Mackenzie King Estate (part one)

For our fourth Tuesday activity, we crossed the river and headed to Quebec to finally visit the Mackenzie King Estate.  Even though the museums, cottages, and restaurants were closed, it didn't disappoint.  I found my dream home here in Canada!!

We started at the guest houses near the lake.  I love these pretty coral flowers hanging in baskets everywhere.

This is the biggest guest house, there were at least five.  I was just smitten with their yellow, green, and white color scheme.  Many dignitaries were hosted here, including Winston Churchill.

We walked down to the lake and had a little peek.  I wouldn't mind playing there.

Macy thought it looked like a great place to play too.

We walked up through the woods to find the actual summer residence of Canada's longest prime minister, William Lyon Mackenzie King.

We found it and it is the most charming home I have ever seen!  It is now a tea room where you can enjoy a delicious meal (once corona virus leaves us).  I can't wait to go back and eat there!

*On the south side of the house is Cafe Pat that sells ice cream.  I heard on the radio that it had opened back up, so we were so excited to have a little treat.  Unfortunately, I didn't hear on the radio that it is only open Thursdays-Sundays, so it was closed when we were there.  That's okay, we made a stop at Dairy Queen on our way home.

Now these are the kind of snowballs I like!

I would love to have an estate like this, so when my kiddos are all grown up, they can come back each summer with their kiddos for glorious family reunions.

Moving around to the west side of the home.  I loved the green and white striped awnings!

On this side of the yard were the perfectly manicured gardens and we found more purple flowers to love.

The end of the fancy garden leads into a more rustic garden with this "window" to the woods.

Looking at the house from the east side.

Can I please spend a few hours on this gorgeous porch?

Young Women and Sunflowers

We drove Noé out to the country for a Young Women activity.  They had a barbecue and went swimming in the pond at my friend, Annick's camper.  Look how cute the girls are socially distancing from one another!

On the way there we passed a huge sunflower field.  So of course, on the way back we had to stop to take a few pics.

I am a sunflower!  I truly feel alive when I am out in the sun!

My friend, Kushnaz, enjoyed our pics so she and her husband went out to see the sunflowers too.  These last two pictures are hers.  She's such a talented photographer, I had to share the beauty she captured!

Long live the sun!  And sunflowers!

Marcel Lalande Park

For our third Tuesday activity, we went to Marcel Lalande Park to play and splash.  This was actually our Plan D.  As with the rest of the world, covid-19 shut down Ottawa in the middle of March.  In the middle of May we had phase 1 reopening, so I could see my fertility doctor.  In the middle of June we had phase 2 reopening, so I could see my hair stylist.  In the middle of July we had phase 3 reopening, which we thought meant everything would reopen with restrictions in place.  We had planned to go to Calypso water park.  Mont Cascade water park in Quebec opened, but alas Calypso in Ontario was not allowed to open after all.  We were so bummed!  The pools and parks were opened back up though, so we made a reservation to swim at Splash Pool.  Later that afternoon, they called to tell us the pool would be shut for the remainder of the day for maintenance.  Ugh!  We decided to go to Cardinal Creek park to play, but when we arrived it was jam-packed!  I mean, it was more crowded than it had ever been before the global pandemic.  People are crazy!  We are not, and we left as quickly as we arrived.  We decided to visit the little park in our old neighborhood and we had it almost completely to ourselves.  The kids had fun playing in the water and sand, and we all enjoyed being outside!

Family fun days are the best (even when you go with Plan D)!

Lac La Peche

For our second Tuesday outing, we headed over to Quebec to spend the day at Lac La Peche.  There were a few other families, but we pretty much had it to ourselves.  This made me sad though, as all the other times we've been to this lake has been with big groups of friends from church.  I miss my friends!  It was still so nice to get outside and enjoy the water and sun.

We had beautiful views.

Now for the vertical shots.

The big kids were mostly in the water the whole time (besides our picnic lunch).

While Macy was mostly on the shore.

Leonard was the parent keeping the big kids safe in the water for most of the time.

So yep, I was the parent keeping Macy safe on the sand.  We did get in the water too.  However, I am spoiled and the water that was deep enough to swim in was way too cold.  The shallow water was a lot warmer, so Macy and I had fun sitting and splashing there...until fish started eating my feet, eek!  I had a fish pedicure in India that was quite delightful, however these were different fish and their bites hurt instead of tickled, ha ha!

We love to swim and are glad we got to enjoy it a little bit this crazy summer.

We changed Macy into her pajamas before we left as we thought she'd fall asleep on the way home.  We were right!

Gavin, Teague, Hiram, and Ali did too!

*You can only see the top of Hiram's forehead- he's resting his head on Teague's shoulder, ah!

*You can see the car behind us too- that's Kaleb and Noé!