Looking back on 2023
Holy moly 2023 what a year! Although it’s been an emotional roller coaster the last few months–our nanny resigning, our nanny coming back, getting laid off–it’s been a really good year. It’s wild to think that this was our first full year of Jojo! Even though there was obviously a lot less travel than in years past, I’m very pleased with what we did do–whether it was solo, Jojo and me, or the whole family! And although I didn’t blog as much as I would have liked to, I did manage to get a few posts up and. I’m optimistic for more in 2024.
The highlights: we committed to *not traveling* all summer and just enjoying life in San Diego, and got in plenty of beach days. We bookended summer with three weeks in New York City and a birthday weekend in Idyllwild and fall trips to Sacramento, Lake Tahoe, St. Louis and New Orleans. I read a lot of books, took a lot of neighborhood walks, spent a lot of time with David and Jojo and neighbors and friends. More than anything, I felt really grateful for a happy and healthy toddler, and my own health and happiness!
January
We kicked off the year with a trip to Mexico City! David and I spent our first anniversary there and *absolutely loved it* and had been talking forever about going back. I’ve realized it’s a lot less pressure to travel somewhere with Jojo that we’ve already been: having a sense of the place and also not feeling like you’re missing out if you don’t do every little thing helps a lot. Although the perks of our return trip to CDMX were that David’s best friend flew down to meet us AND we were able to hire a nanny for a verrrrry reasonable price to hang out with Jojo during the day, the real downside was that I got a little too overconfident with our first food tour and ended up with pretty terrible food poisoning for three out of the four days we were there. That said, we did discover some excellent playgrounds in Condesa for Jojo, I got to visit the Luis Barragan House (while nursing a very big bottle of Gatorade lol) and I got to go back for the guava pastry of my dreams at Panaderia Rosetta.
February
We celebrated our anniversary a little early with a hotel night *sans Jojo* and a fancy dinner at Jeune et Jolie. My parents came out to visit so that we could have a night away, and it was extremely pleasant! I didn’t realize how much I had been hoping for an opportunity to get all dressed up! Bonus: our hotel even had a water slide, which was the true highlight for me.
March
The best part of March is peak bloom! I spent most of March making sure to visit some of my favorite flowery spots, especially the cherry blossoms in Japanese Friendship Garden and the Carlsbad Flower Fields. I also managed to visit almost all of the Bloom Bash flower pop-up installations–all of them were stunning and so fun to see in person.
April
As a lifelong Sacramento Kings fan, the past…20…years have been disappointing. So when things turned around last year and the team made it to the playoffs after the longest drought in the NBA, I absolutely said YOLO and bought a plane ticket and the most expensive ticket I’ve ever bought to sit in the nosebleeds for the first playoff game at home. Worth every penny to go with my best friend and witness the first (absolutely thrilling!!) playoff win in such a long time!
May
I took the last month of my parental leave in May so that we could spend some quality time in New York City with friends and family. It was SO nice to be able to spend a good chunk of time in our former home and to introduce Jojo to so many of our friends. Highlights included discovering all of the good playgrounds (there are SO many), eating as many bagels as possible, and bopping through the Met and MOMA and the Frick. The lowlight was that we got pretty unlucky with the weather and it rained (just drenching, pouring, impossible to do anything rain) so many of the days we were there.
June
Idyllwild is a little mountain town that is a two-hour drive from San Diego that has been on my list to visit since we moved here. We finally went for a low-key birthday weekend for me, and absolutely fell in love! It was mostly a really nice change of scenery from the June gloom of San Diego: tall green trees, crisp fresh air, log cabins and all sorts of cute little shops. I squeezed in a short solo hike on the Pacific Crest Trail, but other than that, we just hung out at our A+ Airbnb (that has gotten SO much more expensive since when we stayed there, so unsure if we will ever go back to this lovely little spot).
