California Dreamin' - Day 2 (San Diego and Anaheim)

Since we'd just gotten into town and had a few big days ahead of us, we just wanted to focus on doing one momentous thing on our second day of vacation.  So that one big thing was taking Clay to the beach for the first time!  So after a leisurely start to our day, we popped into a grocery store for good eats to take to the beach for a picnic.  After that, we headed to a beach just down the road from the famous Hotel del Coronado (interesting side note:  my maternal grandparents honeymooned at that hotel back in the day!).


Clay LOVED the outing.  During lunch he mostly just wanted to each melon and crackers (I know, titillating details but for this mama it was a pretty big deal - while I was trying to cut the melon into bite sized pieces, Little Man just grabbed a huge hunk of it and went to town.  Eeek kind of scary for this worry wart but ever since that trip that's been his preferred melon eating method).  


After lunch, Jim introduced Clay to the water and much to our surprise, he thought it was great (freezing cold temperatures, waves crashing around him, sand and all).  In fact, each time the tide came up to Clay, he would start laughing and would crawl toward the water.  Don't you wish we all had that kind of zeal when it came to embracing new experiences!?!  

Picnic time!

Heading toward the water with Daddy!

Clay's first time to dip his little piggies in the cold water - he loved it!

Just waiting for the tide to come in

Still waiting for the tide!

And there it is!  And there Clay is, just loving it!

He went crawling back for more.

Seriously, this kid was fearless; being elbow deep in water did not faze him and he just kept trying to crawl further and further out!

Mommy playing goalie

After the ocean, Clay was stripped down and took a shower on the beach, then we loaded back up in the car (fully clothed at that point) and headed to Anaheim.  After checking into our hotel and a great dinner, we called it an early night so that we could get some sleep for the big day ahead.