Seaworld...

On Wednesday we went to SeaWorld...we got up and had breakfast and got ready and headed out in the hopes of beating some of the crowds. It ended up being a lot less busy than LEGOLAND was thank goodness.

The boys went straight for Manta...

this big roller coaster and Gunnar stood as tall as he could and was able to ride on it even though he is a tiny bit shorter than the required 48 inches.

(they're in the back...)

Ashton and Lars rode on it twice, then they all rode on it two more times first thing before it got busy. When they went back later, they wouldn't let Gunnar on, so I was glad he at least got to ride it a couple times.

Then they rode this...

And then we went over and got a seat for the seal lion show...

It was cute.

We also watched the dolphin show right after that because they were right next to each other.

 Then we wandered around for awhile before we ate lunch...

At the end of the day we watched this show..."Cirque De something?"

It was actually really entertaining! And after that we finally watched the Shamu show...

Fun to see too.

I actually think the boys liked parts of SeaWorld better than LEGOLAND...

another long day, but fun!

That night we went back down to the mall and ate at Rubio's. Up next...fun at the tidepools :)

San Diego...Part 2, The Beach!

On Tuesday we got up and I went down to the exercise room and got on a treadmill for half an hour while the boys and Lars had breakfast. Then they went swimming while I got ready for the day, then we headed down to the beach. We wanted to get there early enough to find parking and luckily we did. We went to La Jolla Shores and it was a beautiful beach and one of our most fun days in California. The boys went straight for the water, then played in the sand for a little while.

 I was sitting relaxing on a towel thinking about how I wish we would have thought to stop somewhere to get some sand toys, and right as I was thinking it, this nice lady came up to me and handed me a castle bucket and a shovel and asked if the boys would want to play with them! She and her family were leaving and had found them there when they got there earlier.

So of course I said yes and thanked her and thanked God for answering my little prayer and they loved playing with them. 

Lars wandered over to a surf shop and rented some boogie boards for the day and as soon as Ashton got his hands on one, he spent the next 2 hours out in the ocean riding it over and over and over again.

I want to frame this one!

 I don't remember when I've seen him so happy in a long time!

 It was so fun to watch him loving it and it reminded me of our similar trip 5 years ago...

He loved it then too.

Gunnar tried it for a little while too with Lars' help...

 But he definitely preferred playing in the sand...

 He even said at one point...Look Mom I made "sand socks"...oh how he loves his long socks!

It was funny to see him do similar things to what he'd done 5 years before too...

He laid back in the sand and said "This feels soooo good!"

Being at the beach was just so much fun...

 Eventually Ashton got tired and came and got a snack, then they were both pretty much ready to leave....so we went and got them all sprayed off and got in the car, returned the boogie boards and went and got a late lunch.

 Then we stopped at a Baskin Robbins we'd passed on the way and shared a big container of ice cream. We got smart and saved some money after getting ripped off on our churros the day before!

After we made it back to the hotel, it was of course more pool time...

 Then we were going to go to a movie, but the one that was listed at 7:30 ended up not playing at that time, so we just walked around the mall and finally got some smoothies for Lars and me and the boys ate at Noodles & Co.

They sure slept good every night!