift shop, they convinced their grandparents that they needed distillery hats.

Ian with his new Garrison Brothers hat

The very next weekend was the kids’ Dolphin Fest at school. After not having it at all in 2020, and having sort of a masked, traveling Dolphin Fest in 2021, it was fun to return to normal. Maya and Ian played in bounce houses. They played games and won prizes. We all ate delicious frozen treats because it was hot out there. Maya and Ian each got a turn petting the recently hatched ducklings (who, not long after this, all went to live with their surrogate parent, a goose named Gustavo).

Dolphin Fest!!!

The next day was our friend Ruby’s 13th birthday! We all went out to Jester King and enjoyed spending time with friends, celebrating a very special birthday, and letting the kids be kids.

Ruby the 13-year-old super star

The next weekend, Ian went to a birthday party. This sounds mundane, but understand that we haven’t let the kids attend a group party outside of hanging with our bubble family friends for over two years. It was really fun seeing Ian bounce around with other kids his age, just running full tilt and having a good time.

Confetti hair, don’t care

That same weekend, we celebrated Easter. The kids love it! I’m sure that love has a lot to do with the goodies the Easter Bunny always brings, but I get the impression that they also have fun with decorating the eggs, bashing each other with confetti-filled cascarones, and hunting for eggs out in the front yard. I’ll be honest, half of me wishes they’d work out the truth about the easter bunny, but the other half of me knows I’ll miss it once the magic is gone.

It’s the best we could do this time around

We have been watching for signs of good bluebonnet spots, but I think our almost complete lack of rainfall this spring left the bluebonnet patches a little more bare than normal. After our Easter festivities, we loaded up the kids and drove out to our normal bluebonnet photo location and took probably the least impressing bluebonnet photos we’ve ever taken. We had considered driving out to Muleshoe Bend, like we did last year, but ultimately, that just didn’t work with our schedule. The kids were cute anyway, and at least we’ve kept the tradition going.

Suyo long cucumber plant is holding up so far

With some supplemental watering, our back yard garden is coming alive. Maya’s cucumber made some blooms (and now, in May, is actively fruiting). Our cannas have blossomed. I finally took the poor Christmas aloe, who has been diligently replicating in the little 8-inch pot I had it in for a couple years now, and split that single plant into I don’t know how many little “pups.” I chose the three most stable (including the “mother” on principle) and planted them in a nice pot. The rest I stuck around in the garden. They probably won’t survive the winter (or the stupid armadillos), but maybe they’ll flourish in the meantime.

The month of April went out with a literal bang for us. On the 29th, Maya had a roller skating field trip so her class could discuss force and motion. Maya had been looking forward to the field trip for weeks – it’s her first since first grade, before the pandemic. She wanted one of us to go as a chaperone too and was THRILLED when Sean agreed to go.

She did have a good lesson on Newton’s three laws of motion, and she enjoyed her lunch and some skating time. But, she took a pretty hard fall and apparently landed on her skate mate. Thankfully Sean was there to sit with her and assess the need for x-rays. She is now sporting a pretty massive bruise and wound up sitting out that Saturday’s soccer game because her leg was so sore.

Final Monarch Suzuki recital

That last Saturday was bittersweet. The kids participated in the final recital at the Monarch Suzuki Academy. This has been the kids’ music school since before Ian was born. They’ve learned rhythm, introductory music theory, perseverance, respect for others, self-respect, and a firm love of music while attending this school. They’ve even started to learn to play piano and guitar. Thankfully, they should both be able to continue on with their current instrument teachers, though we’re not entirely sure yet how any of it will be structured.

Rose-breasted grosbeak

We did have a new backyard bird visitor. He came by on both Saturday and Sunday morning – a male rose-breasted grosbeak. We haven’t seen him since, but it was nice to have the brief visit – a quick stop on his migration route, I guess.

About the post title … Maya one day was shaking her head around. I wanted to know what she was doing, and she told me it sounded weird when she shook her head. On asking her what it sounded like, she didn’t even pause before telling me it sounded like hummingbirds playing the accordion. It’s as apt a description as any I could come up for the noise that’s constantly going in my own brain, so thanks, Maya, for such fun imagery to accompany the noise.

