Tyler visits LegoLand and Ruth's Chris! (86 weeks)

Hi everyone! Wow it sure has been hot this week, hopefully the weather will get colder again in time for some more snowboarding trips! I can't wait until we can bring Tyler onto the mountains with us!

I think I mentioned Tyler's accident last week at the supermarket - well, I'm happy to announce that his cut is healing nicely. We'll need to be sure to put some good scar ointment on it so that it doesn't become too noticeable. Poor Tyler! You can see his healed boo-boo above his left eye in this photo. This weekend we visited Legoland in Carlsbad. My gosh, are their tickets expensive! I think it's something like $70 an adult. How ridiculous! Good thing we got an online discount that made tickets only $25 - much more affordable. And Tyler is still free since he's under 2. :)

Right at the front entrance of Legoland they had a pirate lego man! We tried to get a good picture but Tyler was pretty wary of him. Every time I tried moving him to my left side (closer to the legoman) he would get upset. Heehee.. oh well.

Darth Vader made of Legos! There was R2D2 next to him but he didn't make it in the shot. Tyler wasn't interested in holding the other light saber though.

Tyler loved the Lego dinosaur and elephant! We stayed in this front area for quite a bit while he stared at them!

We didn't get to go on too many of the rides there since Tyler was too small - but there sure were a ton of them! It'll be really fun when Tyler gets taller. Our first ride was a Fairy Tale Legoland boat ride. It was nice, Tyler got to look around at all the Lego figures.

Here's a video of us on the boat ride. I think this was in the beginning, so he looked kind of worried - but he definitely warmed up pretty quick.

They had this cool musical fountain in the next area with yellow circles on the ground around it. When you stood on a circle, an instrument would play as part of the music! It was really cool! All the kids were standing on the different circles - the more kids - more instruments were part of the music! Tyler had a blast dancing to the music!

Here's a video of Tyler grooving to the fountain. He sure has got moves. :)

There were lots of Lego figures all around the park - here's Tyler peering through the jaws of a lion.

We even got to go on a train ride around a Lego farm. I was hoping to put Tyler on my lap in the lead car, but they said no adults! Aww. Oh well, it was still fun. Those corn are made of legos too!

MiniLand! This area of the park had miniatures of big cities - from Washington DC to Vegas. Here's Tyler and myself in front of the Venetian. They actually had the whole strip there made in Legos.

Tyler even made it to the Presidential Inauguration! you can't tell in this picture, but Obama was there!

They had a cool playground just for little kids. Tyler really liked playing there, even though it was SUPER hot! This is him sticking his head out of a window in the farmhouse - it was on the second story and he went up all by himself!
Tyler loved sitting on Lego Thomas the Train. He kept moving around it and sitting in different areas. (There's a big sign in front that says DO NOT CLIMB! oops...hehe)

After we had exhausted ourselves walking around in the super hot weather, we decided to visit Sea Life. Sea Life is a relatively new aquarium that they opened next door - admission was only $10 with Legoland admission. I was looking forward to getting out of the sun, plus Tyler loves water (and fish!) :)

Right in the entrance is an area called 'Lake Tahoe' with a couple fishtanks as well as a slide for the kids. We spent a good amount here with Tyler checking out the fish and going down the slide.

Here's a video of Tyler playing in the 'Lake Tahoe' area of the aquarium.

A good thing about Sea Life is that they know their customers are kids! They had cool little places where kids could go in and peek their head through bubbles in the fishtanks! It was really cool to get an inside view. Here we are checking out the fish!

They even had little kid-sized tunnels for them to crawl in and get a closer look at the fish. It was really funny watching Tyler crawl into them.

I managed to snap this photo real quick before Tyler ran off. He looks about 2 ft 8 inches! Too bad most of the rides required a minimum of 34 inches (2 ft 10 inches) - so close!
Tyler got to feel some starfish as well. One he kind of poked and it fell deeper underwater. Aww.
The aquarium was pretty cool - they had Lego figures underwater with the fish too!

There were some tanks that had a button you could push to make bubble/water sounds. These were Tyler's favorite - it was so hard to get him away from them! Here's a video of Tyler grooving to the bubble sounds - totally not something you'd think he'd wiggle to - but funny because he does!

They had a fishtank that was all Nemo and his friends! Very cool. :)

And lastly, family shot in front of Legoland! Overall, a fun (hot!) trip. Tyler really enjoyed himself and I'm definitely looking forward to coming back again when Tyler can go on more rides!Other things that went on this week...

Orange County Restaurant week was this week! I got to have dinner with my friend Juliet who is in town for work from Seattle. We ate at Opah - a place I always see but have never gone. It was yummy - specifically their ahi tuna appetizer!

Ruth's Chris Steakhouse! Yum! We haven't eaten here in a while, and we went with our friends Mariam and Frank. Tyler was not on his best behavior though, he wanted to walk all around the restaurant!

here's the weekly picture with the girls. :)

We even had dinner with my dad and my grandmother at a Korean tofu house nearby. They have a rock garden in the front with many many flat smooth rocks. Tyler couldn't get enough of these! He'd pick one up and yell 'ROOCK!!!' and give it to Will or my dad, and then come back for another one. Then repeat the process. Silly Tyler...
Taking advantage of the good weather, we went to the local park to play some basketball. Tyler had his little red rubber ball, but kept wanting to play with Will's basketball. It was so big for him to carry! When he walked with it, he'd have to stop every few steps to readjust his grip. :)
Bubble popping! We have a few sheets of bubble wrap lying around that Tyler loves to pop. He's so funny, he'll say 'jump!' and do a little hop.
Here's a video of Tyler popping the bubble wrap. It's so cute - halfway through, he looks at Will and is like 'baba!' and points to the wrap and he won't jump anymore until Will pops a few. :)

Tyler can make anything fun. Will and Tyler were waiting outside a store for them to open one morning and Tyler discovered a bike rack. He loved it! He kept going around and around the metal loops, between the curves and stuff and laughing.

Here's a video of bike rack fun. :)

Tyler is growing heavier and heavier - he's like 29 pounds! He's getting a lot better at repeating words that we say, but he has to be in the mood to do so. We've been trying to do some time-outs with Tyler, but I don't think he really gets it. No progress yet in potty training either - no rush on that! He has been much more open to getting his teeth brushed though - thank goodness.

That's it for the week! Hope you all have a good week!