Hailey’s First Trip to San Diego

Hailey’s first trip to San Diego happened to coincide with Easter weekend.  I was really nervous about the trip, but Hailey was AMAZING on the drive.  She did so great, she is such a good little road-tripper. 

Taking breaks helped break up the car seat time for Hailey. 

We got in late Saturday (but not so late that we couldn’t go enjoy dinner at our favorite Italian restaurant!)

Sunday it was Easter and time for Miss Hailey to open her very first Easter Basket!  (With a little help from mom and dad of course). 

I had no idea what to put in an Easter basket for a baby, but I think I did a pretty good job.  :)

Her basket is bigger than she is this year!

After opening her Easter basket, we posed for a family picture.

Later that day, Hailey got to meet her Great-Grandma!

We were fortunate that we got to see the majority of our relatives Easter weekend.  Our lucky little baby even got to take her first trip to the beach and pose with her mom, dad, and Grandpa!

Good Times in Galena

We had an awesome "retreat" day today that consisted of me, Brett, Jamie and Dr. Johnson doing a little bit of Iowa/Illinois road-tripping. Our first stop was at Crystal Lake Caves in Dubuque, IA.


This is the crystal clear lake for which the caves are named:




They refer to this stuff as "cave bacon":


This stuff is onyx, which apparently will shine light through it no matter how thick it is:


And here's the group after the tour with our trusty tour guide:


Next we crossed the river into Illinois and spent some time in beautiful Galena.


We went to this awesome winery for some wine-tasting and some "group therapy"


We got some amazing wine called Oktoberfest from Galena Cellars that I can't wait to have. Since we were all a little tipsy from too much wine tasting and not enough food, we headed to lunch.


Brett & I:


Doc. J and Jamie:


After lunch we went and walked around the downtown area. They have so many fantastic shops. Here is one of our favorites... an entire garlic store!


Finally, to relax after our tough day of cave exploring and shopping, we stopped at Frank O'Dowds Authentic Irish Pub on our way out of town. The kegs chained up out front really add a nice touch. ;-)


For more pictures from the day, go here.

We are in San Diego

Nothing really to blog about yet, so I will just leave you with a picture from our drive:

Bad Luck in Bushnell

We went to Bushnell, IL (about an hour and a half South of Davenport) this weekend because a friend of mine was having a bridal shower. So far, we have not had fantastic luck with our trips to Bushnell. The first time we went last February it was in the middle of a crazy ice storm and it looked like this:




Note the healthy accumulation of ice on the windsheild wipers... we actually had to stop to scrape the ice off the car halfway between Davenport and Bushnell. Obviously not ideal road trip conditions.

This trip the weather was beautiful and we had a really great time. Unfortunately, one of our tires decided to develop a (not so slow) leak last night. It needed to be replaced, but of course in a town of 3,000 people the tire shop isn't open on weekends. The good news is that when you are in a town of 3,000 people everybody knows everybody and our friend Derek was able to call the tire guy who opened up the shop just for us. Too bad our plans were foiled again when he didn't have the size tire we needed. I felt like we were in the middle of those 'car trouble in a small town' horror stories you always see in the movies. Luckily, the next big town over had the size tires we needed. $150 and a couple hours later we were on our merry way once again. I don't have any exciting pictures of our tire adventures to share with you, but we did see a giant tractor driving down the road:


Now that's something you just don't see everyday in Southern California.

Maybe we will have better Bushnell luck next time. : )