bucket list

From New York, we drove 8 hours up towards Niagara Falls where we spent the next 4 days.

Niagara Falls has been on my bucket list for a long time and I’m glad we finally did it because WOAH IT IS GORGEOUS.

We had initially planned to fly in to Buffalo airport but it was Thanksgiving weekend and the flight prices were out of control. It would have cost about $2,000 instead of the usual $450 to fly all 6 of us so we decided to make a road trip out of it. It only cost us $150 for a one-way minivan rental from La Guardia to Buffalo and as a bonus, we were able to make a nice stopover at Woodbury Common Premium Outlets for some shopping.

Pro tip: Instead of doing a one-way minivan rental from LGA to BUF for all 5 days (which would cost $800+), we split it into 2 separate rentals: a 1-day from LGA to BUF ($150), followed by 4 days in BUF ($330). This meant that we had to make a 20-minute pit stop in Buffalo Airport to do the paperwork but it was very painless and they let us keep the same car so we didn’t even need to swap it out.

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You guys, Niagara Falls is unreal.

I’ve never seen anything like this in my life. I know it’s just water and rocks but when you put them together like that, it’s nothing short of magnificent. It’s like standing in a huge cloud of mist and you hear the thundering roar of rushing water and you look out and there are all these rainbows all around and it’s beautiful and terrifying all at the same time.

Every time the kids got too close to the edge, my heart would drop and I’d be like “3 steps back, guys!! Don’t make me have to go in after you, I’m not that good a swimmer.” They thought it was hilarious to see me this nervous so they took turns to get as close to the edge as possible and after a while, the only way to make them stop was to be all “You know what, going in after you would be futile anyway so hey, it’s been nice knowing you!!”

And did they buy it? Not for a second.

It’s impossible to not visibly flinch when a piece of your heart is a small barricade away from plunging down the Niagara Falls.

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Here are some of the highlights:

1. Looking at the falls

I’ve always been a city girl but this made me question everything I knew about myself. I loved standing next to the falls and looking out at the rushing water. We couldn’t get enough of it.

We looked at it from the top of Horseshoe Falls, the American Falls, Bridal Veil Falls, Terrapin Point, from the boat at the bottom of the falls, from behind the falls, and I still can’t decide which view I liked best. They were all spectacular.

2. Niagara-on-the-Lake

I love me some small town charm and Niagara-on-the-Lake is as charming as they come. We spent a whole day browsing quaint bookstores and looking at trinkets and having coffee, it was delightful.

3. Hiking

Again, I’m not really the hiking sort and unless you count the one time I walked around Coney Island, I don’t think I’ve gone on a proper hike in my life. I certainly didn’t think I’d enjoy it this much.

The weather was beautiful and we kind of just took a leisurely walk into some woods for a bit to hang out with some dogs and squirrels and ducks. It was an excellent way to spend an afternoon.

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4 days turned out to be the perfect amount of time to spend at Niagara Falls and those turned out to be some of my favourite memories of the trip; we could take things slow and I woke up to the best mornings ever.

We’re back from London after a 10-day trip with the 2 babies.

So here’s the story to this London trip. Tickets to U2’s innocence + experience tour opened up for sale sometime in December last year. Why is this important? One thing you need to know about the husband is that he is the biggest U2 fan this side of the world and right at the very top of his bucket list is to go for a U2 concert. U2 has never toured in Singapore and if this mountain wasn’t going to come to us, we were going to have to go to the mountain. Sort of. We had to make this happen and there wasn’t very much time to plan because tickets to U2 concerts sell out within minutes. After some skillful computer clicking, we scored 2 tickets, which meant that of course, a trip to the UK was in order.

The timing of this was unfortunate in that Truett had to stay behind for school. Kirsten decided that if her precious big brother wasn’t going to go, she wouldn’t go either.

“Are you sure??” I asked her several times as I was booking the flight tickets. “This is London and Paris and Disneyland.”

“If kor kor can’t go, I will stay with him so he won’t be sad.” So she did. 1000 points for solidarity.

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It’s our first visit to Europe and London was the perfect spot to kick things off because underneath this city girl exterior is exactly the inside of a city girl. I like being in a big city where there’s lots to do – getting lost in the crowd, discovering lovely little spots that make the place my own.

The first 2 days in a new city, I like to make like a tourist and visit all the highlights before going off the beaten track.

Day one, both babies were jetlagging and very awake at 4 in the morning so we got in an early start to Buckingham Palace. Before we left, I had told Kirsten that we were going to visit the Queen’s home and she made me practice curtseying to the Queen just in case I saw her. I said this was very unlikely, “practically zero chance of this happening” were my exact words, but she made me practice anyway. And she’s right. One must always be prepared in case once meets the Queen.

