Friends, Roller Coasters and a baseball game

We had a super-packed, fun-filled couple of days last weekend. We were able to meet up with lots of friends, explored different attractions around the city, and even got a glimpse of some spring-like weather.

On Friday I worked during the day. For the last six weeks I have been supply teaching at an independent school in downtown Toronto. I’ve been getting called in a steady 2-3 days a week, which has been a nice way to make a bit of money and develop an understanding of the school system here. The only major downside is it takes me nearly 1½ hours to get to the school on the train and subway. I am getting a taste of the life of a suburban commuter. I am trying to put a positive spin on this and think of the commute as “me time”. I’ve never minded taking public transport, in fact I prefer it to driving, and with two young kids it gives me the rare opportunity to read and listen to podcasts in relative peace! I arrived home from work that evening just in time to help Andy with “chaos hour” (aka dinnertime with Ollie and Ella). My parents have a standing Friday night dinner date with two other couples, so they get to escape the madness of this time of night at least once a week. This week, they generously offered to have an early dinner, as Andy and I had been invited to Kristin and Dan’s for a late dinner and some drinks. We got a free pass for the entire evening and slept over at their house, instead of having to negotiate who would be the designated driver. 

My parents got home just after I put Ollie to bed, so we left them with Ella and drove to Etobicoke for a wonderful kid-free evening. Well, not entirely kid-free, as Dan and Kristin’s two-year old was there, of course! We arrived just before her bedtime which was probably the worst timing. She was really excited that we were there (although wondered where her friend Ella was) and then didn’t want to go to bed. FOMO starts young! Andy and I were just happy that it wasn’t our child that was difficult to put to bed. As a parent it is sometimes nice to realise that everyone goes through the same struggles with their children as you do. 

Kristin’s friend, Julie, also joined us for dinner. Julie lived in Melbourne for a while, and we met up with here a few times waaaaaay back when we first moved there. But she has been back in Toronto for about four years now and we haven’t seen her since, so it was fun to catch up. She has a six-month-old, so predictably lots of the chat that evening was around being new parents. Andy and I are like the seasoned, veteran parents with most of our friends now, so we of course have many stories and pieces of unsolicited advice to share! We had takeaway Thai for dinner, drank wine and just generally enjoyed having a total night off. Andy and Dan ended up going to the pub to meet up with one of Dan’s friends, and didn’t get back until around 1am, well after Kristin and I had turned in for the night! Needless to say, Andy was a little worse for wear in the morning, and it took him the whole weekend to fully recover from his night out. We are so old!

Saturday morning we woke up early and Dan & Andy went out to get us some fresh bagels and coffees for breakfast. Coffee’s were sourced from Jimmy’s in Etobicoke - Australian level flat whites, yay! 

Shortly after we finished our bagels we headed home to pick up Ella, and then were off again to meet up with my friend Cheryl. Cheryl suggested we meet at Nations, which as far as I knew was a multi-cultural grocery store. An unusual meeting place but Cheryl said they had a play are which would be good for Ella. I was expecting something similar to what you’d find in a McDonald’s, so imagine my surprise when we walked into Nations Experience which is not only a (fabulous) grocery store, but also a food court and 4000 square foot, multi-storey indoor playground.

Photo Credit: Renée Suen for Toronto Life

The playground, called Happy Kingdom, was super busy, what with it being Saturday morning. It was also pretty expensive, with entry priced at $17 per child and $2 per adult (plus tax!). But, it was packed with features, such as a ball pit, tons of different slides and climbing frames, a trampoline area and a designated area for toddlers. Ella loved it, and Kristin also ended up meeting us there with her daughter so the two girls could play together.

Photo Credit: Renée Suen for Toronto Life

After a big play we explored the fresh, diverse food offerings in the food court and had a healthy lunch together, before Ella went back into Happy Kingdom for one last play while I caught up with Cheryl. Cheryl is about six months pregnant with her first child and I cannot WAIT to meet her baby in July! By the time we headed back home in the early afternoon Ella was very tired, and was completely passed out in the car on the drive home.

