San Diego Skyline

The Beach!

I have to say that going to the beach is one of our MOST favorite things to do. Check out how much fun the kids are having! These pictures are from Coronado Island on July 26th, it's just been a LONG time since I updated the blog!

She wants to be a surfer girl when she grows up :) I'm strangely ok with that.

After playing in the waves, we took a short hike down the beack to check out the tidepools. While the rest of us know that we just LOOK at the sea creatures, Anna tried to pick up a tiny crab. It wouldn't let go of her finger! I think she learned her lesson :)

Central Beach Coronado Saturday

Jessica said that you know you have a rough life when you have to choose between going to see a Jimmy Buffett concert in Las Vegas or going to the beach. I'd have to agree! When she put it that way, I had to thank the universe for our jobs and geographical location and how they enable us to do the things we want to do. 

There is seriously nothing better than being at the beach and watching your kids run around and have a great time! The beach is such a fascinating place of discovery for them. The little orange fuzzy thing in the slideshow coming up is a sea anenome that washed up on shore attached to a rock. Ian was so excited!

You'll also notice that Shawn is in the water. A few years ago you could barely get him in a swimming pool, and now here he is out boogie boarding in the Pacific Ocean. Who knew?

If I ever win the lottery, I'm moving to Coronado Island. It's just about our favorite place on Earth. If you need to get ahold of us, we'll be there every other weekend this summer and possibly some weekdays too :)

Lizard

Here's a little lizard caught on the playground at school. It's been awhile since I've tried to catch one. Either they're getting faster or I'm getting slower...

I let both kids hold it before it "accidentally" got away. Oops!

Coachella Music Festival 2009

Did I mention that I saw Paul McCartney? Live? In the flesh? I did, and it was incredible. While we were at the Coachella festival we managed to see a few other amazing shows. It was an awesome line up! On Sunday we caught the Perry Farrell show first. He's a fruit but I love him anyway. I thought the pink feather boa was a nice touch. We were lucky that he played one Jane's Addiction song as well as one Porno for Pyros song (Under the Tahitian Moon...my favorite!). He also played the Twilight song! It rocked live. This is a great picture, right? It made me want to kick myself for not bringing the Nikon with the zoom lens to see Paul. Stupid, stupid! We were also able to get much closer to Perry's stage than we were to Paul's. A living legend like Paul needs his space! Beatlemania lives!

We also had a fantastic time chatting with our friends who met us at the show. 

Jeff and Marisa are to my left and Adnan and Nora are to my right. Marisa and Nora also teach kindergarten. We had to drink several beers to ease the pain of the work week. 

Here are the remainder of the pictures we took. If you've heard anything about Coachella in the news, I'm sorry to say that I did NOT get any pictures of the naked guy getting tasered. Or the other naked guy. Or Paris Hilton. Funny story about her, I saw a blonde girl lying on the grass, nudged my friend, and said "Hey Jeff, check out Paris Hilton *snicker, snicker*" I totally meant to make fun of the Paris look-alike. The next day I read a news article about the celebrity attendance at the festival. Turns out the girl I was making fun of really was Paris Hilton. Who knew? If you want to see the naked guy getting tasered, check it out here. 

The last band was another one of my all-time favorites, the Cure. Robert Smith rocked it just like he did the last time I saw them 17 years ago. I love him and his crazy makeup and ratty hair. I was disappointed that they didn't play "Letters to Elise", my inspiration for giving Anna the middle name "Elise", but they did play most of my other favorites. I also have to give them props for continuing to play after the organizers pulled the plug on their show. Apparently the city of Indio has a midnight curfew and in order to dodge a hefty fine the organizers turned off the sound. The Cure continued to play, and the crowd sang along. Paul ended up going 50 minutes after curfew but no one dared pull the plug on him!

Next year we're camping and staying all weekend! 

OMG

I titled this post "OMG" because that's what I kept texting during the concert we went to last weekend. Being in the presence of a Beatle was nothing less than extraordinary! Check out the set list here. It was absolutely surreal.

See that guy in the white shirt in front of the microphone? It's PAUL FREAKING McCARTNEY! Yes, you read that right. The cute Beatle. 

This is my friend Jessica. She's awesome because she teaches high school Spanish. Teenagers are scary. Anyway, she's also awesome because she loves Paul just as much as I do. That middle finger behind us is Shawn. He's jealous of Paul. 

Paul's show was amazing. We were able to weasel our way up to the front. We were close enough to feel the heat from the pyrotechnics during "Live and Let Die". We wished we were close enough to feel the heat off of Paul himself. We weren't so lucky. 

Here's a video of the performance .

We also saw Morrissey. *yawn* His music was good but he was a little bitchy. 

Here I am celebrating Paul with a Heineken. I think he would approve.

Facebook and Blog Update

Facebook has made me a REALLY bad blogger! Sorry to you all who don't use it :) And if you don't use it, you should, because it's fun! Anyway, last weekend we went whale watching in Dana Point, CA. We ended up following three grey whales up the coast. It was amazing! Luckily we had stopped by Target just before we got there and picked up the Nikon zoom lens for my camera.

We ended up going to WalMart that evening and purchasing everything we needed to make a bonfire on the beach and make smores. It was a little too chilly for the kids so we didn't stay long. But we did have a great time. I've never been so frightened by flaming, flying marshmallows in my whole life. A 2 year old with a skewer is a bad, bad idea. We stayed the night at a hotel and left early (well, early for us!) the next morning to head over to Pomona, which was about an hour's drive from the beach. We went to the LA County Irish Music Festival, which was also a blast. However, the best (and most embarrassing) part was when Ian spotted two midgets (is that politically correct? Little people?) He asked "Are those leprechauns?" 

