It was quite the whirlwind of activity for us all weekend. I'm just going to do a brief recap!
Friday:
We checked in to the hotel (Delta Toronto East) around 3 p.m., after getting caught in typical Friday afternoon Toronto traffic! The boys had their swimsuits on about 8 seconds after getting into our room. They'd been scoping out photos of the pool and giant waterslide on the hotel website for the last month and had come prepared to get wet ASAP!
After a quick dip, we got ready to meet our friends Jenn and Bruce for dinner. We had planned on driving to meet them (in the High Park area) but after checking out the traffic on the 401, we decided the TTC (subway) was the only way to go. Twenty-three subway stops later (yes, really, twenty-three, Noah counted them on the way there *and* on the way back!) we finally met up with our friends. The kids played on the castle playground at High Park for a while (a definite must if you're ever in the area with kids!) then we finally got some dinner at a local pub around 9 p.m. We made it back to the hotel around 11 p.m. and crashed!
Part of the castle playground at High Park - it's enormous! That's Nathan in the photo (although this one was taken in the fall, not this weekend - that's why the trees are bare)
Saturday:
I managed to get out of bed early enough to make it downstairs to hear Anne Ohman's "This is Where Unschooling Lives" talk. I need to remember to bring Kleenex to Anne's talks -they always make me tear up (and I notice I wasn't the only one!!) There were some truly adorable little babies in the crowd for me to make faces at too.
While I was listening to Anne, I left Joe and the boys in the kids' fun room. I found them in the pool after the talk! Joe and I did a quick switcheroo in the swimsuit department (me into mine, him out of his) and he headed off to hear Wendy Priesnitz's "The Spirit of Life Learning" talk, while I hung out with the kids in the pool (actually, I enjoyed the hot tub while watching the boys in the pool!) Somewhere in there, we also hooked up with John and Kim from Ohio, who we met at the Peabody Live and Learn conference in 2004.
We all regrouped for lunch (sandwiches and fruit cups in our room) then the guys headed for the fun room while I went to Sandy Lubert's talk on Crossing Over to Unschooling: If You Can't Build a Bridge, Try Flying. Afterwards, I went to check in on the guys- they were happily gaming with some new buddies. I then went to hear Anne speak again (reading her essays "I Am What I Am" and "In Search of Riverglass...Finding Unschooling") - more kleenex required! I have some photos of the kids gaming and playing Twister, but I'm not going to post them here since other people's kids are in them (and I know some people don't like photos of their kids on the internet).
After that, most of the rest of the day was spent in the pool and hot tub. Sadly, none of us made it to Pam's talk on Unschooling Passions or the talent show - we were all too comfy in the pool!
When we finally dragged ourselves out of the pool, we hit the dinner buffet (lots of tasty stuff!) then headed back for the pool yet again. We hung out there almost until the pool closed at 11 p.m. and I chatted with Sandy Lubert for a while.
Here's a very dark photo of Noah standing at the top of the very large waterslide.
Joe and Nathan in the pool together.
Sunday:
We were all really, really, tired when we got up after all the activity of the last 2 days. It was time to summon all our energy reserves and hit the Toronto Zoo! We were hoping to make it there in time to meet up with some other unschoolers, but we arrived just before 10:30 a.m. and no one else was in sight. It was sunny but a bit brisk, not a bad day at all for traipsing through the (very large) zoo.
Very cool "Wall of Fish" at the Toronto Zoo.
Noah and Nathan make a new friend at the zoo!
I think it's just about impossible to do the whole zoo in one day (particularly if you've just spent the past 2 days in a flurry of activity like we did). We managed to see all the important stuff - all the animals from Madagascar (including King Julian!) plus other funky critters like tree kangaroos and electric fish, plus Joe's favourite, the tigers.
As we were leaving the zoo, who should we see heading out behind us but Sandy Lubert and her gang! The only other unschoolers we ran into all day were John and Kim and their brood. Ah well, a good day was had by all. We didn't hit too much traffic on the way home, and arrived safe, sound and exhausted around 5 p.m.
Thanks to Pam L. for putting it all together - I hope it's the first of many Toronto Unschooling Conferences!
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