Pet Diabetes - Niagara on the Lake Diabetic Pet Picnic

Niagara-On-The-Lake Mini Picnic
Diabetic Owners are taking time to meet at different locations
around the countries for small picnics and to just say hello
to people that we chat with every day through the wonder of email!

Thanks to Vanessa & Barb and digitial cameras we have pics!!

The view from the Park at Niagara-on-the-Lake
This is where the Niagara River empties into Lake Ontario
That is New York State...only a river separates the two countries!
or a bridge....read my account of the trip to NOTL for details

This beautiful clock tower is in the center of
the historic town of Niagara-on-the-Lake

The attendees at this picnic were
Barb and Diane Warf!
Bernie and Adeline and Kacey!
Terry, Judy and her Mom!
Vanessa, Deb, their Mom and Fred and Sasha!

At the same time there was another mini picnic
happening in Toronto!!
Attendees were
Brenda & Mozart!
Kathy & Jordi!

The three stars of the picnic!

Sasha

Kacey

Fred

Bernie, Kacey & Adeline	Diane & Barb Warf
Judy's Mom	Vanessa's and Deb's Mom

Deb & Fred

Sasha, Fred & Vanessa

Judy's Mom, Barb & Judy going for a short horse drawn tour of NOTL	Terry & Judy .
Terry & Bernie	Judy & Kacey

Bobbing for hot dogs Canine Style!

Fred and Kacey looked the hotdog over in the water but didn't want to get wet.
BUT Sasha just barreled right in and grabbed the hot dog with lightning speed!

At five am I crawled out of bed on July 5, 2005 in Leamington, Ontario.
The night before I went to mapquest and got my directions (or so I thought)
How was I to possibly know ( I am blonde) that there was another Queen Park and
another 10 Front Street just down the road in another city close to Niagara Falls.
Yep we were not going to be at the right place....you heard it all now!!
As you can see I typed in the right city leaving home and the right arrival city only thing
MAPQUEST sent me to Queeston at the Lewiston Bridge going into New York State

FROM: Leamington, ON N8H 3V4 CA
TO: 10 Front St Niagara-on-the-lake, ON L0S 1J0 CA
1: Start out going West on PROVINCIAL ROUTE 3/ TALBOT ST E toward ERIE ST S. 0.03 km
2: Turn RIGHT onto PROVINCIAL ROUTE 77/ ERIE ST N. Continue to follow PROVINCIAL ROUTE 77. 23.62 km
3: Take the RTE-401 E/ HWY-401 E ramp toward LONDON. 0.40 km
4: Merge onto PROVINCIAL ROUTE 401 E. 185.92 km
5: Take the HWY-403 exit- exit number 235- toward BRANTFORD/ HAMILTON. 1.26 km
6: Merge onto PROVINCIAL ROUTE 403 E. 80.32 km
7: Take the Q.E.W. exit toward NIAGARA. 1.01 km
8: Merge onto QEW. 61.94 km
9: Take the HWY-405 exit- exit number 37- on the left toward QUEENSTON. 0.42 km
10: Merge onto PROVINCIAL ROUTE 405 E. 8.30 km
11: PROVINCIAL ROUTE 405 E becomes QUEENSTON LEWISTON BRIDGE. 0.42 km
12: Make a U-TURN onto QUEENSTON LEWISTON BRIDGE. 0.38 km
13: Take the NIAGARA PARKWAY ramp toward QUEENSTON/ NIAGARA FALLS. 0.25 km
14: Turn LEFT onto NIAGARA PKWY. 0.98 km
15: Turn RIGHT onto YORK ST. 0.29 km
16: Turn LEFT onto FRONT ST. 0.07 km
Total Estimated Time: Total Distance: 365.63 km
3 hours, 55 minutes
wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong that Front Street is in Queenston and there happens to be a park right there with Brock's Monument in it. The Park is called Queenstons Height Park
Yep yep and it is right beside 10 Front Street too only thing this is in Queenston not NOTL.

