On Friday morning, Hayley’s last official day of March break, my alarm went off with a vengeance at 6:30 am. By 10 am I was sitting with George, Hayley, and Breanna on a train heading to Toronto.

The girls were remarkably good considering it’s five and a half hours sitting in seats. Breanna started to fuss about an hour out of Toronto but it was because she was tired; she finally fell asleep and got a half hour in which made a big difference for her. Overall they really enjoyed the train and we kept them busy with lots of coloring books, notepads, books, impromptu games (I taught Hayley to play Boxes, she did great!), and snacks.

We had gone to Toronto for George’s sister Elsa’s wedding, so we went to her condo first, where we were staying for the weekend, had a bite to eat since we were STARVING, and then we went to a hotel to visit with some family from out of town. It was tiring but fun to see everyone. We were all wiped out, but still hungry, so we stopped at a Kentucky Fried Chicken to pick up some food, ate a piece each, then we all crashed by 10 pm.

I don’t sleep well away from home the first couple of days so I was awake for a couple of hours in the middle of the night, and then we were all jolted awake by a blaring siren coming from the ceiling. George called his sister to ask what the hell it was and she said if there was any problem we’d hear a voice telling us what to do from the speakers in the ceiling, and that’s exactly what happened – like the voice of God or something. It was weird. A security guard from the lobby announced there was a fire in one of the parking levels and to stay tuned for further instruction. We immediately got everyone dressed and waited by the door; fire trucks came and then within five minutes they announced it was a false alarm. Alas, it was 7:15 am and we were all groggy but far too awake to go back to sleep then.

Luckily, the building has a big pool and spa room so after breakfast I took the girls downstairs and we alternated between swimming in the smaller pool and relaxing in the spa for an hour. It was really nice and I would have stayed longer if we hadn’t had things to do. We had to hurry to get ready because Hayley and Breanna were flower girls in the wedding, so we had to get them over to the wedding site to get them dressed and to have photos done.

I know I’m a little bit (very much) biased, but holy GOD my girls were beautiful flower girls.

And the bride was pretty damn gorgeous too.

The wedding was beautiful and intimate (it was held, ceremony and reception, and the Heintzman House, a historical building that is really nice), the food was ridiculously good (massive salad, risotto with mushrooms and truffle, beef tenderloin, vegetables, chicken, lemon sorbet, berries, wedding cake, dude!), and the dancing was fun. Ever since the kids saw Alvin and the Chipmunks Hayley has loved to sing “Don’t Cha” by the Pussycat Dolls (Alvin sings it while showering in the dishwasher) so Elsa had the DJ dedicate the song to Hayley and Breanna – the ENTIRE dance floor cleared so the three of them could dance and sing along at the top of their lungs. I can’t tell you how much I wish I had been able to bring my other camera with video because it was so cute. The photo doesn’t quite do it justice but you can almost hear Breanna yelling “don’t cha wish your girlfriend was HOT like me” in it:

Breanna danced almost nonstop until 11 before passing out and Hayley made it right to the very last song at midnight. Needless to say they were both beyond exhausted when we got back to the condo, with a meltdown of epic proportions on the way, but they went to sleep quickly.

Unfortunately we had to get up fairly early at 9 am because we had an 11:30 train to catch back home. It’s a shame that we had to be in and out so quickly. It would have been nice to have some time to see Toronto properly but we’re hoping to go back again relatively soon; if not this summer (because we also have to save up to go to Halifax for my sister’s wedding!) then definitely over March break next year!

There was one definite upside to taking that particular train home though – a month ago my friend Andrea emailed me to see if I would be able to meet up at the downtown train station in Montreal since she’d be there for an hour and a half layover on her way home from a conference. I was sad to tell her we’d be traveling that day too… until we both realized we were taking the same train from Toronto to Montreal!

I found her in line, about 25 people ahead of us on Sunday morning and we were so excited that I clocked her right in the face with my shoulder when we hugged, but luckily she didn’t seem to hold it against me. Since approximately half of Canada’s population was traveling on that very same train, we got separated and ended up in different cars, boo. However, two stops later, the door at the back of our train opened and there she was!

Let me tell you something about Andrea. If you read her, in person she is every bit as fun, bubbly, hilarious, and sweet as she comes across in text. It’s easy to put on pretenses online because no one can see you, but when you meet someone who is just as awesome offline, that’s special. Meeting Andrea was the highlight of my trip home – well, that and the fact that I was able to rescue my camera bag which I dropped while trying to board the train, and which then flopped over and fell ON THE TRACKS UNDER THE TRAIN OH MY GOD. Whew.

The only disappointment about meeting her was that it was too short and hopefully we can swing something some day where we can get together again and not be tired, and just talk each other’s heads off, because I swear it was instant companionship – the kind where you talk over each other because you’re both so excited and you laugh at each other’s jokes because you have the same wacky sense of humor and then you stop talking for a couple of minutes and the silence isn’t awkward in any way.

Overall, it was an incredibly exhausting trip but it was worth every yawn because we all had such a great time. But on that note, I need to finish this tea and get my still-tired self to bed! You can see all 20 photos that I posted over here – I actually took over 300 from Friday through Sunday but figured you didn’t need to see every.single.one. You’re welcome!