The Mott Family: June 2014–Southern California Trip (Part Two)

For part two of our Southern California trip, we left LA and headed down to San Diego for a few days. The first place we went was the San Diego Zoo.

Some of the fun things at the zoo included feeding goats:

Getting to see a giant panda:

And a two-headed snake:

I have written before about how fun it is to be at the zoo with Henry (really, it’s fun to be anywhere with Henry – he just gets so dang excited about everything). Anyway, this time was no exception:

Here’s Daniel and the kids studying the map to see where to go next:

Cindy took this job very seriously:

At the end we got to go on the Skyfari tram, which was very exciting. The kids loved looking down and trying to spot different animals.

Girls in one car:

Boys in another:

After the zoo Daniel and the older boys went to Petco Park to watch the Mariners play the Padres (We had planned the dates of our trip for when the Mariners were in town so we’d be able to go to a couple of their games):

The younger kids hung out at the hotel with me and played their favorite swimming pool game, called “let’s see how many sweet jumps we can do into the pool while Mom takes pictures.” They never get tired of this game.

These are some of my favorites. They’re such goofballs.

Also, some underwater posing:

And Cindy had to take a break every once in awhile to do some important organizing of the pool toys:

After swimming we warmed up by the poolside fire pit:

Then baths, jammies, and books. The kids have our hotel routine down solid by now. I love it.

The next morning we started out by walking around Seaport Village.

Here is Oliver pushing Cindy in the stroller and Daniel pointing out some crabs on the rocks:

And you can’t point out little creatures to some of my children without them feeling a desperate need to go try to catch them. I don’t know why. Except that I know for sure it comes from Daniel.

Ha! I love this picture.

Success! A little tiny crab.

More Seaport Village adventures:

Next up was a tour of the U.S.S. Midway, an aircraft carrier that has been turned into a museum at Navy Pier. It’s a really neat museum, and the self-guided audio tour is great. The kids loved being able to press the buttons that corresponded with each exhibit or area to find out more about it.

Next up was another Mariners/Padres baseball game, this time with the whole family. Petco Park is not too far from the pier, so we all walked over together. We got there with lots of time to watch batting practice and also get signatures from our favorite Mariners.

Here are the kids after talking with Felix Hernandez; he signed so many things for them. Cindy didn’t have a baseball for him to sign, so she handed him her sun hat and asked if he would sign that for her.

Henry with his Felix ball. It was pretty fun talking to Felix this time, because he remembered our family (especially Henry) from other Mariners games we had been to earlier in the season in Texas (I guess a family with six kids all wearing Mariners gear at several of the away games got his attention). He was very friendly and chatted with the kids for awhile.

Also exciting was me getting my Robinson Cano jersey signed (this one was a little trickier to get and involved some scrambling up on top of the dugout, but it was worth it).

Petco Park:

Cindy enjoying a nice long nap on my lap during the game:

Playing around on the trees near the USS Midway on our walk back from the game:

Happy Mariners with our signed jerseys:

After the game we headed over to Lucha Libre, a gourmet taco shop in San Diego that we saw years ago on Man vs. Food, and have always wanted to try. Lots of good burritos with french fries on them.

The next morning we went to the La Jolla Cove beach. I think this was one of our favorite places of the whole trip. The kids had so much fun.

There were seals everywhere:

At first Henry was so focused on looking for crabs on the rocks below that he didn’t even notice the seals. Then when he saw them the first thing he asked was if he could try to catch the seals, too.

We didn’t know if it was going to be a great beach for swimming, because it seemed so rocky and looked so different from the beach up in Santa Monica. It ended up being perfect though.

There was a nice shallow cove area for wading/swimming:

And a small beach area with enough sand to get buried in (if you are Tristan), or to cuddle up in the beach tent on (if you are Cindy).

There were also rocks and caves with crabs all over. The kids thought this was the best thing ever. They were going crazy.

Crab excitement:

We waded/swam across the cove to climb up on top of this rocky area. There were so many crabs up there! The kids took a bucket up so they could start collecting them.

Daniel and Henry hanging out and watching a seal swim around the rock:

My boys with a bucket full of crabs:

After awhile we had them turn the bucket over to release all the crabs back onto the beach. Oliver and Henry couldn’t resist the sight of so many crabs on the sand, and started catching them right away again.

Pure joy:

Those hands! So much excitement!

Kind of reminds me of this picture, back when Henry was introduced to sprinkles for the first time:

When it was time to pack up and go, I sent Tristan and Oliver out into the water to clean off all the sand, and they realized that they could see tons of cool fish swimming around. They grabbed their goggles and went back out for a few minutes. We wished we had discovered that earlier so they could have spent more time swimming around; I guess we’ll have to go back now!

After the beach we left San Diego and drove up to Anaheim, stopping first for lunch in Irvine. One of Daniel’s friends from Dell lives near there, so we met her and her husband for lunch at a fun grilled cheese restaurant. Then I headed to our hotel with the younger three, and Daniel took the older boys and Rachel to an Angels game.

Back at the hotel we were doing our usual routine:

Lots of swimming:

Followed by baths, jammies, and some drawing lessons from Lizza:

The next morning we started the long drive back to Texas, stopping on the way at Daniel’s sister’s house in Phoenix again, for one last baseball game (Diamondbacks vs. Rangers) and another fun night with cousins.