I’m really struggling to continue with updating COVID stats. I feel like data isn’t reported as diligently as it used to be, and I don’t know how much I can trust the numbers I’m collecting. Here’s what I’ve gotten from screen captures I did right at the start of May. Percentage of US population that has been fully vaccinated (66% as of 4/1, 66.7% as of 5/1). Travis County – 3/31 237,325 cases and 1479 deaths – 5/1 247,244 cases and 1533 deaths. Texas – 4/1 6,683,298 cases and 87,549 deaths – 5/1 6,752,590 cases and 88,303 deaths. United States – 4/1 80,039,322 cases and 979,827 deaths – 5/1 81,260,672 cases and 992,010 deaths. The World – 3/31 488,524,257 cases and 6,143,724 deaths – 5/1 513,770,292 cases and 6,236,172 deaths.

After a quiet January and February, we were all ready to get out of the house a bit more. That very first weekend in March, we discovered, was the last weekend we could take the kids to the circus. Apparently, we had waited too long to get tickets though and only the horrendously priced ones were left. After some discussions with the kids, we eventually decided to go to the Austin Aquarium instead.

Maya and Ian at the aquarium.

This place is maybe at its baseline an aquarium, but there’s more to it than that. They have  different kinds of birds and reptiles scattered throughout the place as well. They have animal encounters, a play area for smaller kids, a VR experience. They even host birthday parties. The kids love it there, but I don’t know. I worry about how well the animals are looked after and how tightly confined some of them seem to be.

I’m a sucker for experiences where I get to interact with animals though, particularly if I’m unlikely to do so any other way. Enter the ringtail lemur. This delightful little creature would wander back and forth across our laps, letting us pet its amazingly soft fur. The keeper would coax the creature along with a glassy red orb on a stick and the promise of some treats. Maya and Ian got to learn about how the animals are suffering for the loss of habitat. This always strikes a chord with conservationist Maya, and she expressed her anger at those people. The keeper did her best to present the other side of the story, for perspective – how people in poorer parts of the world will choose to feed and care for their families over protecting the habitat of a wild animal. I’m not sure Maya was having any of it, but it doesn’t hurt her to know that there isn’t always an easy answer or an obvious villain.

Ring-tailed lemur

After our lemur encounter, we wandered around looking at various birds and reptiles and aquatic creatures, purchasing food when we wanted to feed something. Maya had a lot of luck feeding seaweed to the fish in the large, open-topped tanks – they’d eat it right out of her hand. Ian was a little more hesitant, often letting go of his seaweed just as the fish got there. Another favorite was the little parakeet enclosure. We all had our little seed cups and the birds would just perch on our arms and nibble away. At one point, I had four of them lined up on my arm, not-so-graciously waiting to get at the seeds.

Parakeets!

We had burned through most of our tokens feeding animals, but we had just enough left for Sean to take the kids in to see and hopefully interact with a couple of the other resident lemurs – this time (we think) a red ruffed lemur and a black-and-white ruffed lemur. They were cute and bounced around their enclosure, but they weren’t terribly interested in interacting with the aquarium visitors. Ian got a few pets in, but I think by and large, it wasn’t as satisfying an experience as our earlier visit with the ringtail lemur.

“Stomp” noodles (aka udon noodles)

Spring break was smack dab in the middle of the month. Given all the COVID uncertainty earlier in the year, we had decided to save our vacation plans for the summer, and so the kids would have to entertain themselves for a week. The weekend before spring break, we tried to do some things with them. We made Japanese udon noodles from scratch. The cookbook I was working from had you kneading the noodle dough by walking on it (fear not, it was protected by multiple layers of plastic). The kids LOVED this part – they now refer to them always and forever as “stomp noodles.” Ian even found noodle stomping music – “We Came to Smash” by Martin Solveig (you can blame Sean for that one).

Maya’s birdhouse

We also painted the birdhouses and the stones that Lolli and Pop had sent for valentines day. The birdhouses in particular turned out really well. Each kid painted one, and we hung them up from the awning over our front porch. So far, I don’t think any birds have taken up residence, but the houses have little wind chimes hanging from them, and I hear them tinkling in the breeze now and then.

Ian’s birdhouse

The Friday before spring break, Maya’s class voted that she could take Wolfgang, the German class bear home for the whole week. Throughout the school year, the class would choose a kid take the bear home each weekend, I think based on who they believed had been well-behaved. He would be packed in a bag with a notebook into which the kids pasted photos of the bear having adventures. They’d write about what Wolfgang had been up to, using as much of their German vocabulary as they could.