Sunday we had some fantastic weather (which is sadly still a rare occurrence here in Toronto) so we decided to head to Canada’s Wonderland for the afternoon. Canada’s Wonderland is a HUGE amusement park located in Vaughn, just north of Toronto and about 40 minutes from my parents' house. It has some of the biggest and fastest roller coasters in North America, along with a ton of smaller rides that are just perfect for Ella’s age. We bought Season’s Passes, which at $75pp are great value: less than the cost of two single day admissions. I grew up in a very amusement park and roller coaster loving family, so I was super excited to start going to Wonderland again with my own young family.

It was the opening weekend and a very nice, sunny day, so not surprisingly the park was pretty busy. We ended up adding the dining pass option on to our season’s pass - for an extra $93pp you get two meals a day… for the whole season! Again, that is a fantastic deal when you consider that each meal is somewhere between $14-17. We didn’t get Ella a dining pass, figuring that the meals are big enough that Andy and I can just share ours with the two kids. The only “catch” with the dining pass is that you have to allow four hours between meals. We arrived at the park around 1:30pm as we wanted Ollie to have his first nap at home, so once we got our passes sorted out we headed over to a restaurant to have some lunch before going on some rides. 

After lunch my parents offered to take the kids to Planet Snoopy (the children’s area of the park) so Andy and I could get in a few roller coasters. As I mentioned above it was a pretty busy day, so we ended up waiting in lines for 30-45 minutes before getting on a ride. We checked out the latest ride, the Yukon Striker, which has a 90 degree vertical drop and looks insane, but the line was VERY long. We figured we’d save that one for a less busy day. We went on two rides and then headed over to Planet Snoopy to see how my parents and the kids were doing.

Ella’s first request was to go on "Swan Lake" which I remember from my childhood, and has to be one of the most boring rides of all time! But she loved it.

When Andy and I joined up with the others Ella was on a car ride with my dad which she looked like she was loving as well.



After that my mom and I stayed with the kids while Andy and my dad went on a few “adult” rides. We took Ollie and Ella on the carousel, which was Ollie’s first amusement park ride. I think Ollie enjoyed it, although I had to work hard to keep him from licking the pole.

Once my dad and Andy returned we all had dinner and then headed home as it was bedtime for the little ones. It was a really, really fun day and I can’t wait to go again!

"The Bat" roller coaster

Once we got the kids bathed and to bed it was nearly time for… Game of Thrones! I’m loving our Sunday nights watching the last season of this epic show together and I can’t believe there are only two more episodes left! Who will take the Iron Throne?! So exciting.

Monday morning I was pretty tired but had to get up early to supply teach - I’ve actually had a full week of supply teaching, which is my first full week of work in nearly a year! As I was about to leave work that afternoon, I received a text from my friend Karen, saying she had just been given four tickets to the Blue Jays baseball game that night, did Andy and I want to go? Feeling tired but not wanting to give up the opportunity to spend time with friends and go watch a Major League baseball game, I asked my parents if they minded taking care of the kids, and Andy made his way into the city to meet us. 

The tickets were incredible, just 10 rows behind home plate, which is about as good as it gets in baseball. Karen, who is an avid Jays fan, was given them by a parent of one of the students in her class. What a parent!

Unfortunately the game was one of the most boring baseball games of all time, and baseball is not a particularly fast paced game to start with! The Jays lost 8-0, and only had two hits the whole game. Bummer! Oh well, it was still fun to hang out with our friends that night. 

After a whole week of working I am pretty tired - I’m not used to having to get up so early every day! But my days of full-time work are short-lived for now; tomorrow we fly to California for a week for my brother’s wedding. I’m looking forward to hanging out with my bro and his wife-to-be, along with some warmer and sunnier weather!