As most of you know, we were able to go to San Diego in February, for an entire month. We were gone the entire month of February. It was kind of insane.
Why did we go for a month, you ask?
Bryan was sent down to North Island Naval Station on Coronado (part of San Diego) to help work on the USS Ronald Regan (aircraft carrier). He volunteered on a Wednesday, and found out the next day, Thursday, that he was going. Not only that, but he needed to be there ASAP. He was on what is known as the 'trouble desk', which basically means he is there in case something goes wrong, or they need help immediately. (Every boat has a 'trouble desk' while being worked on, and Bryan is actually going back out to another trouble desk this week, here in Bremerton.' Basically he had to wait for something to happen, and if nothing did, then he had to sit there and wait. It sounds pretty boring, but he was actually pretty busy the whole time we were there. The only down side of this was he was working swing shifts (2 or 3 in the afternoon to about 3 in the morning). Yeah, he got no sleep. He found out on Thursday, Jan. 29th, and we left on Saturday the 31st, and he started working in San Diego on Tuesday, February 3rd.
But the best part of this whole trip: the government paid for 90% of it. That's right. Our hotel, Bryan's rental car/gas, and food(ish) were all covered. The only thing they didn't pay for was gas in our personal car, and any fun things we did. It was awesome.
Living in San Diego for a month was an adventure. I mentioned earlier that Bryan needed to be to San Diego as quickly as he could, which meant that we had two days to plan for a month long trip. Two days. And in those days, we had to find a hotel room that had a full-size kitchen, laundry on-site, and the amount of space we needed (2 small boys), do laundry and pack enough clothes for a month, get our callings covered (Why does no one want to lead music in Primary?), make about a dozen other phone callings to get appointments and mail rescheduled, and pack anything and everything we could want or need during that month. Overwhelming isn't it?
We chose to stay at the Extended Stay America, because that is the only hotel that had everything we needed, for the dates we needed. (There was a professional golf tournament in San Diego the first week were there. Apparently it was a bigger deal than we thought.) Our hotel room, which we thought was a suite, turned out to be a standard hotel room, with two queen beds, a dresser and closet, and a small bathroom. The only thing that made it different was the two-burner stove, full-size fridge and microwave, and a few cabinets, and a small table with only two chairs. We were a little disappointed, but I was determined to make it work. However, Bryan and I slowly lost our minds. No one had any kind of privacy, Bryan got no sleep because the boys are super nosy, the boys got no sleep because they could see the TV from their beds and they got couped out pretty quickly, and we had to eat all our meals on the bed because there was no room at the table. Housekeeping only came once a week, so we had no way to clean our room if it got dirty.
After two weeks, Bryan decided to start looking for another hotel. So at breakfast one morning (at McDonald's because our internet at the hotel had been down for two days) we decided to change hotels. We picked the Residence Inn by Mariott, across the freeway. This new hotel was like heaven. We had a full-size kitchen with cabinets and a dishwasher, a table with enough chairs and room for everyone, a separate living room with a couch and comfy chair, and a desk with a rolly-chair. The bedroom was in a separate room, with a door that shut. Bryan could now sleep as long as he needed in peace, and I could watch TV without waking up the boys. On top of this, we had daily housekeeping, a continental hot breakfast, gym, and most importantly, a pool. Switching hotels made our lives so much more enjoyable, let alone easier.
Now I don't want to make it seem like we didn't have any fun. Because trust me, we did. Even while living in the first hotel. I have been to San Diego many times (probably at least once a year from kindergarten through high school), and my mom and lived there way back when, so I knew where all the fun things were, and what we absolutely had to do. We went to the San Diego Zoo, SeaWorld, to the beach, to the USS Midway Museum, to the San Diego temple, and many drives to see the pretty things all around. We even went to Los Angeles to see Grandma and Grandpa Dial, and they came to see us, and we went to the Mormon Battalion Museum and Harbor Tour of San Diego. We went shopping many times, and I bought lots of jewelry at fun things in San Diego. We went out to El Cajon (25 minutes east of San Diego) to a Mexican restaurant that my family has been eating at for YEARS! All of the pictures are in the post below. There were may too many to fit here!
On the way home, we stopped back at Grandma and Grandpa Street's house for 3 days to rest from our vacation, then we returned home to Bremerton. I am so incredibly grateful that we got this opportunity. Bryan and I always talked about how it would be nice to do something like this while the kids were young enough and not in school, but we never thought it would happen. We had sooo much fun. It was crazy, stressful, a thrill, hectic, amazing, chaotic, and so worth it.
After the adventure we've had, we'll be staying put for awhile. But if anyone wants to come see us, here in the stunning Pacific Northwest, we have a guestroom all made up and ready. But for now, we're not going anywhere!
(Check out the pictures below!!)