We got to Buckingham Palace but we didn’t get to meet the Queen. Or the Princess. Or even one of her chambermaids. Being the lowly peasants that we are, we just stood outside the gate waiting for the change of guard to happen.

No disrespect to Her Royal Majesty, but it’s horribly boring, by the way. We stood for an hour and a half getting squeezed by a million tourists, thinking that there would be some fanfare or dancing horses or something that would make this worthwhile. After like an eternity, we finally saw the top of some furry hats as a bunch of guards marched past. Okay, the hats were pretty cool, and it’s what I really wanted to see anyway, but the marching seemed very ordinary. All in all, I’d consider this a very mild success. If I could have touched the furry hat, it would have been a much bigger success.

After the new guards marched in, we tried to exit the crowd, but we were told to wait till the old guards marched out, so we had to stand there for another 20 minutes to see the tops of more furry hats.

Baby Theo was not pleased, I can tell you that. He spent the entire time yelling/demanding hi fives from strangers. Baby does not understand the importance of royalty.

We left Buckingham Palace and crossed over to St James’ Park, which was lovely in the fall with all the crunchy autumn leaves and cute little ducks. And squirrels! There were lots of squirrels just running around having a good time.

With so much space to explore, these 2 little squirrels had a good time too.

From there, we walked to Westminster Abbey, Big Ben, and the River Thames for a view of the London Eye. We could probably have hopped onto the tube to cut down on the walking but we had beautiful weather and also, we stopped to peer down the long flight of steps to the tube station before deciding that one of us would very likely injure something if we had to lug the double stroller all the way down and back up again. For most of the trip, we either hiked our way around the city or called for an uber when we were too exhausted. Most of the uber rides ranged from £5-10, which wasn’t much more than paying 3 adult fares on the tube.

We also found a promo code for Gett, a London-based uber alternative, which gave us another £30 of free rides around the city. Sweet.

In the evening, my mom babysat the babies while we went off for a truly epic U2 concert at the O2 arena. The husband was in U2 heaven and even for a moderate U2 fan like me, it was an incredible performance.

Quite a way to start off our first day in London, if I might say so myself. I think I rather like this city.

Since we last visited Universal Studios Orlando in the fall of 2013, there’s been some really exciting additions to the park, most notably in the form of the stunning Harry Potter Diagon Alley expansion. ZOMG DIAGON ALLEY!!!

If you’re a Potterhead, you need to put this on your bucket list right now because the theming here will make your brain explode. The Wizarding World of Harry Potter was already pretty amazing with the original Hogsmeade section but now with the addition of Diagon Alley, it has entered a new level of awesome.

I was maybe a little too excited when I walked into Diagon Alley, Finn was all like “Mommm, you’re embarrassing me.” Little guy needs to get used to it, he’s got a whole life ahead of being embarrassed by his mom. It’s all part of having a mom.

We had pies at The Leaky Cauldron, perused wands at Olivanders and Gregorovitch’s wand store, strolled past the Daily Prophet, went into Borgin and Burkes, checked out Eeylops Owl Emporium, then picked up ice cream from Florean Fortescue’s Ice Cream Parlour. We also met Stan Shunpike, who was just casually standing there with his Knight Bus and even got to sit on the steps of 12 Grimmauld Place, headquarters for the Order of the Phoenix.

Awesomeness level? Insane.

I can tell try to tell you about how extraordinary it is, but I think this will work better if I just show you the photos.

And of course, I have to introduce you to THE Dragon. That sits on top of Gringotts Bank, breathing fire just for fun.

We were hanging out along Diagon Alley when we noticed some sort of commotion going on – people were whispering excitedly and gathering along the street. Next thing we knew, the dragon let out a roar of fire and the street erupted in spontaneous whoops and cheers. It was magnificent.

The line for Escape From Gringotts (one of the 2 new headliner rides) was too long and the kids were getting restless from watching mommy go a little nuts in Diagon Alley (plus they couldn’t ride anyway) so we decided we’d have to come back for this another time.

Escape From Gringotts, you and me, we’ve got a date.

We did get to ride The Hogwarts Express (the other new headliner), which was an excellent ride. It’s a real train (with steam and everything!!) that connects the two Universal Parks (Universal Studios and Islands of Adventure), themed such that it seems like we were riding from London to Hogwarts. Each cabin has a window that projects scenes from the movie, and it all felt incredibly real and immersive.

Even the platforms were done so brilliantly. Platform 9 3/4 has this holographic screen effect so it seems like people would calmly walk into a brick wall and then suddenly disappear behind it. Super cool.

No question about it, this new addition to Universal Studios is really a game changer. We had such a wonderful time nerding out to Harry Potter, watching all our favourite places in Diagon Alley come to life and sipping delicious butterbeer, it was most definitely worth the visit.

For a Potter fan, this is absolute gold.