Birch Aquarium & Old Town

More rain. Boo. But trying not to complain too much because again, I know what we left back home. Added to the rain this morning was a dense fog, so San Diego has certainly not been looking as pretty as it should!

We kind of sat around for a bit this morning wondering what to do. Jay was almost at a little bit of a loss because basically everything in San Diego involves being outdoors in one way or another. Jay joked that even their shopping malls are outside.

We decided to head up to Birch Aquarium, hoping that during our time indoors, the rain would pass and the fog would burn off.

It was a cool little aquarium, but for the record, Shedd Aquarium in Chicago remains my favorite of all time. :) That guy above is a sea dragon. Weird.

In addition to the indoor stuff, Birch also had a few outdoor areas that Nora got a kick out of as well.

…except the “touch” part. She had no interest whatsoever in touching any of it. Ha!

Forcing a laugh out of her. She was still moping about not wanting to touch anything.

Apparently we were supposed to be able to see the ocean from here. Um, not happening. Thanks for nothing, fog!

The weather had obviously not improved much, but we decided to take a ride to La Jolla and check out Seal Beach and grab some lunch nearby.

Seal Beach was pretty cool. Nora kept yelling at them repeatedly, “Wake up!” or “Awake!” They were not cooperating. Lazy bastards. ;)

A few of them came up out of the water while we were standing there, which was cool. Those poor things, it looks like such a huge struggle to move with those short arms (well, fins?) and big bodies!

From there we decided to grab lunch at a brewery/restaurant called Karl Strauss. Good stuff. Michael and I had really good salads (and Michael had a flight of beer samples, I was so sad I couldn’t partake!), and Jay had some crazy good macaroni and cheese dish that had ham and bacon in it.

The kids menu was cute, too. We ordered Nora macaroni and cheese, which she enjoyed for a few minutes… until two pieces fell from her spoon and hit the floor.

A total meltdown ensued. It was reminiscent of our experience the day before on the plane, with LOUD screaming. I plucked her from her seat and took her outside, only to have her hit me out there. NOT COOL, kid. NOT COOL. So I had no choice but to leave our half-eaten lunches on the table and drag her back to the car, where I put her in her car seat for timeout.

To be fair, by this time, we were past naptime, she was clearly tired (and jet lagged). But still, really frustrating. She eventually did calm down and tell me she was sorry. I asked her if she was ready to go back to the restaurant and be a good girl and she said yes, but alas, as we headed back to the restaurant, Michael and Jay were already on the way to the car—with the rest of my lunch in a box. *sigh* Oh well.

Back to Jay’s place we went to put Miss Sass down for a nap. I ate the rest of my salad AND the rest of Nora’s macaroni and cheese. It was delicious. Her loss! :) We laid low and watched a movie during her snooze, then when she was up, we let her have yogurt as a snack. No dining chairs/table at this bachelor pad = eating while standing up. She’s getting good at it.

The weather was still gloomy but wasn’t raining anymore, so we decided to go up to Old Town to walk around a bit and then grab some dinner.

I can’t tell you how tempting it was to buy Nora one of these little ukeleles. Especially after she showed an interest in one. But alas… willpower kept us moving on.

There were some cool shops and stuff that we wandered.

We went to Coyote Cafe for some Mexican food for dinner, where I learned that I am not completely over my Mexican food aversions from early pregnancy. Ughhhh. I freaking love Mexican food, why do you have to mess with me, baby?? Nora had another mood swing (no tantrum, just a lot of pouting) toward the end of dinner, and refused to take even one bite of a cheese quesadilla, which is basically unheard of for her. I even tried to bribe her with a rice krispie treat, which didn’t even work. She has been challenging to say the least.

We called it a night to get the once-again-crabby girl into bed. More tomorrow!