New York State of Mind

Two weeks ago we made our first summer road trip.  First time in New York state for the kids and I (unless you count an airport from which our children all have snow globes and from which we caught a glimpse of the Statue of Liberty) and first time driving through Ontario for the kids and I.  (It is hard to find firsts for my ever traveling husband these days).

The scenery in this part of Canada leaves something to be desired.  Not that our children would notice with all of their electronic entertainment devices.  We still got lots of  "Are we there yets!?".  Sarah is holding her nose in this picture because we were passing by some sort of landfill.  We all agreed with Sarah.  Other stinky things about driving through Canada: my cell phone was roaming and checking my e-mail causing quite a large bill to accumulate before I noticed the text of warning that it sent me and the KFC we found for our first meal on the trip was less than clean yet cost significantly more than what its U.S. counterpart would cost.  Not really Canada's fault, I know.  Just live and learn moments.
Five to six hours after we started with two stops other than border crossings, we arrived at Auntie Kathy's house in Buffalo!
Because she is the Hostess with the Mostest she had something waiting for our sugar-deprived children....

Who doesn't like strawberries and ice cream at 10:45 PM?!  These are the things childhood memories are made of and this will help Auntie Kathy's house rank right up there with Disneyland.

We met each of her "dogs" and then got settled for bed.  She has the best kind of dogs--no food and no poop clean up required.  The kids loved her prank poo and played a fun trick on Aunt Daphne the next morning that also involved a fake snake.  Just like Disneyland, I tell you.

Still coming off of the sugar high...but finally sleep for all.

The next morning we had breakfast and then a visit from Aunt Daphne and Larry.  Then we all (minus Larry) headed into Buffalo to look around.

First we checked out some random wooden people. 

Not just people, also fish.

And a Buffalo, naturally.

We checked out Lake Eerie (or Niagara River?) and a light house.

We had ice cream--I mean, it had been like 10 hours since the last time. :)

We tried to figure out if we should feed the birds or not.

We walked and stopped to smell the flowers.

Some of us walked faster than others.

She came back for a photo op.

This is the closest we got to the ships.  We had mentioned a visit to the Buffalo Zoo and at some point Sarah realized that there were no animals in this particular area of Buffalo and in order to prevent an uprising (the second sugar rush was wearing off), we decided it was time to have lunch and find some animals.

To Be Continued...