A vacation of our own - FINALLY!

I don't mean to sound like a selfish brat, really.  My love language is Quality Time and I've been dying for some.  Craving a family vacation, JUST US.  Our [not so] little family.  No other family or friends involved.  I really, REALLY wanted this to happen last fall, but we just couldn't swing it.  I was bound and determined to make it work this year.  I started selling outgrown kids clothes and saving money to contribute to the vacay fund.  The kids had no idea about this trip.  I love a good surprise!

We sent the kids off to school on Thursday morning, finished up packing and picked them up midway through the day.  They were a little confused but figured out we were going on a trip SOMEwhere.  When we got to our hotel in San Diego, we sat them down and announced we were taking them to Legoland and Sea World!!!  Of course they were thrilled, they've only been begging to go to Legoland for the past two years!  Every time an issue of Lego Club magazine comes in the mail, Blake reminds me that there is a coupon in the back and kids can get in FREE!  Thanks bud- we finally got to use that coupon!  We ordered pizza to our room and watched Madagascar 3 before tucking everyone in bed for the night.

Friday morning, we drove up to Carlsbad (passing the San Diego temple on the way, I love that you come around the bend and boom! it's right there next to the freeway!  so beautiful!) and the kids could hardly contain their excitement!!  They were in absolute heaven!

Daddy built this miniature throne for his littlest princess

Brooklyn may not be getting her license any time soon!  Apparently she likes to drive on the wrong side of the road!

The kids {and Matt} loved the Lego Star Wars miniland.  Brooklyn is just as into this stuff as the boys! I wonder if it would be different if she didn't have three brothers!

Matt and the kids raced Lego boats in the water

New York, New York!

The White House

Happy Hayden!

This is NOT a flattering picture of me, but Brooklyn is DEFINITELY our thrill-seeking child!                                         She was CrAzY on all these fast roller coaster rides!

Lucky kids with their bags of souvenirs!!

Saturday morning, we woke to a gray, drizzly morning.  That didn't deter us from our plans to spend the day at Sea World!  The first place we stopped at was the sea lions.  Man, were they ever loud!!!  Matt bought some little fishies to feed to them.   Once they saw we had something to give them, they just howled!  Poor Gavin got nipped by one of the "aggressive seagulls," as the sign warns, while trying to toss a fish in and I think it scared him a bit.

 We watched the sea lion show, which the kids loved.

The oldest three kids and I went on the Manta roller coaster, which was crazy fast!  It left Blake feeling quite woozy for a big chunk of the day.

We pet the bat rays, watched the dolphin show, saw the sharks, sea turtles, arctic animals (beluga whales, polar bears, walrus), and penguins.

We went to the Shamu show and Brooklyn BEGGED to sit waaaay up front in the soak zone.  We came prepared with ponchos so Matt took the kids up to the third row,  but Hayden and I stayed safely at the top of the soak zone, praying it was far enough away.   We even made it onto the Jumbotron! ;)  It's always amazing to see these huge whales jump, flip and follow the commands of the trainers.  The only bummer is that the trainers aren't allowed in the water with the whales because of incidents of whales dragging the trainers down under.  Brooklyn got her wish of getting sprayed with water by the whale and I got my wish of staying mostly dry. ;)

Our 88 cent ponchos came in handy (vs the $8 Sea World ones) later too when the kids wanted to ride Journey to Atlantis, similar to Splash Mountain at Disneyland.

After that, we did our souvenir shopping and called it a night.  We got back to the hotel, got everyone bathed and in bed.

Brooklyn-penguin, Hayden-shamu, Preston-"walgrus", Blake-polar bear, Gavin-harbor seal

Sunday, we visited some touristy places.  Matt and I went to the Mormon Battalion while on the doctors retreat last month and we thought the kids would like it, especially since it refers to one of our ancestors, Zemira Palmer.

Next, we made our way to the USS Midway museum.  Matt really wanted to do this one!  We got our headsets and wandered around the massive aircraft carrier, learning all sorts of things.

Cramped sleeping quarters - no thank you!

Future pilot?

On the runway

We grabbed some lunch then drove over to Coronado Island to spend a little bit of time at the beach.  What is a trip to Southern California without a dip in the ocean???  I packed the kids swim suits but it was soooooo cold and windy outside, I figured they probably wouldn't even want to get in the water, but I was wrong!!!  We rolled up our pants, but that didn't really work well so they just got wet!  Preston got knocked down by the water so he was completely soaked from head to toe.  Sweet Brooklyn, she just wanted to look for and collect seashells!  Hayden touched the ocean for the first time and then promptly turned into a popsicle so we had to keep her wrapped up the rest of the time.

Found a mostly intact sand dollar!

We stopped by the grocery store and picked up some ice cream to eat back at the hotel.  We absolutely loved our hotel!  It had a GREAT breakfast each morning and the room had separate bedrooms with a living room and kitchenette.  The kids loved the bunk bed!

We had SUCH a wonderful time, just the thing we needed.  The kids were really good the whole trip!  The consensus was that they liked Legoland *only* by 1 inch.  Haha!!  I'm so grateful for each of the children we've been blessed with.  I love our sweet little family!