February was a busy month. When we were in Ontario, we were house sitting. We also spent a week in Florida, and had mum come to visit for a week. Florida was awesome. 
It was nice to get out into the sun and surf for a change. And there was so much to do there!!! The flights were terrible, but that's only to be expected I suppose. We ended up arriving in Florida almost three hours behind schedule, after being transferred to a completely different airline, and flight pattern. Needless to say, after arriving at 2AM, the next 
day was pretty much a writeoff. We went to breakfast, toured around the local area, bought groceries, and went to dinner. That 
pretty much set the pattern for the trip: dinner out every night. And most of the day revolved around where we were going for dinner! We had a couple rainy and stormy days, and used those to go to the gym (they have a full facility gym in their complex), 
go shopping, and sit around reading books. We rode cruiser bikes around the complex one afternoon, and got yelled at for travelling on the golf cart tracks. We didn't know any better!
Finally the sun came out again, and we used it to go to the beach. The complex's beach is actually on a private island, that you have to take a little ferry to get to, rather like Sidney Spit. Mike and I went shell hunting in the morning, and came back with a huge haul. I found some gigantic horseshoe crab shells, which were pretty and
interesting. In the afternoon we lazed around at the water front, reading books under our sun umbrellas, swimming when we got too hot, and watching the dolphins playing. They would ride the waves in almost to the shore, and Mike went out to try to play with one. The dolphin saw him coming, and swam away.
The next day we went kayaking through the mangroves. There is a river that flows through the complex, and they rent kayaks and canoes for free. We saw a lot of wildlife, and even an alligator! We almost made it out to the gulf, but after listening to Mike's dad assure us that it was "right around the corner" for half an hour, we decided to turn back. After we got home and looked at the map, we realised that it really was "right around the corner" at that last stop! Oh well.
We also went on a sunset cruise out into the gulf of Mexico. We were joined by dolphins playing in the wake of the boat, and they put on a
spectacular show for us. The sunset itself was fantastic, and we watched a bunch of pelicans roosting for the night. Part of the cruise was to take a side trip down some of the mangrove inlets and look at the gigantic houses. Some of them were worth over $20 million, which is just a little too extravagant for me!
Mike and I both ended up with decent mid-winter sunburns, and had a fantastic time anyways. The food was delicious, and it was a nice break from regular daily life. It was tough to go home, especially when our flight was delayed yet again. We ended up circling Toronto airport for about half an hour before we even landed. It was so frustrating!
Once back in Ontario, we had a week to prepare for mum's visit. We showed her around town,
and took her up North for some "real" winter. The temperature did drop to -21C while she was here, so I feel our mission was accomplished! We snowshoed on the frozen lake, wandered around old town Dundas looking at houses, ate at the Old Ancaster Mill, ate lots of good food, and of course went out for dessert at Dimitre's.And finally, what would my blog be without some mention of snowboarding! Yesterday we went to
Chicopee for $10 Tuesday, and it wasn't even worth that. It was very very boring. First time I've ever been bored on a snowboard, in fact. Mike and I called it quits after an hour, and drove back to Dundas (Chicopee is in Kitchener, about 40 minutes away), where we went to the 
Conservation Area and built our own jump. The two hours we spent building, hiking, and riding, were so much better than what we'd paid for at Chicopee! I got a handle on being in the air, and even mastered the grab. I was feeling pretty good by the end of the day, but very very tired.All's well that ends well, as they say!
It's long, just not very tall!
View from the top
Untracked snow at the top 
Tree runs in the powder are our favourites
Mike stopping for a look
Trees... Nothing like the glades in BC though 
This is probably the most snow Ontario has seen in a while!
There are a couple evergreens around... 
Passing through Collingwood area on the way home
Sunset from the car
Sunset over farm land
Sunset over a snowy graveyard
Farmland on the way home
Downtown Dundas
One of the side streets
The Mikes
The other three
Sledders!
Mike and the snowblower... It's a large driveway.
Not working too well in the snow!
The back yard
Have a seat?
Time for a picnic
Bridge and reeds 
Old decrepit bridge in the pond
One of the trails around the parents' house
A flag through the reeds