Wolfgang seemed to enjoy soccer

Maya hadn’t gotten that bear all year, so she was elated that she could keep him for an entire week. He played soccer with us at the park on Monday evening. He tried to make friends with Lumos, but I’m pretty sure she didn’t trust the way he smelled. Sean and I took Wednesday afternoon off to hang out with the kids, and they (and Wolfgang) had lunch at Freddy’s, took a bird-watching hike at Mills Pond, and spent the rest of the afternoon playing at the arcade. I pointed out to Maya that one of the songs in her Suzuki piano book 2 was by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, but she didn’t seem to think that had anything to do with her bear.

We had hastily planned an overnight trip up to Waco for the end of spring break, just as a mini-vacation, and Wolfgang came along for that too. We started our visit with lunch at a neat little restaurant called Cupp’s Drive Inn. The food was soooo good, and the people there were incredible friendly. After that, we stopped in at Waco Mammoth National Monument. We wandered around the grounds a bit, but the big draw here was the Dig Shelter.

Columbian mammoth fossils

Columbian mammoth fossils are being unearthed in this climate-controlled shelter. These guys were quite a bit larger than the more well-known woolly mammoth. Also, because the Columbian mammoths occupied warmer climates, they were also less, well, woolly than the woolly mammoths. In the dig shelter, in addition to male, female, and juvenile Columbian mammoths, we also saw fossilized bones of a saber toothed cat and a camel. It may sound a little dumb, but I thought it was kind of fun to tie something real to those goofy Ice Age movies that Maya and Ian enjoy so much.

Dr. Pepper Museum in Waco

After Mammoth, we drove into town to visit the Dr. Pepper Museum. Did you know Dr. Pepper was created in Waco, TX? The kids tolerated Sean and I trying to read the information throughout the museum, but let’s be honest, they were mostly there to sample the Dr. Pepper floats. The floats were delicious and we loved them, but I had also wanted to sign them up to create their own sodas. Alas, all the time slots were booked by the time I got around to checking. Word to the wise: book these time slots in advance.

After the Dr. Pepper museum, we went and checked into our hotel. Ian and Maya had been looking forward to a swim in the hotel pool, but we learned when we got there that it was really crowded. We had planned a distillery visit and dinner for after the pool, but we decided to do those first instead.

Ian and his mock-tail

Balcones Distillery has been making some of our favorite Texas spirits for years. We have never gone up to Waco to visit their tasting room, but we decided to do so today. Sean and I shared a whiskey flight (we tried the Lineage, the Mirador, and the Peated Sauternes), and followed that up with a couple of well-crafted cocktails. The kids enjoyed a couple rounds of mock-tails. They were particularly enamored with the lovely metal straws in their drinks. Ian, in true Ian fashion, ate all the mint leaves off the garnish in his virgin mojito.

Maya’s distillery hat

While we were there, Maya became obsessed with the idea of having a Balcones Distillery cap, and darned if she wasn’t just as cute as could be wearing that thing. So yeah, her souvenir from our Waco vacation was a cap from a distillery. For what it’s worth, we told her she couldn’t wear it to school. (We tried Maya’s hat out on Ian – also friggin’ cute.)

We had a place in mind for dinner, but found out that it was closed. Our backup plan wound up being a Cajun joint called Cajun Craft. Ian had fried crawfish, Maya had fried shrimp, and I can’t even remember what the grown ups ate, but it was deeelicious.

After all that, at long last, we finally made it back to the hotel so that Maya and Ian could try out that pool they had been looking forward to all day. Unfortunately, the pool was very cold. Maya is Maya and she had a good time swimming anyway. Poor Ian with his absolute lack of body fat tried a few times, but eventually gave up on trying to swim. He and I went up to the hotel room and watched cartoons while Sean hung out with Maya and let her swim.

The octopus mural at Milo

The next morning, we weren’t in too big of a hurry. We checked out of our hotel in time to make our brunch reservation at a place called Milo All Day. It was maybe a little fancy pants, but the food was really good, and I certainly don’t regret eating there. One of the best parts was that walls near the restrooms were painted with a giant octopus whose arms extended out toward you as you walked back, beckoning you into the murky depths (of the impeccably clean bathroom).

Got vultures?

