vacations are nice

Last week, the Jacobs family slept, ate, played, worked, crawled, pooped and babbled in San Diego, California - to be more specific, at the Loews Coronado Bay Resort. Judd had a work forum there, so we decided to make a family trip of it. We embarked on Saturday the 17th, mid-afternoon, stopping for the night at my Uncle Fred and Aunt Jan's house in La Canada (near Pasadena), and continuing our journey south on Sunday after breakfast. We also stopped to have lunch at The Grove with Jinny, Matt, Rodney, Ari, and Ma'ayan (I think I spelled that correctly...she's the 9-month-old baby of Rodney and Ari...just a couple of weeks younger than Gracelyn) and dropped by Aunt Judy's for a short visit with her, Wendy, John, and two of their friends. When we finally got into Coronado (after getting lost due to some wacky directions from Google Maps), it was rather late, and we were exhausted!! We put Gracelyn down for the night, and Judd and I shared a small bottle of wine (Testarossa Pinot Noir from our wedding, since our anniversary was on Friday!)

The next morning (Monday) greeted us with clouds and rain, even though the forecast, when we had packed our bags on Saturday, had said sunshine all week. Judd, not being a Boy Scout, was not prepared for such atrocities, so we had to do some shopping to ensure that he didn't freeze his li'l tushie off for the rest of our trip. Horton Plaza, the mall in downtown San Diego, is, like much of the rest of SD, ideal only in sunshine (or at least in something other than rain, snow, sleet or hail); it is an outdoor mall, so we found ourselves trying our best to stay dry without slipping and face-planting on the tiled pavement. Of course, the cold weather didn't stop me from taking advantage of the Ben-n-Jerry's coupon that we got with our parking stub: free waffle cone upgrade!! After finding a solution to Judd's clothing issues (a solution that became unnecessary after that first day due to a pleasant change in weather), we headed back to the hotel for naps. Later that evening, we enjoyed a delicious meal at The Brigantine Restaurant in Coronado; I recommend their lobster fettuccini...yummmm!!!

Tuesday morning dawned bright, sunny and warm (like SD is supposed to be!). Judd had to head over to the lobby to spend the day (and evening) with the rest of the Intuit folk doing whatever those Intuit folk do, while Gracelyn and I got to look forward to a day with the Menzers (my Aunt Monica, Uncle Stuart, and cousins Lauren and Michael). Lauren, Michael, Gracelyn and I went to the Rueben H. Science Center at Balboa Park to check out their new "Grossology" exhibit. The Science Center is childrens-discovery-museum-exploratorium-tech-museum-ish -- lots of hands-on science stuff to play with. The Grossology exhibit was pretty cool; it was all about the science of the body, specifically the gross parts: vomit, snot, farts, burps, etc. One exhibit had you squeeze different bottles to smell the odors that emanate from certain human body parts; I didn't actually test it out myself, but I was told that it was pretty nasty. Actually, I would've been more active in participating in the Grossology exhibit, but that morning I came down with some sort of stomach bug that had me feeling nauseous, dizzy, and all around crappy (turns out, the La Canada crew came down with the same thing, as did my Aunt Monica). I have to admit, I was not much fun to be around that day (sorry, Lauren and Michael! I'll be better company next time!). After we left the Science Center, we went back over to the Menzer's house in the Poway area of SD to walk Riley their yellow lab, meet some neighbors, have a family dinner, and watch some American Idol. Due to Aunt Monica's wonderful directions, Gracelyn and I made it back to Coronado safe and sound.

Wednesday was a lazy day for me and Gracelyn. Since I still wasn't feeling 100%, we just stuck around the hotel: walked around the perimeter of the hotel a couple of times, had lunch outside at the hotel cafe, took long naps in the room, etc. Pretty uneventful but fun, just the same. I even enjoyed a luxuriously hot bath during one of Gracelyn's naps. It was a lovely lazy day.

We left SD on Thursday and headed back up to La Canada to spend the night at Uncle Fred and Aunt Jan's once again. Before we left SD, we met up with Zach, Mike and Jessi (two of Zach's Wisconsin whazzmaster pals...along with their dog Parker) for a Sushi Summit at Seau's (nice alliteration, huh?). It was nice to meet Mike and Jessi, especially after having conversed with them via whazzmaster for awhile now. Gracelyn and Jessi got along really well, although our li'l one wasn't too sure about their li'l one (the dog, I mean). Everytime he would come close to her, she would scream at him. She did enjoy playing with their DVD's and their laminated map of SD, though! Just as we were heading out of SD, it started raining again, but, luckily, it didn't follow us all the way home. We made it back home on Friday early afternoon and spent the rest of the day unpacking and relaxing. Whew!! Vacations are nice, but sometimes it's just nice to be home...