Many of you would have got our Out of Office Reply for the last half of August so you know that we were away for a little while. We had a wonderful trip to Ontario and Quebec to celebrate our 10th Wedding Anniversary. It was the first big trip that we've taken with all three girls and we got to see and do a lot! Other than road trips, we hadn't done anything like this with our whole family. It ended up working out very well. We had some family members join us and some other family and a close friend meet us along the way. We weren't outnumbered with our girls this time around which was a good way to travel! Our trip started in Toronto where we spent four nights on the 60th floor of a high rise. We had fabulous views of the CN Tower, the Rogers Centre and Lake Ontario. Natalie wanted to make a trip to Toronto so that she could shadow at Jack Newman's International BreastFeeding Centre in North York. She did just that and it turned out to be a very good experience for her.
Our entire trip was done with Public Transportation and Via Rail once we arrived in Toronto courtesy of WestJet's amazing new Boeing Dreamliner. The flight was quick and extremely enjoyable. We spent two days in Ottawa before taking the train again to Montreal. The girls did very well along the way and really enjoyed travelling by train. They also liked getting around the cities using subway systems and the bus. Montreal was fantastic with our Bed & Breakfast located two minutes from a subway station. We took in a lot of sights there and celebrated Natalie's birthday right on Crescent Street. We ended our trip in Quebec City right in the heart of old town. We all ended up doing a lot of walking throughout the adventure so although we ate lots of delicious local cuisine, I feel like I came back in better shape than when I left!
I'd love to tell you that the trade war between the USA and China has been resolved by now, but that's not the case. The markets have continued to be volatile because of this. Canada did have an excellent GDP report this summer, but we also had bad news about Household Spending and Business Investment. It seems that we've had more mixed results here at home. I'm writing this right before we get a Bank of Canada announcement so I can't tell you if any decisions were made yet. We'll just have to do that in person in the coming weeks!!
Happy start to the school year everyone and have a fantastic last few months of 2019!
Bryce A. Borden