Return to Canada June 2017

After being home in Australia for 2 months we made the decision to return to Markham for Newton to see his Year 8 class Graduate from Elementary School. Tickets were booked, hotel rooms and vehicle secured, time off work approved -  the wait begins. We decided to keep our return to school a secret from everyone....

Friday June 16th arrived, our flight left Perth at midnight, 29 hours later we arrived in Toronto, tired but excited to be back. Sunday we went to Cora's for breakfast (our favourite place) surprising the staff who remembered us from 2016, we then took in a Baseball game - Toronto Blue Jays vs Chicago White Sox and a visit to our exchangee's family.  Monday morning we went to School to see everyone, the reactions Newton received was amazing. The students have really missed him. (Luckily we had a gopro to record it all). Tuesday we supplied Tim Tams and made lamingtons for the staff's morning tea. We thought the lamingtons would be a little difficult when living in a hotel room but decided to use the School staff room and made do with the equipment we had. Wednesday we headed into Toronto for a bit of shopping then Thursday back to school for Graduation lunch with the staff and students. Newton had the students lining up for him to sign their year books. Friday was graduation day, the School Secretary gave up her award presentation for Newton so that he could be included in the night. (Thank you Moira). Speeches made, awards presented it was time to party.

Saturday's weather was perfect so we took the opportunity to drive to Bobcaygeon then to Peterborough do a boat cruise through the worlds highest lift locks. 

Sunday we attended a baby shower for the beautiful Mikaela who was just 10 weeks old, then out for pizza made on the  BBQ. Another perfect day!  Tuesday was our last day in Markham, time to say goodbye once again. Hugs/tears all round at Cora's, School and with friends. Our flight out of Toronto was cancelled 5 hours after it should've taken off - no big deal for us, these things happen on the plus side we were put up in a hotel for the night and upgraded to business class from Los Angeles to Sydney.  Win, Win for us. We had an amazing 10 days - Thank you to St Patrick Elementary School for allowing us to gatecrash Graduation week.

 

 

Goodbye.

Happy 150th Canada Day

December Whirlwind

December has been a whirlwind of Christmas, snow, School concert and packing. We have had approximately 20cm so far this month which is unusual but awesome for us. Garden nurseries have the most amazing Christmas displays. The snow is so pretty, it will be hard to leave it behind. The School Christmas concert was really good. Newton got so far out of his comfort zone it was awe-inspiring. He sang Waltzing Matilda with the help of his students then the students sang Aussie Jungle Bells. We had two pictures taken with Santa, loving the ugly vests. Apologies for all the snow pictures.

The Christmas Tree that we can see from our kitchen window.

Christmas Markets and Prime Minister Trudeau

Toronto Christmas Markets

Unionville Santa Parade

Unionville decorations.   Newton and Chris. Santa was hiding.

Unionville decorations

Parade and decorations

Decorations on a house

Bradford Nursery Christmas display

Geese using the crosswalk

Snow at St Patrick School

A heart on the fence.    Don't eat the yellow snow.

The Christmas Concert

 

The animals were drawn by Newton and painted by Wendy. The students loved them and have taken them home.

Sheridan Nursery

Beautiful Christmas decorations and house

Santa photos

Beautiful snow

Whiteout and gorgeous tree

                                                                                                                          Snow plow

Friday 23rd December was the last day of School and  teaching for Newton. The students organised a surprise party with a farewell cake for him. It was an emotional day for the students who had enjoyed their Aussie exchange teacher and did not want him to leave. The cards, messages and gifts received were overwhelming.

Newton being mobbed by the students.

Graduation hoodie and some of the gifts.

Gifts for the students from Newton.

Thanks to Anne-Marie, Ryan, Chris and Mark for a wonderful Christmas Day. After a great Christmas dinner we went to the movies to watch Rogue One.
Wednesday 28th December, we have packed, cleaned, repacked and repacked again. 6 boxes posted home and 6 suitcases coming home with us. We didn't think we purchased that much extra gear. We are currently in our hotel room awaiting our 8am flight to Anaheim.
The flights inside the USA are expensive. Tip - post home as much of your luggage as possible, it will be cheaper and make sure you have a meal before boarding your flight. We arrived in Anaheim safely albeit a little poorer to spend 4 days with our friends Diane and Ron who had driven 1400kms from Oregon to join us. We had an incredibly marvelous time at Disneyland and Disneyland Adventure Park. We watched the Christmas Parade, sailed though It's a Small World, checked out the Star Wars props, oooed and aahhed over the World of Colour water show, saw Frozen live on stage, watched in awe at the Paint the Night parade and had our photos taken with the Disney characters. After a magical few days it was time to pack our bags and commence the long 30 hour journey home.

Candy Apples

Our time away had come to an end, we arrived home on 6th January 2017 after an amazing 379 days living in North America. Over the year we traveled 50,000kms seeing some amazing sights and animals drinking litres of coffee and eating some unusual foods. Taking 8200 photos.
Would we do it again? - yes definitely but would like to go to a smaller town. Somewhere with more snow. ☃
We hope you have enjoyed reading our blog as much as we have enjoyed traveling and sharing our adventures with you.

Newton and Wendy.