Our last adventure in the Waco area was to visit the Cameron Park Zoo. Right away, we were caught up in the antics of the white-handed gibbons. They had these rope-like woven straps strung between trees to run and swing on. They were situated one above and one below, the top serving as a handhold and the bottom as a base for their feet. The gibbons made easy work of this of course, but to our delight and amazement, one particularly agile gibbon walked across the rope without using the handhold up top. Instead, it swung its long arms to the side to maintain balance. It was an impressive sight.

Giraffes!

The rest of the zoo was fun too, and the weather was perfect. One thing that fascinated me to no end was the large quantity of vultures that shared the outdoor enclosures with whoever was living there. The bears seemed like they could hardly walk for all the vultures hanging out with them. I remember an informative sign explaining they were a mix of black vultures and turkey vultures (I think).

After a very pleasant stroll around the zoo, we drove back home and our little weekend jaunt was officially over. Maya set about writing up Wolfgang’s adventures that evening in the shared German class notebook and took both notebook and bear back to school on Monday.

Wolfgang’s spring break shenanigans

Right away Monday, things got weird. What had started out as a severe thunderstorm warning (to which I had paid little attention) quickly became a large hail and heavy tornado risk situation. Several of the schools had called for early pickup. Our school, mere minutes before the end of the school day, announced the cancelation of all after school activities. We got the kids home and settled in and more or less finished out our work days, keeping half an eye on the weather forecast.

That blue dot is us. All hell broke loose to the north and south of us, but we were very fortunate.

The weather radar was looking pretty terrible, so we gathered the kids up into the only interior room in our house. You’ll see from the photos that they had a “few” things they thought were super important and had to be kept safe in the bathroom as well. We watched a live weather report on our phones showing a tornado having touched down in Round Rock, which is *just* north of us. We watched the straight-faced weatherman kind of freak out a little, because the national weather service seemingly hadn’t been aware of that one. It clobbered portions of the kids’ former nanny Anna’s neighborhood. She was mere blocks away from having sustained damage to her house as well. And then just a short while later, it was all gone and the sun came out.

Chocolate chip ajugas bloom beautiful and purple in early spring.

The rest of the month was quiet. A few plants had started to grow in earnest out in the back yard. We potted up our little Calabrian chili seedlings into real soil and have moved them outdoors. (I had started seeds planted in vermiculite on a heat mat in our bathroom in late February.) I’ve started purchasing plants to get in the ground before the heat, but I’ve been letting the weeds get away from me, as usual. In March, we had already had at least one 90+ degree day. Because Texas.

These numbers were screen-captured right at the end of March. Percentage of US population that has been fully vaccinated (65.2% as of 3/1, 66% as of 4/1). Travis County – 2/28 199,845 cases and 1350 deaths – 3/31 237,325 cases and 1479 deaths. Texas – 3/1 6,617,106 cases and 84,899 deaths – 4/1 6,683,298 cases and 87,549 deaths. United States – 3/1 79,045,719 cases and 950,489 deaths – 4/1 80,039,322 cases and 979,827 deaths. The World – 3/1 437,247,221 cases and 5,958,321 deaths – 3/31 488,524,257 cases and 6,143,724 deaths.

I can barely remember February at this point (now that it’s nearly the end of March). We started off the month with an ice storm. This is the kind of ice storm I think of as normal for our part of the world, but because of how badly we were hit last winter and how poorly our power grid withstood the abuse, people around here were worried.

Happy birthday, Mom!

The only downer for me was that it happened on my birthday. We pay enough attention to the weather though to have acquired birthday dinner the day before. This year it was the special lobster pizza from Via 313. They have magnificent Detroit style pizza anyway, and I know it sounds like a gimmick, but their lobster pizza is wonderful! And the kids don’t like it, so more for me!!!

Sean, Maya, and Ian gave me nice gifts. I am now the proud owner of a light pink pair of silicon oven mitts (Ian’s favorite color, since he couldn’t find purple), and Maya gave me a super soft blanket. They both seem pretty thrilled when I make use of their gifts. I gotta say, using the baby pink silicon mitts to handle a 12 pound brisket over a hot grill makes a statement – not sure what that statement might be, exactly, but it’s being made regardless. As a group, they also gifted me with a one year Masterclass subscription. This gives me access to tons of self-paced video coursework on a variety of topics, taught by people you have heard of (currently I’m taking a writing class taught by Margaret Atwood). I have been only minimally successful at making use of that lovely gift, but I’m still trying desperately to carve out time. We’ll see.

