East Holland River/ Tom Taylor Trail

The Greater Toronto Area (GTA) is built around some great trail systems. The East Holland River Tom Taylor Trail is the one trail way that is closest to our house. We enjoy taking the kids there and walk. The scenery is just beautiful!

 

River leading into Fairy Lake

They also have some huge playgrounds along the trails. Which is a bonus for us, the kids just love to climb!

Climbing to the bird's nest

Caitlin in the bird nest

Connor and his Daddy

Richmond Hill Live Steamers

We found this place by accident last week coming home from the petting farm.
http://richmond-hill-live-steamers.tripod.com/

Waiting for the train to take off

patiently waiting our turn

Getting excited to ride the train

one of the miniature trains

the train we rode on

Riding the train

Mom and dad trying to hold on!

Googled it and saw they were having an open house this week. Not knowing exactly what it was, we decided to take the kids there. I am glad we did, all though the lines were long, a good time was had by all. I had never heard of miniature steam trains before! Who knew small trains could haul so much weight around! One of the trains we didn't get to ride looked really fast and carried 2 people besides the conductor.

 

This train is one that carried two people plus the conductor.

Along the side of the tracks, they had built models of the towns all built to scale. It was awesome!
I was really proud of the kids, they did an awesome job patiently waiting in line for their turn!

Lionel's Petting Farm

We found this awesome little petting zoo not too far from the house. We love going there, it's a free afternoon (they only ask for a donation) and the kids love to run in the open and feeding all of the animals. Caitlin has decided she loves the llama's. She asked for one for her birthday, but I wouldn't know where to keep it. Our backyard is barely big enough for Kaiser. And Today we remembered our big bag of carrots to feed the animals!

Connor feeding the momma cow

Caitlin feeding the momma cow

Feeding the spotted pony

He's hungry, momma!

Apparently goats can smell the carrots!

 Connor absolutely loved this bird. I swear we'd probably still be standing there watching this bird walk in and out of his house if we let Connor have his way.

 Connor has turned a corner this summer. Earlier in the spring I don't think he would even look at a pony let alone ride one! And trying to tell him his turn was over!

 Caitlin only wanted her dad to lead her pony around. She is turning into such a daddy's girl!

 Connor's pony's name was Hercules. He was such a gentle and beautiful pony!

 Caitlin's pony's name was Trigger. He was gentle, but he tried to end her turn early.

 This had the kids just laughing so hard! Apparently a goat lying down in a tire is some seriously funny stuff!

Caitlin wanted to bring him home, but where would he sleep? She wasn't willing to share her bed!

Home Improvements

We had our first home improvement here in Canada!

We  took out this patio door
 

 And added this beautiful sliding glass door.

 It wasn't that I didn't love the patio door, I did, I just didn't understand if you were going to use a door like that, why not make it a full french door so both doors opened up? Besides the new door came with a screen door that I could fix every time someone ran through it. I was not a fan of the melted crayons on the floor in front of the door either. Melted crayon on a hardwood floor is not the easiest thing in the world to clean up! The new door shouldn't allow enough heat in to warm up anything! The only downside is more window for the midgets to touch!

P/S, the light next to the door is new too!

Life's a Beach!

 This is Lake Simcoe. It is a huge lake about 20-30 minutes north of our house. Playing at the beach seems to help Connor over his fear of water. Before this, it was hard to get him in the swimming pool. The water was pretty shallow for a way's out, both kids were able to walk out for a ways.

South Simcoe Railway

Since both kids love trains, we found a train close to the house. It was a 50 minute train ride, and we were able to see more of where we live now.

 Connor loves Choo Choo Soul on Disney channel. He was asking about Genevieve.

 This is how 45 minutes of our train ride looked like, with both kids hanging out the window

 I swear we live out in the middle of nowhere!