Memorial Day Weekend and Vacation to San Diego

I'm looking forward to a time when our household can feel like we're back to a normal schedule. We're getting closer to a normal lifestyle again, but we have certainly been jam-packed busy the last couple of weeks.
The Friday before Memorial Day weekend, Ava had her Pre-K continuation ceremony and party. It was a bitter-sweet day for us to see our big girl graduate Pre-k (and daycare) and leave the only daycare and many friends that Ava has known since she was 6 months old.

The rest of the Memorial Day weekend was spent with Ava riding her bike on the High Line Canal while mom ran with Dylan in the stroller. We headed out for three big bike/run trips over the weekend and stopped at parks along the way to play. I also finished unpacking the remainder of boxes which felt great to check off my To Do list, except they I wore myself out and was exhausted by Tuesday. I was thankful to have Simon back home. Simon was off on a guys weekend with 5 other Iowa buddies and they all ran in the Bolder Boulder together.

SAN DIEGO, CA

After a very long wait for our very delayed flight in the airport on Sunday night, June 6th, my two tired kids and I, a very tired mom, finally boarded our plane heading for San Diego, CA to meet up with Simon for a fun vacation. Both kids slept the whole flight which was just perfect and we arrived with Simon waiting for us at baggage claim in CA.

Simon headed out to San Diego earlier on Saturday to run the San Diego marathon on Sunday morning. He ran the marathon in an impressive and very fast, 2 hours and 46 minutes, placing 30th out of 10,000 runners. Awesome job Simon!

Leaving Denver for CA, for me, wouldn't have been possible without my mom's help from Saturday packing to Sunday getting through the airport security because I had to work, pack for myself and the kids, time a race for Simon on Sunday, and of course, I was sick and lost my voice. THANK YOU, Mom for your help and thanks mom and dad for watching Marley while we were gone. Yay! The kids were so excited to wake up to palm trees in California. We had a wonderful, relaxing and very fun vacation! It was perfect and our vacation was well earned for myself and Simon and much awaited for the kids with lots of exciting and new experiences. Our vacation was spent enjoying lots of beach time... ... eating out at many entertaining and yummy restaurants and best of all not having to do the dishes... ... of course, visiting Sea World where the kids watched the swimming and jumping dolphins, waddling penguins, encountered sharks, listened to barking seals... ...and enjoyed an entertaining Shamu show even without the trainers getting to swim and dive in the water with the Killer whales which was a bummer, but understandable and our kids didn't know any different... ...after a busy, full and long day at Sea World it was time for a long nap for the kids... ... Ava and Dylan thought it was such a special treat getting to play at a park at night right on the beach. With long naps during the day we let the kids stay up later then their usual bed time which allowed us to do fun activities into the evening thus making the most of our vacation... ...hiking in the very beautiful, scenic Torry Pines State park...

...lots and lots of pool time, splashing and jumping in the water, fun...

...evening walks along the beach...

...watching the evening surfers...

...and all around quality, family time together. What a great vacation. We only wish it hadn't gone by so fast.