Playing in the … sleet and ice

The kids had a couple of days off school for the ice storm, and they enjoyed crunching around in our sleety yard. They yanked icicles from bushes, which more often than not resulted in them tearing off whole branches. I’m *sure* that was an accident. They lamented the fact that they wouldn’t get real snow this year, but managed to have fun anyway.

So busy with their valentine writing!

They had fun writing up valentines and exchanging them with classmates at school. Because Maya has a doubled up classroom, she wound up writing nearly 50 valentines out, and she seemed to genuinely enjoy it. I think I may have a plan for Christmas cards this next year! On their own, the kids decided they’d send things to their grandparents. The wrote or drew them, packaged them up, and then presented them to Sean for help with stamping and addressing. We didn’t know what they sent! It was weirdly cute.

The kids received Pokemon cards from Grammy and Grandpa for Valentines Day. They very quickly dug into those. Even now, they still spend so much time with their Pokemon cards, designing their own decks and occasionally even playing together. They received crafts from Lolli and Pop – birdhouses to paint and build and rocks to decorate. Those projects got saved for future (now past) deployment during spring break week.

Maya’s big project for the past couple months has been rock tumbling. She received a tumbler for Christmas, which had enough of each grit powder for one batch of rocks. She loved the first run so much that we restocked her supplies and almost immediately reloaded it with more rocks to tumble. The original set had four different grits, each with a finer and finer texture for smoothing the stones to different degrees. The refill set had those  four grits plus something it called “gem foam” for final polishing.

Before …

We were astonished how much of the rocks got smoothed away, so we decided to be more scientific on the second run. And to our delight, the gem foam really did manage to put some shine on some of the stones! Here’s the data we collected:

• Original rock weight: 342.3 g
• Grit 1 – 4 days – post grit 1 weight: 324.4 g
• Grit 2 – 7 days – post grit 2 weight: 296.5 g
• Grit 3 – 7 days – post grit 3 weight: 273.0 g
• Grit 4 – 10 days – post grit 4 weight: 244.3 g
• Gem foam – 3 days – post gem foam weight: 242.9 g

… and after

The only other noteworthy things that’s really happened around here is that Maya has started soccer again! She only got a few games into her first season in 2020 when the whole world was shut down by COVID. And then we wouldn’t let her sign up again till she had gotten her COVID vaccine. Aaaaand then her first game in late February was canceled for weather, alas.

I know it looks like a regular steak, but that thing weighed between 2 and 3 pounds!

We tried a new food thing too. Sean makes a run to Costco about once a month, and on his February trip, he found they had tomahawk steaks. These are ribeye steaks that are still attached to the big rib bone. Because those rib bones are so wide, the steak is cut nice and thick. I grilled that puppy (I think this is the method I went with, but I took no notes, so I can’t honestly remember), and it was BLISS. Maya won’t eat grilled food, but that one steak fed the other three of us, and we even had leftovers for Ian, who had chowed down. He explained to us that he’d like to eat that every week, and we in turn explained to him that that wasn’t really in the budget.

These numbers were screen-captured right at the end of February. Percentage of US population that has been fully vaccinated (64% as of 2/1, 65.2% as of 3/1). Travis County – 1/31 168,740 cases and 1264 deaths – 2/28 199,845 cases and 1350 deaths. Texas – 2/1 6,258,336 cases and 79,447 deaths – 3/1 6,617,106 cases and 84,899 deaths. United States – 2/1 74,943,050 cases and 886,691 deaths – 3/1 79,045,719 cases and 950,489 deaths. The World – 2/1 378,721,023 cases and 5,675,545 deaths – 3/1 437,247,221 cases and 5,958,321 deaths.

After a sad October, and anxious November, and a flat out insane December, we had planned for January to be a recovery month. And I think it started out that way, for a few days at least. We didn’t make resolutions as such, but we decided to eat at home more frequently and ease up on the alcohol consumption. Try to be less sedentary. Little things.

Serenity at West Cave Preserve – this is part of the Grotto hike

Our friends invited us along on a hike the first non-holiday weekend in January at West Cave Preserve. That gave us all some motivation to get out of the house and see people  we hadn’t seen for a couple months. (The hike, by the way, was lovely. The grotto was peaceful and our guide was both patient and informative. Plus, we got to go into a cave and see a tiny bat!)

