Tour the Canada Days

My parents bought a house in Markham, Ontario, Canada. So to celebrate for a new home, off we flew to Canada for our very first White Christmas!

After Christmas, we then went to tour Canada.

Our first stop was Ottawa. That's where the Parliament of Canada is. It was very very cold. The Parliament was closed for the holidays so we just had some picture taking outside.

We spent the night at Montreal - where the night life is. Luckily for the boys - all shops are closed for the holidays so the girls can't go shopping. Luckily for the girls - all bars are closed so no night out for the boys. How cold was it at Montreal? We left our bottled water at the van, went up to our hotel room to sleep. The following day, our bottled water turned to ice.

From Montreal, we went to Quebec to see Canada's Little Europe. The place is so cute, so old, and everything in ice, even the river.

We went to visit the Cathedral of St. Anne, which is a must-see for it is the patron saint of the Church where our parents grew up from.

We loved taking photos of the fresh Christmas trees with Christmas lights on.

We haven't seen the most of Canada. We still have Vancouver to visit soon! Canadian Rockies!!!

First Day of School

Summer was invited by her 2nd cousin, Henry, son of my cousin Harry and Chiquita, to attend his school at Ontario Homes.

So all bundled up, we went to her day school. We registered with our home address in Canada. She met a lot of kids - surprisingly Asian, she sang and danced with the teacher. You can really see her big eyes focused on the teacher. She was attentive and was following the dance instruction of the teacher. She shared toys with other children too.

Summer went home with lots of books, VHS and casette tape of musical songs for kids, and lots of reading materials for mothers on raising babies and toddlers.

Christmas Day

Dec. 25, 2005 - It was our first Christmas with Summer. We had a White Christmas, we witnessed our first fleurice on Christmas night. We were all excited as we went out of our cousin's house taking photos in the snow without any jackets on. So much excitement, we did not feel the cold air.

We spent it at Toronto, Canada. We had our picture taking with our family at our house in Markham, then we went to hear the Christmas Mass. We went to Tita Turing's house for dinner - where Summer changed to her Santa outfit surprising everyone. We then went to my other Tita's house at Mississauga. It was past midnight when we got home already and everybody's energy were still up to open everybody's gifts. It was Summer's first time to receive so much gifts, she was more excited with all the wrappers around than with the gift itself. She'd rather play with her cousin's gifts over her toys. At night, we went to Ate Heidi's house to plan our trip to Quebec and that was when we saw our first snow fall.

Summer spent her first Winter Christmas at Canada.

NYer Day

A day after travelling a thousand miles from home to Canada, off we went to Buffalo,NY to see the Festival of Lights at Our Lady of Fatima. We went there in the afternoon so we could see the lights. It was so cold, my baby was bundled in a blanket aside from her jacket, bonnet, scarf, and gloves. We didn't get to stay long looking at the lights since it was so cold.



We went to the factory outlet to do some shopping since tax is lesser in NY than in Canada.

And above all, with 3months US Visa, we got stamped for 6months!


From NY, we dropped by the Niagara Falls to see the fireworks.


Fireworks are not enough to warm the freezing misty air of Niagara.

A Day to Fly

It was Summer's first time to fly on Dec. 22, 2005 via Cathay Pacific on our way to Toronto, Canada.


Summer met a lot of korean honeymooners who shot photos of her calling her 'big eyes'.


Summer slept well onboard, waking up to take her milk and play with the toys I brought for her.
We were met at the airport by my brother and Summer played well with her cousins as if she did not travel a thousand miles and more - so full of energy.

She was a good traveller and I was so happy with it - we can travel some more! =)

Christmas Day with the Reantasos

Summer will be flying out Manila for her first christmas. So before leaving for Manila, we celebrated our Christmas in advance with the Reantaso's.


Though it may be advance, the Christmas spirit was everywhere - lavish food, gift giving and lots of picture taking.

Here are some of our first Christmas photos:

Interview Day

We were scheduled for our US Visa interview on Dec. 5, 2005. It was my first time to go for an interview at the US embassy since I always go through the drop box everytime I renew my US visa. But since, drop box is no longer possible, we have to go through the interview for Omar's and Summer's US visa.

We were scheduled for 1pm, arrived at the embassy at 12noon, finished at 4pm.

We brought Summer with us for luck and lucky she was! Omar and Summer got their first US visa.

They were issued visa for 3months.

New York, here we come!