1 Week!

We're officially one week in of nearly 4.5 weeks of travel! Technically today is day 9.

The long haul driving is over. Thanks heavens. No meltdowns going south, fortunately. We did do a couple of quick stops along the way - such as doing a tour of the Jelly Belly Factory, walking along the wharf in beautiful Monterey and visiting Solvang, a little city that doesn't know if it's Dutch or Danish.

Some fun lessons we learned along the way:

-book a hotel/motel/campsite/whatever you like when you know you'll be driving on the days when the kids are happy. It's kind of exciting to wake up in the morning and go as fast as the wind takes you. Ideally we prefer mini suites, but managed fine in a single room. It just means I actually get to go to bed when the girls go to sleep!

-Squeegee packs. I can't rave more about them. Should have brought my reusable squeegee packs from home to save some $$$. 

Baby girl trying to get Daddy's Hearing Aid (and yes, we got Jelly Bellies to go!)

-Minimalist entertainment: favorite soundtracks, meReaders (best gift ever from my parents neighbor), and a LeapPad that we swapped with our neighbour - only one game on it, but still, keeps our toddler thoroughly entertained. She only has one small backpack full of toys for the entire trip.

-Tupperware bento lunch box. Keeps snacks and whatnot contained!!! Worth the $12 price tag IMO.

-Diaper bins. This is a MUST. I store all of baby's snacks - mum mums, food, etc in these. Very convenient size and keeps the sand out!

For the last 4 days, we've been in beautiful San Diego in an awesome airbnb. It's about 1,000 sq ft, incredibly close to all the major attractions, and has in-suite laundry (nearly ran out of clean underwear by the time we got there!!!!).

So far, we've:
-Covered all of SeaWorld. The Manta Rays were a huge hit, partly because you can go up and touch them as you like. We were there from opening to the last half hour before closing. 

-Taken in a beach day at La Jolla. Gorgeous! Picnic day - glad we brought our picnic essentials from home.

Can't get enough of the Palm Trees!

-USS Midway. We thought we'd be there for no more than a couple of hours... we guessed wrong: 4 and a half hours!!! (pretty much until toddler dropped from exhaustion). Accessible tip: they provide audio video tours that you can take with you that has both ASL and closed captioning! Neat.

Looking forward to the SD Zoo and Legoland in the next few days. :)