Summer in San Diego

So this year we decided to hit up San Diego once again for our summer family get away. I have to admit that it's a favorite of mine...vacation combined with all of my fantastic family and friends there to help us enjoy the time. I look so forward to this time to go 'home' and the rest of the gang love escaping the heat for the sand, surf, family and friends and this year Disneyland.

We started off the week packing up the minivan...and yes, it held all of our items and came home loaded to the hilt with a few souvenirs from the trip. We love the minivan...oh, did I actually put that in writing? Isn't it funny how life changes you? Anyway, back to the vacation. The drive was uneventful. Seth making his first road trip to sunny San Diego. We pulled into San Marcos and it's amazing how comfortable it feels to be there even if just to visit. Dan and I talked about it a bit and we both agree that there's something so nice about everything being green and moist. It's what we crave here in the desert and San Diego is satisfies that craving for us. We stayed with Mike and all for two days and made our 4th of July treck up to Canyon Lake for a wonderful day in the sun. They do a wonderful fireworks display and we've decided to make that 4th of July tradition when we're in San Diego. Ashley enjoyed spending time with her cousins, Seth loved all of the attention, Sean had a friend from our last summer's Powell vacation to hang out with and Dan and I both enjoyed the day with all. Couldn't have asked for a better day.

We then headed down to Mom's for the remainder of the trip. It's better than staying in a hotel and just as nice. It was there that Seth pulled himself up for the first time and officially started a real crawl. So now he's off and mobile...help us all. :P

Whenever we're in San Diego we have to get everyone we know together for a day at La Jolla Shores and that happened again this year. We had a wonderful day in the sun with Dad and Sue, Mike, Laurie, Tanner, Hunter and Jordan, Aunt Lea and Uncle Ron, Mom and Leif, Kari along with Gavin and Savannah, Heather with her new beau, and Elizabeth and Alan all stopping by to help us enjoy the day. It was a perfect day at the beach with the surf, sand, sun and great family and friends. Well perfect for almost everybody...Ashley didn't think the surf or the sand were too fabulous this year. She was less than thrilled at the sand sticking to her little body and once she figured out that the waves moved and could knock her down she came running back to the protection of the grassy local behind the boardwalk wall. Her phrase to all was, "It moves!" So Ashley has made a monumental discovery about the ocean...yes, it moves.

After a day at the beach Tanner, Hunter and Jordan joined us at Hotel Grammy for two nights of total child chaos. We rented movies, ate pizza, went swimming, hit up the Zoo along with Heather, Bill and Wyatt for yet another fabulous few days. Somewhere in there I even managed to get an evening in with Kari and Heather while Dan and Sean hit up In N' Out burger and a movie.

The climax of our San Diego trip...not that it hasn't been just spectacular this far...was our trip to Disneyland and California Adventure accompanied by Grammy, Michael, Laurie, Tanner, Hunter, and Jordan. Ashley's first adventure to the magical world of Disney and magical it was. We hit up Toon Town where she rode her first roller coaster, the Go Gadget Coaster, rode the Dumbo ride, saw many princesses, got dizzy with Daddy and Jordan on the Tea Cups, climbed in Tarzan's Tree House and partied with the Pirates of the Caribbean. After an exhausting half day at Disneyland and a major meltdown we headed over to California Adventure. Here the big kids rode California Screamin' more times than we could count, the younger ones enjoyed a few tamer rides and we all danced along with their parade of characters from movies like Cars, Monsters Inc, the Incredibles and more. We ended the day with an ice cream cone and headed out of the park as the Parade of Lights capped off the evening.

Thank you to everyone who helped make our summertime in San Diego so memorable. Here's to many more summers in the sun, surf, sand and all that San Diego has to offer.

Becoming a Blogger???

Well here we are...life with the Hagan's for all to view. It's about time. I've thought of MySpace or Facebook, but all require you all to sign up. Here all you have to do is check in and see what's going on in the life of our Hagan family. So far so good. It's going smoothly and I can say that I'm a bit nervous. Though this blogging thing seems like it has great potential. I'm anxious to here about how you all feel about it. Please let us know.

So the reason for this blog is to keep you all updated on our lives through editorials, photos, the works. I'm not so great at getting out photos or even taking them all the time, but I'm making the promise to all of you to keep this blog updated with all major events and even not so major events.

I'm off to play around with all of the features this has to offer. Fun, fun, fun!