Canada Day in Detroit

Just as American's celebrate Independence Day on the July 4th, Canadian's show their nation's pride on Canada Day on July 1st.  This year we mixed up our celebrations and spent Canada Day in the States with a fun day trip to Detroit and we celebrated Independence Day in Canada with a trip to Niagara Falls (post to coming up).

For Canada Day we decided to drive into Detroit to explore Great Lakes Crossing.  It's a large indoor outlet mall and entertainment complex.  Lots of friends had raved about what a great day trip it was. This was another item on my hit list of places I wanted to visit while we're here, and it seemed like Canada Day would offer a great chance to do it since Jacob had the day off and Brenna just got of school the day before.  We left first thing in the morning and made a short detour to Oakland University for a special treat.  We got to enjoy the only Chick-fil-A that Detroit has to offer that doesn't require a security pass (the only other one is in the McNamara terminal of the Detroit Airport).  We walked around the Student Union a little bit while we waited for the food court to open.  Brenna enjoyed the Saints and Sinners Fountain.

After a great breakfast, we headed over to Great Lakes Crossing where our first stop was a tour through the Disney Store and then on to the new Legoland Discovery Center.  Brenna's not a big lover of legos, but recently she discovered Lego Friends on Netflix and it was just enough of a draw to get her in the door.  We enjoyed the park.  We did all the rides, watched one of the 4-D movies, toured the lego Detroit city, and spent some time on the Lego playground.  

Next we moved on the Michigan Sea Life Aquariums.  Brenna enjoyed a scavenger hunt that led her through all the aquarium attractions and she got to touch the horse shoe crabs and star fish.  I was impressed for an aquarium located inside a mall.  After she completed all her scavenger hunt tasks she received a gold medal from souvenir shop which she was very proud of!

We stopped by Great American Cookie Company for a slice of cookie cake, another of our favorites that we miss in Canada.  We spent the rest of our time with alittle shopping at Justice, Brenna's new favorite store.  Since it seemed to be a day of American favorites that we have missed in Canada, we stopped off for dinner at PF Changes before heading home.  It was an all-around fun day!