Vacation time

James and Sarah's vacation in San Diego

Since the birth of Jimmy (our first child) James and I have not taken a vacation without children. That's 10 years... so it was about time we did! We planned all year for our vacation to San Diego and the Comic-Con 2008. It was well worth all the saving and planning and prayers to make this vacation happen! And we definitely won't wait another 10 years until we do it again!

We stayed in Downtown San Diego in a nice condo. It was a little expensive but we found some friends of friends who were also going to the Comic-Con to split the cost with us. It saved us some money, too, because we didn't need money to park at the convention and we didn't have to eat out for every meal.

Some of the highlights of our trip were from day 2, Tuesday, July 22, when we went to Sea World. I have never been to a Sea World park and I enjoyed the Arctic exhibit and the Shamu show a lot. The dolphin and sea lion shows were great as well. We also saw manatees, sharks, penguins, and I got to touch a manta ray. This picture of the polar bear swimming under water is my favorite, but the killer whale in mid-air is a close second.

We also attended a couple of museums: the Maritime Museum with actual floating ships from around the world (the Star of India, a Russian submarine, and the HMS Surprise which is the actual ship filmed in Master and Commander). Later in the week we went to see the USS Midway, which is a huge aircraft carrier! James was once enlisted in the Navy and he had fun seeing what it would have been like had he not been given a medical discharge.

The bulk of our time was spent at the Comic-convention itself, which I will post pictures of separately. Overall it was a fantastic vacation. Coming home I had a bit of a realization (while sitting in the Salt Lake airport waiting for our shuttle). I realized I am "me," Sarah, not just Mom or wife or Sis. Droegemueller. I have a personality! Wow. I didn't realize how much I'd pushed aside to be "mom" 24 hours a day. I surely enjoyed spending the week with my sweet and patient husband, relished a "whenever we want to" time schedule, and can't wait to do it again!