Niagara Falls

Time to round out our vacation with a little trip to Niagara Falls!  It was amazing!  It's crazy how much water is just constantly flowing over the waterfalls, and how long the falls are.  I've never seen anything like it before... which makes sense, or else Niagara Falls probably wouldn't be such a special place... :)

On our way to the falls, we made a stop to pick up a space Hello Kitty.  The Checketts left it at an AirBnB they stayed at in the area, and we were able to pick it up for Laura.  It was just 15 minutes from the hotel we were staying at.

And then we drove to Niagara Falls!  We went down to see the Cave of the Winds where you can walk down at the bottom of one of the waterfalls.  Monica and the girls went up on the closer walkways while I waited with Grayson.  He did NOT want to get wet.  I got a turn to walk up close with Brooke when they got back.  It's definitely good that they provide ponchos.

Here's Monica and Brooke up where the water really gets ya!

After going down low, we walked around the walkways up top.  Grayson made this face... 3 year olds are so good at smiling.

We stopped to get some ice cream.  Grayson ended up getting the super full one, and we didn't realize that the ice cream would come out a different place than where we ordered since we ordered on kiosks, so it was a little melted when we got it, and very hot outside.  All that to say that Grayson needed some help with his overflowing ice cream, which also meant I got to try his and mine!  Win win.

There was a bridge over one of the waterfall rivers.  I think this was the only one, and our family always loves a good bridge.  I think this might be the place they filmed the waterfall scene in a Goofy Movie as well!

Here's the view of the top of one of the waterfalls.  This isn't the one over the Cave of the Winds, and it's not the horseshoe shaped one that has a ton of mist coming up.  I think this was my favorite view of a waterfall from the US side though.

After the falls, we headed to our final hotel, and the good news is it was a nice hotel!  Yay!  And here's Grayson washing his hands probably.

Oh my, a few stories here.  The quick one is that Grayson got a new bird as his souvenir for the trip.  It tweets just like his orange tummy bird from Colorado, and it's great!  The second story is that car seat.  That is NOT our car seat.  When we arrived in Rhode Island at the start of our trip we saw a garbage bag with yellow ties similar to the one we used, but it couldn't have been ours, it was much to small.  Well, somewhere along the way the bag ripped open, the car seat fell out, and they tied it back up with just Winry's booster in it.  So we went to the luggage claim place and got a loaner from Southwest for the duration of our trip.  They lady also did us a favor and gave us a proper car seat bag so we wouldn't lose our car seat in the future.  Anyway, the next day our car seat was located and in Rhode Island, but we had just left for Boston, so we had them ship it back to AUS where it waited for us until we flew back home.  In the end everything turned out fine, but we got a loaner car seat for a week.  Grayson liked it, though he couldn't quite get the buckles by himself, and it didn't have cup holders, so I think we're glad to be back to our own car seat now.

Throughout our trip Grayson found many treasures he needed to keep.  He's got 3 leaves, many pine cones, and a few other treasures like acorns, etc.  All stored in his door so they were within reach when needed.  Anyway, we ditched them all before returning the car, and he seemed okay with that.

Tuesday morning we woke up and headed for home.  At the airport they had a "play gate" that had these giant and soft toys.  The floor also had a mat under it to make it soft in case anyone fell off.  The kids had fun climbing around until it was time for our plane to take off.  In Baltimore, our layover airport, Grayson was asking to go back and play while we waited.  He didn't understanding why it wasn't there and available.

Monica has been working to get Grayson's room painted since we got back.  Grayson helped put all the outlet covers back on and screwed all of them in himself.

On Thursday Oriah's family and Jerusha came down to visit!  They invited us up, but we didn't think the kids would handle more travel very well.  While they were down we promised a pizza party at the pool, and Jerusha made sure we delivered!  She found this pizza place that had like a 26 inch pizza or something like that.  After our pizza party we ran over to Andy's to get some custard.  Always a great choice!

Everyone also had a lot of fun playing together, and Theo came along with Jerusha too!

We picked a watermelon from our garden while everyone was here, and it was TASTY!!

Saturday evening Winry had a birthday party at a splash pad at a park.  Grayson wanted to go play too, so Winry played with her friends, and I followed Grayson around.  We had a lot of fun and got plenty wet.

Here's everyone gathering around for the ice cream cake!  You might notice that my kids managed to both get in right next to the cake.  They heard the word cake and immediately got to the table.

And here's Winry with her friends from school.  She spent a lot of time playing with Lily in the green swim suit, and the part was for Olesia in the rainbow swimsuit.

On Sunday I made strawberry bread because we had a lot of strawberries.  It's been a long time since I've had it, and it was great!  Grayson didn't like the strawberry chunks, so in the future I think I'll have to blend up the strawberries.

Here's Brooke having a great moment with Jelly.  It's nice to see the kids have really good moments with her.  I think Jelly is still often warry of the kids, though Brooke hasn't been crazy around her for a long time, so they're getting closer and closer!  Jelly looks so happy.

And that wraps up the week.  We had a super vacation, and I'm so glad we went, but it's also good to be home.  It was also awesome to have family come visit to finish out the week.  No down moments for us!