CA or Bust

We've been long-time planning a trip to San Diego for our family -- and it has finally come and gone. I think if I gave the go-ahead, we would move there tomorrow -- Ry loves that place.

The standard scene in our car -- I'll tell ya what -- this porta potty saved us more than once, what with our newly-trained Max and our timely bladder-infected Aves.our kids had their moments, but overall were pretty good in the car for such long periods of time

we stopped at the Bear Paw Cafe in St. George on the way, did a tiny bit of shopping and then to Las Vegas in time for a buffet dinner and a swim at our hotel. That night was miserable trying to put kids to bed and then having them keep whining at us because "they couldn't go to sleep when we were just staring at them". Finally we just turned off all the lights and went to bed early. Wasn't worth the fight to try to watch all the nothing that was on TV.

The next day we headed the rest of the way, stopped in Barstow for picnic lunch:

Then made it to San Diego that night and introduced the kids to Anthony's Fishette - where Ry took me the day he proposed. Max and Tru REALLY didn't like all the stray pigeons begging for crumbs -- they screamed off and on the whole time. Our fellow diners were amused in a sympathetic sort of way.

but they liked walking the docks and checking out the boats:

and then the next day we went to Sea World -- here we are waiting for the shuttle:

the kids loved the shows, Avery's favorite were the flying acrobats dressed as birds and such, at the dolphin show

and this is where Max really let loose, fun way to cool off in the fountains:

we loved strolling around all day there

Aves loved touching the sting wrays

and the tide pool was a favorite:

the best 7 hours of sea world ever. the kids were great even though we were all pooped.

this is max eating some weird fizzle Skittles. He'd make this pained expression every time he'd eat one, but it didn't stop him from eating them gone over a few days.

Truman gets left out a lot. but he is a cute little lug to haul around too. The next day we spent all morning at the beach:

they buried my legs,

and Avery was THRILLED to find bits of seashells. (she doesn't know what she's missin')

checkin' out the waves for the first time

after we got the sand out of places sand should not go, we went to Old Town:

and visited the Mormon Battalion visitors center which was very interesting for Avery, she made us take a picture by all the covered wagons, because it's "just like in Nauvoo where Gramma Terry is!"

Max did NOT like the tour, because we were led through an interactive ordeal where we watched still pictures talk to us and felt and smelled things in the movie clips we watched. It reminded him too much of the Sesame Street 4D movie we watched at Sea World, which scared him to death. He hated being sprayed, blown, shook -- all the fun stuff. He did like panning for gold though, and wouldn't leave when it was time:

We had a lovely week -- it was good to get away and breathe some of that ocean air in. Avery commented when we drove the last 10 minutes through a rain storm in Provo that she could smell the rain and it kind of smelled the same as the ocean.