The week leading up to that was pretty mild. Kids went back to school. We slowly took down Christmas decorations and packed away gifts and souvenirs and things.

Then on Thursday night (I think), after we had put the kids to bed and I was coming through for some hugs, it happened. Maya was fully hiding under her covers as usual. She’s pretty wary of the dark, and it just makes her feel safer, so I didn’t think much of it. I came in and leaned over the cover lump to give it a hug, just like I have done hundreds of times before, and just as my head was mere inches from hers, she launched directly upward to surprise me. Surprise! Her hard head collided rapidly with my left orbital socket. I saw lightning bolts emanate from the impact site.

After assessing the situation and watching my eye rapidly swell and change color, we decided an ER trip was not necessary. Instead, I applied an ice pack and set about assuring the kids that I would be fine, that I understood it was an accident, etc.

This is, I think, three days post bludger attack

By the next day, I looked like I had been on the wrong end of a domestic dispute. And I had to present myself for work. And that weekend, I had to go hiking. I avoided video conferences that first day when the swelling was at its worst. By the day of the hike, it was mostly just colorful.

The next weekend was a long weekend for us, and so I smoked my third ever brisket. My first one was still the best iteration, and I still don’t quite know the “why” of it. I can say that it’s much nicer tending a smoking rig when it’s 40-50 degrees out than when it’s 90. But the meat this time developed a tough exterior, which is not a trouble I have had in the past. Oh well, we’ll see how the next one goes.

We were going to have friends over to share brisket and hang out, but they had a close COVID exposure at one of the kids’ school and so our visit was canceled. This is the new normal, I guess.

Happy New Year from Ian.

Toward the end of the month, we discovered that we had a rodent issue … in our ATTIC. And that’s the story of how the month after we paid for Christmas gifts and a Disney trip and the month during which we paid our horrific property tax bill, we also paid to have the insulation replaced in our attic. Toys in the attic, you say? Nope, we had rats. Yuck!

Maya at the pottery wheel

And then the next weekend, Sean thought he might have COVID! We had just gone for a much-needed date night (we carefully selected a movie that had been out for a while, so we could hang out in an uncrowded theater) on Thursday. And then Friday, Sean started feeling bad. The kids had to be reassured that Dad wouldn’t end up in the hospital or worse, that we were just taking precautions.

Sean scheduled a PCR test for as early as he could manage, which happened to not be till Sunday. We had requested our government-issued rapid antigen tests earlier in the month, and they had just recently arrived, so Saturday morning, Sean took one of those – negative. He got his PCR results back already on Monday – also negative. In the mean time though, he stayed masked up and distanced, and I did all the running around that needed doing, which thankfully was not much.

Ian’s focaccia

During these weekends full of downtime, the kids dug into their Christmas and birthday gifts. They built legos. They tumbled rocks. They made pottery. Maya made cookies and muffins from her new cookbook. Ian made focaccia and pizza from his new cookbook. They played sooooo much Pokemon. Our January was a little fraught with peril, but it’s probably as quiet a month as we’re likely to get, so I guess we’ll go with it.

COVID sucks – here is a cute photo of 2/3 of our cats.

I’m so tired of talking about COVID. And thinking about COVID. And trying to decide whether we should do this or avoid doing that because of COVID. It has wrecked so many plans, has limited so much interaction, has taken so much time away. The omicron variant has been astonishing. The case loads ramped up so intensely, had we not been so COVID-weary already, we probably would have panicked. Now instead of letters from school about one case here and one case there, we get letters that say 9 new cases, 7 new cases, etc. Both kids have now had multiple close exposures in their classes. It feels like it’s just a matter of time now.

I had the sense to capture covid stats at the end of January / beginning of February, so here we are. Case counts are quite a bit higher than this by now, but it seems we’ve passed the peak – at least for this surge. Percentage of US population that has been fully vaccinated (62.4% as of 1/8, 64% as of 2/1). Travis County – 1/7 137,126 cases and 1221 deaths – 1/31 168,740 cases and 1264 deaths. Texas – 1/8 4,949,933 cases and 76,365 deaths – 2/1 6,258,336 cases and 79,447 deaths. United States – 1/8 59,388,623 cases and 836,603 deaths – 2/1 74,943,050 cases and 886,691 deaths. The World – 1/8 303,306,989 cases and 5,481,521 deaths – 2/1 378,721,023 cases and 5,675,545 deaths.