Dropkick Murphys

As if Shawn wasn't lucky enough for being able to go fishing out on the ocean on Friday, I had a wild hair and decided that we should go see one of our favorite bands, the Dropkick Murphys at the Hollywood Palladium. We were able to find two tickets from someone who wasn't able to go, and after fishing Shawn and Brett drove up to Point Hueneme to pick them up. Jennifer and I took a chance and decided we'd try to get tickets at the box office. Anyway, long story short, the show was sold out but the universe was on our side and we were able to get two tickets outside the gate from people who just happened to have extra and at a lower price than what we would have paid online. Dropkick fans are the best! We're so lucky! We had a fantastic time! I think Jennifer may have been terrified at one point during the show when the crowed erupted into a jumping, shoving, screaming mass, but I think she quickly learned to enjoy it :) I think we'll be making the short, 2 hour trip to Hollywood more often for concerts. The venue was historic (Frank Sinatra opened up the place!) and it's small enough that you can actually SEE the band. Hell, Shawn and I made our way up to the barricade in front of the stage about halfway through the concert. I wouldn't have been able to give Spicy McHaggis a kiss otherwise! I also have to say that the Denny's on Sunset Strip is by far the best Denny's I have EVER been to, lol.

Weather

One reason I wanted to move back home was for the weather. Sure, 110 degrees in the summer is HOT, but on the other hand, numbers in the teens and twenties in the winter in Kansas suck too. They suck right along with the giant mosquitos and humidity in the summer. We don't get the bugs or the humidity here! This week they're forecasting temperatures between 68-71 degrees. It's heavenly! This is the winter I've been dreaming of, where I can go to the grocery store in my flip flops :)

SNOW!

It snowed for about 8 hours today, nonstop! I'd say we had about 4-5 inches but a town near here got 2 ft! I'm hoping for another snow day tomorrow since desert communities lack the snow removal equipment of places accustomed to winter weather. The news reports say that it hasn't snowed like this in the Morongo Basin since 1979! The kids had a fantastic time playing in the snow and pelting each other with snowballs. It's pretty, but I'll also be glad when the thermometer outdoors gets back up to 65 degrees next week :) That's the kind of California Christmas I remember!

ETA: By the time I was finished typing this post it started snowing AGAIN! Holy cow!

So, We're Even

My friend Mason texted me from Kansas last night. Our conversation went like this:

Mason-"$1.63 gas, lmao"

Me- "It's still $2.20 here. But it was 80 degrees here today, so there" (very mature of me)
Mason- "Ok, so we're even"

Sometimes you have to pay a little extra for very big perks!

I Lied...

Remember when I said we'd be grounded for awhile to hang out around the house and relax? Well, I lied! I thought of six more places I'd like to go in the next couple of months...

1. San Diego Zoo

2. Knott's Berry Farm

3. The Aquarium of the Pacific

4. The Huntington Museum and Botanical Gardens

5. The Los Angeles Museum of Natural History

6. The La Brea Tar Pits

Not that we'll get them all done, but it sure is nice not to have run out of things to do already :) 

Pumpkin Picking!

We went pumpkin picking in Oak Glen today and it was a blast. The kids had a great time, I ate the most delicious caramel apple ever, and we all got dirty scrambling around in the pumpkin patch. Afterwards we visited the most beautiful Wal-Mart Supercenter EVER in Banning. It was so nice it almost brought a tear to my eye. I have such a love-hate relationship with Wal-Mart. Anyway, we purchased several larger pumpkins for our yard there and we plan on having one heck of a Jack-O-Lantern display here in the next couple of days. I, of course, will post pictures. Don't forget that if you want to see the pictures in a larger format you can click on the slideshow and it will take you to my Picasa Web Albums. Enjoy!

Disneyland!

We picked up Suzie at LAX on Saturday night and drug her to Disneyland kicking and screaming on Sunday :) Not really, I think she actually enjoyed it as much as the kids did! We went directly to Downtown Disney after LAX and ate dessert at the Rainforest Cafe. Ian was TERRIFIED of the animatronic animals and passed out on my lap, possibly of sheer terror. Shawn and I split a Margarilla, which is like a margarita with orange sherbert and we each ate an order of Bananas Foster, which was heavenly. So we stayed Saturday night at the Ramada in Garden Grove, not realizing that it was Korea town. Not that it makes a difference, but I had not expected the hilarity of drunken Asian karaoke at our hotel until the wee hours. They were singing Pink Floyd which makes it extra hilarious. I could barely contain my giggles as I checked into the front desk but tried REALLY hard not to burst out laughing because I didn't want to offend the hotel manager. Disneyland the next morning was a BLAST and we all enjoyed ourselves immensely (even Shawn! See the teacup pictures for proof!). I see a yearly pass purchase in our near future. The Halloween decorations were AMAZING, especially since I'm a huge fan of Nightmare Before Christmas and a huge fan of Halloween in general. It's so awesome to see a spectacle like Disneyland through a child's eyes! The kids LOVED the characters and the music and the rides and Ian asked if we could go every weekend. With yearly passes and it only being a 2 hour drive, I think we could maybe go every other month at least... or monthly if it was up to me. Enjoy the photos!

I Love California Because....

we're going to the playoffs Friday night! Thank you eBay! We're so lucky to be only 2 hours away from Anaheim stadium :) 

Oktoberfest!

Oak Glen Saturday

San Diego Weekend