The San Diego Babymoon: Or, how we celebrated the end of "Just the two of us"

Last weekend, Dave and I took our babymoon, by which I mean our last babysitter-free, kid-free vacation with just us. We drove down to San Diego and stayed at The Westgate Hotel in the Gaslamp District, which had a lobby so ornate that it would have even impressed my antiques-savvy grandfather. The first afternoon we were there, we wandered around the Gaslamp District, saw a matinee of Crazy Stupid Love (really funny!), and just sort of unwound from life in general.

The next day? SeaWorld, baby! I have always wanted to go, ever since I was a little kid, and Dave indulged my lifelong dream by buying discounted tickets through his work. I think we may have been some of the only people there WITHOUT kids, though technically we did have one with us. Obviously, I couldn't go on any of the rides (SeaWorld is half amusement park, half aquarium), so that cut down on line-waiting time considerably. We did, however, watch the Shamu "One World, One Ocean" show, which, aside from the amazing-ness of watching three GIGANTIC killer whales do backflips and loop-de-loops, was the cheesiest thing I've ever seen. And I kinda sorta loved it.

Up next? The Behind-the-Scenes Animal Tour. Dave bought tickets while I was visiting the restroom and refused to tell me how much they were, because he knows that the five year old girl inside me has always wanted to feed and pet a dolphin. And we DID. They split our tour group up into small groups and each of us got to hang out with a trainer and a couple of dolphins at the tanks behind the scenes. There was a pregnant dolphin (Calla, I think?) who especially liked me... I think she sensed a kindred spirit. Anyway, we got to pet them (they feel like wetsuits or kick boards!) and feed them unflavored gelatin cubes. We also got to feed eels (through safety tubes) and sea turtles. Awesome.

Dave insisted on buying our daughter a huge stuffed Shamu, too. This kid has already got quite the menagerie of stuffed animals, including: A sheep, a lemur, a killer whale, a homemade Raggedy Anne doll, two hand-sewn rag doll siblings, and a set of anthropomorphized vegetation - carrot, broccoli, and strawberry.

We ate dinner at Filippi's Pizza Grotto in Little Italy, per a recommendation of one of Dave's coworkers, and stuffed ourselves silly on old-school Italian-American-style pizza and lasagna. The next day, we slept in & then went to breakfast at The Mission Restaurant for killer blackberry pancakes, then took our time driving around San Diego a bit to see the sights, and drove home. We both took the next day off of work as well to sleep in and just chill out at home.... Blissful.