San Diego and more

We spent this past weekend in San Diego.  My cousin got married on Friday and then we decided to make a weekend of it.  We were lucky enough to stay at the Hotel del Coronado (it was across the street from the wedding), which was super family friendly and really gave us no reason to leave the grounds.  So nice when you've brought along half your house, plus your two little children.

BUT, before we made it to San Diego, I was solo with the kids for a few days.  Carmen was in New York and North Carolina Tuesday to Friday - and he actually flew from New York to San Diego on Friday.

Baby girl trying on her new shoes.  She did not like them, but she's trying so hard to walk these days, I figured she needed some good soft-soled shoes to support her.  She'll never wear them at daycare, but at least she can practice on the weekends, maybe.

Jayden got this headband from school.  I think he looks so adorable wearing it.  AND it gives him super powers.  Who knew?!?  He can fly, and do something else that I can't remember now but is not something I would have considered a super power.

Playing around with the settings on the camera on my phone.  Jayden loves doing "cartoon" photos of him and Dakota.

I took two hours to myself Friday morning (which really was a 30 minute run, a 20 minute conference call and dropping the dog off at the vet, but at least I wasn't dragging two kids along) while the kids went to daycare, then I gathered them before lunch and headed down to San Diego.  Lucky for me, Dakota passed out five minutes after we got in the car and Jayden was super patient the whole way.  And there was very little traffic, so we made it down in 1-1/2 hours.  I must have done something good last week to deserve such good luck!

We got there in time to do some relaxing before the wedding, which was necessary since Jayden refused to nap.  So he and Gramma played a competitive game of Uno in the hotel room.

The wedding was really beautiful, and actually quite a bit of fun with the kids.  Both kids were pretty good during the ceremony, and then had a great time with the music.

Ceremony setting.

Carmen and I passed Dakota back and forth during the ceremony to keep her occupied and quiet.  She finally found the buttons on my granddad's (her great-granddad's!) sleeve and started playing with those.  It was very sweet.

"Smiling" and clapping during the cocktail hour with Gramma (and eating 23 cheese quesadillas).

Being silly.
This is a common pose for Dakota - arching her neck so she can get a better view of her silly brother.  On my worst days, the two of them entertaining each other, even at this age where Dakota can't do a whole lot, just really confirms that they need each other and they will be so much better with each other in their lives.
Just like I am with my lizzle.  :)  

The boys.  Being all handsome and stuff.

Mama/daughter.  

Saturday we made it to the San Diego Zoo, one of my favorite zoos ever.  I love the polar bears, and all the other animals too.  Jayden was tired, so probably didn't enjoy it as much as he would have, and Dakota was dead tired, and slept through 85% of the animals.  Oh well!  The grown ups learned a lot, including never to go to Russia for fear of encountering the 400 pound eagle we saw.

Flamingos.  

Okapi.
I love this animal; I think the stripes are just beautiful.

Mama and kids.

Swimming polar bear!

A polar bear being cute through the scratched up glass.  The bear was playing with a ball in the water and kept doing somersaults and tossing the ball in the air.  It was adorable.

Family photo, with Dakota still asleep.

Kiddos in a helicopter.

The double stroller turned out to be mostly useless, except for the last 20 yards or so.  Oh well.  They were awfully cute for the ten minutes that they used it.  Dakota loved it.  A new perspective for her.

Mama duck and her babies.  Quack quack!

After the zoo, we went back to the hotel and enjoyed some pool time.  Mostly relaxing.

With some cold kiddos.  And Grampa looking on in the background.

Jayden got to have a shirley temple.  With SIX cherries.  Best. Day. Ever.

The view from dinner.  The hotel at night.  Classic California.

Dinner was hard.  Jayden had an accident.  And was suuuuuper tired.  And Dakota was tired.  And it was late.  I tried.  I really tried.  But it was just so much.  So finally I just took Dakota to the room and put her to bed.  Gramma/Daddy and Jayden came in a little later and we did get them to bed.  I had asked Carmen to bring my wine back to the room, but by the time they were both down, I couldn't do anything but just lay down, so my wine just went to waste.  So sad.

Sunday morning everyone was still tired.  Jayden was determined to make it to the beach, so after breakfast we headed down to the sand.  Dakota was ready for naptime, so I walked the boardwalk with her for an hour or so to keep her asleep while the rest of the family splashed in the waves.  I did get to jump in the waves with Jayden for a few minutes before lunch, which helped clear my head a bit.  But I had hit a low point and Sunday was hard.  I tried, really hard, to pull myself out, but just couldn't quite get there.

The beach that is literally steps from the hotel.  Not a bad place to have a weekend getaway.

Also not a bad place to nap.  

And then Sunday we were home.  Everyone was happy to be home - the kids were exhausted, and actually the parents were too.  And there was the week to get ready for.  I had planned to take a vacation/sick day on Monday, but had meetings come up so had to go to work.  Oh well.  Now it's almost Thursday and we've almost made it to the next weekend.  Thank goodness!

There has been a whole bunch of drama at work - two more people are leaving (maybe three, I learned today), and it's just so clear that management cannot understand that there is a problem.  It's making it difficult for those of us still there, especially since I've been there so long and through so many versions of staff.  It makes me wonder why I've stayed so long and whether I'm the fool.  For now, I believe in the people I work with and I'm going to stick it out for them.  But there are other opportunities here and there, and I'm also going to keep my options open.  We'll see.  It's going to be an interesting upcoming few months.

The NFL draft is next week, so everyone keep your fingers crossed for Carmen's people.  And then wish him a happy birthday on Friday!!!  I can't believe he's going to be 34 again.  So incredible.  ;)  Unfortunately Carmen will be gone not only for his birthday, but really for the weekend of his birthday so we won't get to celebrate with him until maybe Sunday night.  At least it gives Jayden and me some time to make his special cake (stay tuned - it's going to be exciting!).