July
Like I mentioned, we committed to spending the summer in San Diego–which is not the worst place to spend the summer! We tried to go to the beach as much as possible, whether it was to the ocean or Mission Bay. One of the wonderful parts of San Diego is how many extremely scenic beachfront playgrounds there, and we worked on enjoying them all! I also finally checked off two San Diego summer bucket list items: snorkeling in La Jolla Cove and SUPing in Mission Bay. It was fun to plan some more active daytime dates to take advantage of our surroundings and sunny weather!
August
Despite living just two hours from Los Angeles–and going up fairly frequently for work over the last several years–there is still so much that I haven’t explored in the city, because, candidly, it is not my favorite city. But I decided to do a little adventure up for a couple of days with Jojo and we absolutely delighted in catching up with some of my girlfriends, sampling Erewhon smoothies and going to the Getty Museum for the first time. (Also – I chopped off my hair and donated 10 inches to Locks of Love!)
September
Jojo and I popped up to Northern California twice in September. First, just the two of us went to Sacramento so that I could go to two very fun events. My high school has an annual wine tasting fundraiser on campus, and it was a lovely opportunity to drink wine and eat food with my best friends from high school. And then I won the raffle for tickets to the Tower Bridge Dinner, a pop-up farm-to-table dinner event on the iconic Tower Bridge in Sacramento. The added bonus was Jojo getting to experience some of my favorite parts of a Sacramento childhood, including a morning at Fairytale Town and lunch at Vic’s (with a sip of a mint chip milkshake, of course!). And then David, Jojo and I went to visit one of my friends in Lake Tahoe and I was blown away by just how beautiful it was. It doesn’t hurt that my friend is *the* hostess, but we truly had such a wonderful time and I’m ready to go back!
October
A true highlight of October was a baby-free trip to Hawaii! One of my first friends that I met in San Diego (neighbors and fellow pug-owners!) moved to Oahu last year, and I went to go visit her for a long weekend with another mom friend (sans baby!). Jenna was such an A+ tour guide for her adopted city of Kailua and we got in plenty of sunrise beach walks, delicious meals (aka poke poke poke) and chill girl time. And after so many flights with a baby in tow, having six hours on a plane to read and watch movies and sit quietly was honestly a delight.
November
And then the trade-off for that baby-free trip to Hawaii: we took the gals to New Orleans! Although I am a huge proponent of traveling to *any city* with kids, I will say that New Orleans left some things to be desired: namely, accessible sidewalks, good playgrounds and changing tables in public bathrooms. (Living in this nanny state has really spoiled me!) That said, I did thoroughly enjoy the beignets, the NOMA Sculpture Garden and the stately Southern architecture. The gator cruise was also a big hit! My biggest regret is not eating more Creole food (I bought some of this hot sauce and it has quickly become a house favorite) , but there’s always next time.
December
2020 really changed my perspective on traveling during the holidays: it was just SO pleasant to stay home and decorate and avoid the craziness of Christmas travel, especially while Jojo is little. We committed to staying home again this year and it was just as pleasant! We took our second annual Coronado beach walk on Christmas Day (especially fun to see the beach-side ice skaters and the Del hotel all decked out!), and went to the Lightscape at the San Diego Botanic Garden (which will definitely become a tradition). And while getting laid off at the beginning of the month was a shock, I also got a lot more time and space to read, relax, run errands and enjoy the holidays–so it hasn’t been the worst!
What’s coming up
When it comes to 2024 travels, we have some good stuff on the books! I’m taking advantage of this little sabbatical with two trips to Mexico in the beginning of the year and a mini solo silent retreat, and we’re also thrilled to be heading back to New York City and Jackson Hole with Jojo. I’m also hoping to reinvent my birthday tradition from a new country every year into a big hike every year! We’ll see what else we get up to, but I’m feeling pretty jazzed about going back to a few favorite spots and continuing to make the most of living in sunny San Diego. Thank you all for reading this year, and I’ll do my best to get some more content coming in 2024!
