Out and About in San Diego

It's vacation time for the Wilcoxes...which means the annual week of "stay-cation" activities we get to enjoy as a family. This is by far the highlight of our summer.

We kicked things off with a day of good old fashioned picnicking with family at Santee Lakes. We even had our 15 (mili)seconds of fame as a local news station filmed us. This quickly became a game of "How Many Wilcoxes Can You Count". Wanna play? (click to access link) I think just about all 16 of us made it on the news clip to some degree. And the kids couldn't have had more fun at the splash pad. For the twins (who can't swim yet), it was a welcomed chance to play independently in the water...however they wanted. It was a great day and fun time spent with cousins.

If there is a table full of girls, you can bet Garrett will be near.

Coming off the 4th of July and needing to recover from way too many nights of going to bed late, we opted for a low-key bowling excursion on Tuesday. Unfortunately, I think the novelty has worn off some for the twins, who were done by the fourth frame (granted a game with six players does seem endless when the ball is getting stranded in the lane every other turn...or taking an eternity make its way to the pins, only to knock down ONE). And the boys were anxious to make their way to the arcade, where Garrett promptly spent the $4 in quarters he brought on pencil toppers (another pointless collectible)...and Blake spent most of his trying to win a stuffed dinosaur for Chase using "the claaaawww". No such luck, but a sweet gesture none the less.

We braved the beach on Wednesday...with the rest of San Diego and out of town visitors. But the boys love any opportunity to crash into waves and the twins to dig in wet sand. Garrett also got try out his new boogie board, which he picked up quickly.

Blake has been saving diligently for an iPod Touch, so rather than spend his money on a boogie board, he opted for the less expensive water toy- the pool noodle.

The twins are still not too excited about moving water, but Chase had a great time making friends with the sand crabs and Ella enjoyed the multiple trips to the "big girl potty" and the perpetual process of getting sandy, showering off, getting sandy, showering off, so on and so forth.

Chase's red bucket is full of sand crabs.

Even though going to the movie theater for the first time to see Cars2 was supposed to be Chase's potty training reward (it didn't take long for me to realize that unlike his sister, Chase isn't quite ready to potty train), we had planned to go all along and decided to go through with it. The twins did better than I thought through the previews, but Chase promptly declared he was ready to go home after they ended (flashback to fireworks...). We convinced him to stay and to eat his popcorn. They made it through almost half of the movie before they decided they would rather explore. Ella was especially upset to learn that when the movie ended, it was over and time to go home. She learned the hard way that movies at the theater do not pause while you get up to play. Needless to say, the twins' lack of naps this week was quickly catching up with them.

But not to worry...the backyard camp out was sure to wear them out! We saw this as a trial run for "real" camping and campfire fun for the twins. The kids had a blast roasting hot dogs and smores on the little red bbq.

And playing outside after dark wasn't so bad either.

But NOTHING can compare with sleeping in the tent!

Do you think someone is excited?

It was a perfect night for camping and I loved that the option of modern conveniences was footsteps away! The kids did great sleeping in the tent (except maybe Chase, who was fighting with his brother in his sleep...literally! and Ella who woke up three times to go potty).

Judging from the next morning, I would say it was a success.

But, alas, what would a true vacation be without a trip to Urgent Care? Chase tripped running out of the tent and spent the night and morning scooting around so as not to put pressure on his foot. An x-ray confirmed no broken bones, but follow up will be necessary if it doesn't improve by next week (which it seems to be, thankfully!).

And then there were the little things that make vacation...plenty of junk food, time spent with extended family, staying up late and sleeping in (for the kids at least), lots of sunshine and water and hopefully some good memories. Restful and relaxing? Not exactly...but nothing with four kids ever is. And it's just enough to make you long for the predictable chaos that is "normal" to recover from the "fun".

Something tells me I'm not the only one...