Toddler Trials sponsored by Timmies - Canada 2018 Day 17 Final day, Travelling home & Reflection
 

Toddler Trials sponsored by Timmies - Canada 2018
Day 17 Final day, Travelling home & Reflection

I’m Emily, my husband is Gary and this was our first overseas holiday with our 17 month Libby. We visited family near Toronto and spent a few days in Montreal too.

Today was our last full day, we were flying home tonight so time to pack up and say goodbye :(.

We went for a wander down to Hamilton waterfront with Lorraine and let Libby play with the pebbles on the beach.

Hamilton Waterfront

Gary & Lorraine

It was a lovely hot day again but the breeze off the water was nice and cool.



We went to Walmart for a final stock up on biscuits and sweets to take into work and some more make up for me!

We then headed to Buffalo Wild Wings for lunch. Gary was desperate to go back. I don’t have any food pictures, sorry, but my notes say I upgraded my snack size wings to the lunch size and shouldn’t have :erm: #eyesbiggerthanmybelly

We headed back to the house to pack up and say our goodbyes.

We left for the airport at 4.30. Libby was exhausted and fell asleep in the car almost immediately. Not ideal as we hoped she’d sleep on the plane but we appreciated the peaceful journey! We hit traffic as it was rush hour but got to the airport in plenty of time.

Bye blue skies :(

We returned the hire car and got checked in and through security relatively pain free.

There was the usual idiots at security arguing with the man that they didn’t need to take out their liquids. They couldn’t understand why their full bag was being emptied!

The airport was really busy, we got a seat on the floor and I went to queue for Smash Burger. It took ages, people waiting with me kept having to leave to run for flights, offering receipts to anyone who wanted to collect their food!

We eventually got our food and Libby joined in eating chips with ‘dip dip’ sauce.



Gary went to the bathroom and she was sitting on my crossed legs facing forwards so I couldn’t see her face. An American lady was walking towards us and said to her husband oh look at this cutie. I smiled, then realised they meant look at the ketchup she’s covered in. It was everywhere :d:.



After we’d eaten and had a last look in some of the shops, we went to the gate.

Libby fussed while we were waiting to get on the plane, not a great start!

On the plane, she was reluctant to sleep again but we managed to get her down eventually, about 10pm. She’s a wriggler and kept moving herself about though, nearly falling off the seat a few times!

Gary also had a snooze

We got dinner - Chicken and orzo, which wasn’t too bad. I ate mine over Libby’s head as she slept!

The drinks took ages, the air hostesses were all lovely but sooooo slow. They couldn’t work the brake on the trolley so it took them forever to reach us.

We landed slightly early and were sent down the family lane at Border Control so we didn’t have to wait longer than a few minutes. Our luggage all came fairly quickly too, but unfortunately our transfer was delayed! We had to wait about an hour which wasn’t ideal, but we got home in the end.



We fed Libby fishy crackers as we waited. She kept pulling her PJ legs up to her knees, she was clearly hopeful it was nice and warm outside like she'd been used to :d:.

We got home and text my mum and dad to see if they wanted to see Libby. i.e. we text and asked if they would please take her so we could sleep for an hour or 2, we were shattered! Luckily they were desperate to see her (they weren't too bothered about us) so came and picked her up :grin:. Gary and I went to bed for 2 hours then got up to unpack and sort everything :zzz:.

She went to bed no problem that night but slept till nearly 11 the next day, she wouldn't wake up for anything haha so must have been more tired than we realised.

Jetlagged baby!

So that’s it! I made it to the end at last :grin:. Thank you so much to everyone who’s read and liked and commented, it means a lot to know someone is reading along. I know this trip was nowhere near as exciting as most on here but I’m glad I’ve written a report, it’s a great thing to look back on.





Taking a toddler abroad…

Gary says we won’t be taking Libby long haul again for a long time, the flight stressed him out too much but to be fair she was exactly how I expected her to be on the plane. Mums really do know their little ones best! It was entirely worth it to get there and I didn’t feel like the other people around us were annoyed at her/us. If they were, then I didn’t care enough to notice!

We had a brilliant holiday, it was great to spend time with family and just chill out. We also did quite a bit of shopping (my favourite hobby) and we explored child friendly places we hadn’t done before. We didn’t hit all the touristy things because we’ve done them before and didn’t think Libby would appreciate them. We’ll do things like Maid of the Mist, the CN Tower etc on future trips. I'm glad we went for slightly longer than 2 weeks, it meant Montreal didn't eat into our time too much.

Going to Montreal was amazing, its such a beautiful city and I can’t wait to explore more of Canada and America.

Future plans…

So what are we going to do now?! No Canadian/American holidays this year :( (see comment about Gary’s ban on transatlantic flights with Libby above), although we did very nearly book a week in Orlando in November in the BA sale. Someone turns 30 you see :erm:. The older looking one of us I should add ;):d:.

But nope, we were sensible and have decided to give Libby her first Disney experience closer to home, so we’ve booked Disneyland Paris for June. She’s now 2 and starting to learn the art of negotiation and can also quite happily play a flashcard app on my phone, so we’re hoping the flight and queuing won’t be too bad. Pray for us anyway please :spin:.

We’ve also got a week in Centre Parcs in March booked to see us through to summer then a European city break for the aforementioned big 3-0 in November.

I plan to do a full trip report for DLP so I will have a pre-trip up in the coming months. I’m excited to be in proper Disney planning mode again :grin:.

I love reading other people’s reports and I hope you've enjoyed ours. It's taken longer than I'd hoped and is definitely a labour of love!

Thanks again for reading & commenting.

The Sands x

I've really enjoyed reading along although my kids are older as hoping to take them to Canada next year to Toronto, Niagra Falls and then possibly drive down to our friends in Ottawa and visit Montreal too. When I was in Ottawa last year the only thing I saw in Toronto was the airport and I remember giving up in burger queue and getting pizza instead !

Glad you managed to finish it as will be great for you to look back on in years to come and look forward to reading about Libby's first trip to Disney :grin:

Thanks for a lovely report - always nice to see places you have been to through someone else’s vision!

Enjoy your trips this year!

It’s been a great read, a labour of love. Thanks x

I've really enjoyed your TR, thanks so much for sticking with it :) I've got family in Toronto (well Oakville) and visited a long time ago now. Would love to go back and take DH to see the sights.

Looking forward to your DLP report :)

Ahhh this scares me for taking Charlie long haul... especially since we have just entered tantrums (yes, already - who know?!). Luckily, I guess, we don’t have anything booked so who knows when that pleasure will come ;)

Sounds like a fab year ahead & DLP will be lovely.

Thanks for taking the time to share. It’s really great to read about other alternative holidays xx

I've enjoyed reading along with your Canadian adventure and your first big trip with Libby.

I hope your future plans all go well, some exciting trips there with DLP and then a city break for the not 30th celebration...We won't mention that!

Thanks so much for taking the time to share your trip with us I can't imagine having the energy to have done that when my two were toddlers! Just getting through the day was brutal enough.

Thank you for reading :). That sounds like a brilliant trip, its such a fab country to explore. We hope its the first of many Canadian/US road trips for Libby!

Thanks Mel! And thanks for all your help on previous threads/your reports, I picked up lots from you :).

Thank you!

You should definitely go back :D. We weren't far from Oakville at all! Thanks for reading x

Thanks Michelle! You've got enough to keep your hands full at the moment, hope you're keeping well :) xx

Thank you so much :D. It's been hard work but so glad I've finished and people have enjoyed reading xx

many thanks for posting have really enjoyed reading your posts

Thank you so much for reading & commenting :)