Beaches and more beaches

The day after big Brother graduated Kindergarten, we headed to the beach. My kids love Marmaduke (the movie) in which they move to the OC. So, when we landed in California, Big Brother asked, "Is this the OC?" Just made us laugh a bit!

Our first few hours there, we headed to Huntington Beach. It was actually cold and very windy, but we had to see the beach after preparing and traveling all day to get there!

After a walk on the boardwalk, we found our favorite restaurant from Hawaii. It's called Duke's. In addition to locations on the different Islands, they have 2 in California. It's fantastic- I love the fish tacos and we all loved the Hula Pie. It was gone so fast, I couldn't even get a photo snapped. Little Brother said it was the best restaurant ever. Here he is above with a mac-n-cheese mustache. 

The next day, Kevin was working. I was on my own with the boys for my first time ever in California and one of my first times driving a rental car. I found my way to a Walmart, picked up buckets, shovels, towels and snacks, and we made our way to the tide pools in Laguna Beach. We saw tons of snails, crabs, and even some lobster that were washed up and eaten by the seagulls. We found a few small fish and when the kids got bored, we headed over to splash in the ocean.

We picked up Kevin after his meetings were done and headed down to San Diego. We stopped in La Jolla to visit the seals and do some sight seeing. The kids really loved it.

The next day we hung out on Coronado Island- one of our most favorite places on earth. It was a beautiful, relaxing day- the beach, our favorite ice cream place and a sweet little town. The only non-relaxing (is that a word?) part was a bicycle ride around the island. The boys hung out in the basket up front, while Kevin and I pedaled them around for an hour. Easier said than done!

Our last beach day was spent at Mission Beach. It was a cold, gray morning, so we walked along the beach, writing messages in the sand. Eventually it warmed up and the kids made more castles, found more shells, and ran through a zillion more waves. We relaxed!

Spent the evening with old friends from our high-school days that live on Mission Beach. Had great pizza and fun at their house afterwards. (No Pictures, though!)

Our last day was spent at Legoland. That's a post in itself...