Adventures in Parenthood: San Diego for Emmett's Fourth Birthday

I gave both kids the option of having a party or going on a trip for their birthdays this year. Of course Clara choose a party and Emmett chose to go to Legoland. We headed down Friday morning and managed to miss most traffic. We met Mikaela and Dylan at the beach and then went to dinner. We had a great time with them! Emmett wanted nothing to do with the cold water and Clara spent two hours playing in it and pretending to surf. Of course Emmett fell asleep on the 5 minute drive to dinner and did not want to wake up!

Pretending to surf

Saturday we had to tear the kids away from playing with Perrin and Bennett to head to the San Diego Zoo. We saw orangutans and chimpanzees nursing tiny babies, hippos, lions, and tigers and bears oh my, and so many other animals. Mikaela and Dylan joined us for a few hours and we stayed all day. We managed to see pretty much everything (except Emmett who fell asleep for a couple hours) and spent a good chunk of the day there. I hadn't been since college and it had changed a lot!

With her favorite animal!

The Lazarus family planned to join us at the zoo, but little Samuel wasn't feeling great so they stayed home. We stopped by to see them on our way to the Crutchfield's and had a great time catching up.

We had a lovely dinner with the Crutchfields and the kids had so much fun playing! They get along so well and it's so fun to watch them! Bennett even read Clara a book before bed!

We headed out after breakfast on Sunday morning (Emmett's birthday) to get to Legoland as soon as it opened. Because we were staying at the Legoland Hotel, we got to go in an hour early. Only a few rides at the front of the park were open, but we managed to go on Ninjago which usually has long lines. The park wasn't that busy and we went on tons of rides and even went to the water park for a little while. Emmett finally got to meet the hot dog lego he has been obsessed with and that made his day! Clara conquered her fear of the Technic Coaster and ended up going on it numerous times. Of course Emmett fell asleep in the stroller. We decided to check into the hotel at that time and he continued to sleep after being transferred to the bed. We went back to the park after waking him up and checked out the aquarium. It turned out to be Emmett's favorite part of the park!

Dada kicked butt!

We hit up Legoland again Monday and had another great day. It was a little more crowded, but we still had a great time and ended up staying way later than planned. Emmett managed to stay awake the whole time, but fell asleep before we left the parking lot. We stopped for dinner in LA and he didn't even wake up! It was a wonderful weekend spent with family and great friends and we had so much fun celebrating our favorite little guy!