having some fun

 Daniel loves playing with his sword, when it hasn't been confiscated!

 Little girls...still figuring out what to play...

 Double trouble!

Another pair of double trouble

 even a jacket can serve as a gun!

 Better run!

 or have a shield.

 Because they asked so sweetly, I gave these two a push

 and another one, and another one...

 Jennifer has been eager to help me make dinner in the kitchen.

 Daniel, not so much. Depends what there is to do.

 Nathan is reading up something off of Wikipedia about the Kon Tiki espedition. Interesting! (His expression has to do with the interruption, not the reading. ;)

A project completed!!

 Long ago there was a doorway (and steps up) to get through this wall into the the next bedroom. It's a bathroom that opens up to Nathan and Daniel's bedroom, and used to open up to the sewing room.

 Philip finished the sink cabinet, so I needed to get my act together and finish off the drywall work and painting. The sink was preserved from the original unit that had been unable to handle the moisture.  The unit is made of cedar wood that was in the garage when we moved in. We are such a green family re-purposing everything. I even reused drywall from a wall I took down downstairs. :p

 It is an imperfect job, but the camera lighting doesn't pick up the unevenness on the wall. :) And yes, I need to keep getting that rust out of the shower...but it takes a lot of elbow grease. I told myself "three tiles every time" I clean the washroom. Eventually it will look good too. Nathan is very pleased with the washroom. All it needs is a small cupboard on the wall for storage.

And in the sewing room, I still have to put up the molding back. I am a bit short actually, and hopefully can find a matching piece and trim it to size from somewhere else in the house.

I was practicing painting so that when we paint the living room we know what we are doing...well, Philip thinks that he may find time to do the patching and mudding after all (so I don't do it. :o)

Niagara Falls Jan 7

 We said goodby to the falls, driving all the way up and turning back again. There was a crowd of photographers snapping pictures of the wreck just upstream of the falls.

 And here the waters go crashing over.

 We popped in to see the whirlpool downriver.  Water is such a powerful force!

 The butterfly conservatory was part of our pass, so we came in for a visit.

 We had butterflies passing us by...this one going was sure big!

 There were plenty of colours and varieties. We noticed a butterfly that didn't seem able to hover, but flapped fast enough to make us think a hummingbird.

 Jennifer and Evelyn didn't find the butterflies that interesting. After half an hour they were more interested in the walkway and the various people who were also there in the conservatory.

 And before we left the area we stopped in a nature area for a walk.

 Quite a steep drop off! Down below Philip and the older kids vanished from sight.

 Evelyn and Jennifer posed before we turned around. Evelyn was cold!

 Trudging back is Evelyn, Jennifer is dashing off in eagerness.

 See the stairs we had to climb down to get to the bottom of the escarpment?

 When the older ones got back from their tour, Melanie and Matthew took me to where they went. The Niagara River.

 If you look at the water you can see how powerful it is -- we are not far downstream from the whirlpool. Swimming is not advised.

 The size of the overhang is easier to tell with kids as measuring sticks. There was some neat looking icicles hanging from them underneath.

And the rocks looked like they'd just tumbled down off the cliff and settled in below. There were even ones (not quite so big as this one) with tree roots going over them! Mighty and rugged beauty!

See how cold it is! Most of my pictures from the walk showed my breath! From here we drove through Niagara-on-the-Lake and headed home again.

Niagara Falls Jan 6

 We checked out the Bird Kingdom in the morning.

Ahh we're going down the falls! (Don't they look scared?) There was a bit of a museum before we got into the aviary proper.

 An owl!

 The small bird area was really neat because the cage is huge, and you are in it! The birds were flying right past our heads, and we also got to watch them fighting over nesting materials.

 Jennifer was finally happy by this point in the tour. Earlier she was very upset because I insisted she have a stamp on her hand. That's also why she refused to take off her mittens. Until they got pooped on. Then they came off in a hurry!! :o

 The big birds were in a separate place, and it was fun to see them too. We went in one place where Matthew had a bird land in his hair! He thought it was so funny!! Evelyn and Jennifer wanted to hightail it out of there after they saw what might happen to them there!

 Then we walked past the falls again. This time the skies were clear. From our home we go by the American Falls first, and then get to the Horseshoe Falls.

 The Horseshoe Falls look like a cloud making machine!

 The ice formed from the mist makes for a beautiful landscape.

 And with the sunshine is a beautiful rainbow!

 We did ask Jennifer not to climb up there again. Wouldn't take much to land in the water...

 and over the edge you would go! What a scary thought!

 Our passes included a tour of the "Journey Behind the Falls". This is just a hyped up title for...

 permission to walk in the tunnels under the falls that were built for exploiting tourists like us. The first tunnel "portal" gives you a view just at the edge of the falls. Nice view with icicles hanging over your head! You can't get close enough for them to fall on you though. :p

 And from this viewpoint the rainbow is even more impressive! Too bad the colours don't show as well here.

 The second (and last) view of the falls from behind is exactly that, behind. It must have been quite the engineering challenge to finish the tunnel off at the end, with the cement drying and all that. No details on the few boards that are up with information.

 You can't see anything out through here, at least, you'd expect to see so much more on a sunny day! But the constant roar of the falls and the thought of it running right over top of you does impress!

 The walk home took more than 30 minutes. We timed it because we were hoping to go see the fireworks at 9pm when they showed. It'd be cold though!

 There were a few neat board games in the house, so we tried them out. Fortunately Google could find me the directions for the Penguin game in English...as my German is a little rusty.

 The game started yesterday continues on...requiring much thought and deliberation.

We went out for dinner...driving to it instead of walking this time. We drove past the falls after dinner and saw them lit. We saw some of the "light festival" stuff as well. And then we decided to watch the fireworks from our house. It was -13 and windy. Brrr! We could see the fireworks that went up high enough...and it lasted about 2 minutes. When it was all over we agreed that 40 minutes walking for a 2 minute show would not have been worth it. We were cozy and warm and well entertained after all. ;)