But alas we are suppose to be across from 10 Front Street at Queens Royal park
in Niagara-on-the-Lake
Back to getting up at five am ....hubby says to me at five thirty where is my tooth...he has a false
tooth that is attached to a plate (lost tooth playing hockey). I said your tooth is in the bathroom
where you left it. I never touched your tooth and I seen it yesterday on the bathroom sink when
I was coloring my hair with good old Lady Clariol. NO tooth we searched everywhere in the
house and time was slipping away so he had to leave home without his tooth and he never
goes anywhere without his tooth so you can imagine how ornery and hissy he was blaming
me for supposedly moving his tooth and losing it. NOT so!!
Proceeding towards NOTL the trip is going amazing fast and I am reading the
mapquest to hubby as we drive down the road and everything is perfect. We are at number
eleven on those directions proceeding down the 405 and he says it says no more exits before
bridge to the USA and I say don't be silly says right here you make a U Turn at the bridge
HAHA only thing once we hit the duty free store I said stop I go in duty free store and show her
my directions and she said only way you are going now sweetie is to the USA there is no
turn around. Hubby is no longer happy. We get to other side of bridge they ask us where
we are going at customs and I said hmmm back to Canada we made a boo boo so they turn
us around. We again wait in line to enter back into Canada. Hmmm how long were you in
the states and I goes hmmm we weren't haha....did you buy anything in the duty free store...no
by now he thinks boy how dum are these people. OK done deal we are now back in Canada
and only lost about three quarters of an hour .... hubby says now you know why we always
leave early. I at this time still do not realize I am not in the right city and thought hmmm
just missed the turn no biggie so we proceed with directions find ten front street and hmm
there is this nice big park right there called Queenston Heights Park and I think hmm this must
be it but was thinking hmmm don't have to pay for parking wonder why Adeline said we would.
We walk around the park and hubby reminisces how he had been there years before with
his uncle (who lived in Welland before his death) and his family and how he and his brothers
and cousins had climbed this monument many times. Me I am still thinking about not paying
for parking and thinking something is just not right. I go looking for Adeline's Cellphone
number and decide to give her a call....She says I think you are in the wrong place
You have to be in Niagara on the Lake. I go talk to the groundskeeper in the park we are in
and she tells me NOTL is ten miles down the road that I am definitely in the wrong place.
Ok back in the car and no directions and hubby giving me dagger looks.
We proceed down the road to NOTL and I no longer know where I should be!
There are a lot of Parks in NOTL .... fifteen to be exact but we have one advantage
we do know this park is suppose to be near Front Street!

I am having a very hard time today without all of this happening. Bless Adeline for realizing
how hard this day would be for me and understanding why I was so quiet when we finally got
to the right place. First time I have been someplace in a situation
that we always had Queenie with us.
I have to apolgize to everyone at the picnic that I was not my usual self nor was My Mom!
We were both missing Queenie like crazy today....it just didn't seem right to be here suddenly.
The day before I made all these tags and laminated them
and bought ty beanie white dogs and made a little
collar and attached the following tag to it....a beanie for each person there
but I couldn't bring myself to take them out of the car! :((
Here is a picture of the tag

Then I strung little wooden beads in multi color like a rainbow through a pink
ribbon and tied it around the neck of the following beanie with the Red TY tag still attached
in the ear of the beanie.(as a collector of beanies I never damage a TY tag)

In my mind I brought all these Queenie beanies to the picnic thinking Queenie could
not be there in the flesh but this way she would be there BUT to get them out of the
car was making me face something that I had buried deep inside....Queenie is in heaven!

Other then that it was great meeting everyone .... I just wish I could of been more myself and
not loss in the past but I feel this was a big leap forward for me in accepting what cannot
be changed.....After the buggy ride I came back to find that Vanessa, Deb and her Mom had
to leave to return to Toronto....I did get the beanies out now (I have mailed yours Deb & Vanessa)
We went for a lovely horse drawn buggy ride and Adeline has such a historic beautiful
city to visit here. Like a refreshing step back into history.

Fred, Sasha and their Grandma are priceless....right down to these two furchildren being
fed by their Grandmother from a spoon YES you heard me from a spoon.

You know it is funny when we arrived at the Park I didn't want to be there and didn't think
I could participate but by the end I didn't want the gathering to end. It is so wonderful
to put faces to people you chat with and know these people understand you.

After the picnic we went to Niagara Falls where we had a very interesting time too.
We even took Mom on the spanish aerocar ride across the Gorge and they had fireworks
over the falls that night. Though Niagara Falls has become very very commercialized.
There was so many people there. The streets were even lined at eleven pm that night with
wall to wall people including mom's pushing children in strollers.

The next day we went home hubby went through the garbage and found his tooth amongst
all the yeuky stuff....of course he said it was right beside my empty hair coloring boxes haha

I want to thank everyone for being my friend for life and helping me to cross another milestone
in my life even if they didn't know they were doing so by just being there.