Opus 39 - Seattle, Part I

We are now home from our vacation to Seattle. We made it! It was a good vacation. It was also stressful, but it was still good. I've decided I'm going to break the trip details up into a few different posts so there isn't one long one. This is all about our flight, drive, etc., to Seattle...

As I was hoping, I was able to get everything packed up and the car loaded before I started feeding the babies. Yeah! We left as soon as Jason got home from work. Jason's Mom very kindly followed us up so she could help me with the babies while Jason was leaving the car in long term parking (we left it there so my sister, Lissa, could pick it up and use it when she flew in a couple days later) - thanks Mom! We fed the babies some carrots while waiting for Jason. Fun, fun :)

Getting through security was pretty easy considering all of the junk we had - two diaper bags, lap top, rolling carry-on, stroller, two car seats, two babies... The security staff was very kind and helped us a lot. We were so on schedule that we even had time to grab a bite to eat before loading the plane. A very kind lady helped us get our stuff down to the end of the jet bridge. We boarded the plane, found our seats and were ready to go when a flight attendant realized that we couldn't have Jason and I sitting in the same row. Why?, you might ask... It turns out there are four oxygen masks in each row. Who knew? With the other person on our row and the two babies, we had five people. After a little juggling and a very nice passenger switching seats, we were able to arrange it so Jason was sitting behind me.

The babies started getting hungry before the plane was loaded, so we had to start feeding them early. I was nervous that they would finish their bottles before we took off and they wouldn't be sucking on anything as we went up in altitude, but it worked out. Both babies finished their bottles and fell asleep sucking their binkies. They slept the entire flight!! It was great! Lissa actually woke up for about 10 minutes, but she just laid in my arms staring off until she fell asleep again.

It was after we landed that the excitement began. The pilot had a hard time lining the plane up with the jet bridge. We sat there for about 20 minutes waiting. One of the flight attendants held Joshua during this time because she thought he was so cute (who doesn't?). Both babies were awake, but happy so we didn't mind the wait too much. Unfortunately, the pilot never got the plane lined up right, so we ended up having to get off the plane the old fashioned way - walking down the stairs to the tar mat, then back up to the jet bridge. As soon as we walked out of the plane, Lissa lost it. When I say lost it, I really mean LOST IT. She was screaming at the top of her lungs. We got to the end of the jet bridge and found out they had sent our stroller to baggage claim! We had to walk all the way to baggage claim with two screaming babies (Joshua thought it'd be cool to join Lissa after awhile) and all of our stuff. It didn't help that we were at the furthest end of the airport, requiring us to take the train.

When we finally got to baggage claim, we happily found our stroller and put the babies in it. A kind Delta employee got our bags and put them on carts while we tried, unsuccessfully, to soothe the babies.

We then had to load a shuttle to get to our rental car (crying babies in tow). We finally made it to our rental car, loaded it, and got to our hotel. When I was checking in I asked about our pack-n-plays that they had promised (several times) they would have for us. I was told they were in the room. There were no pack-n-plays in our room. I called the front desk about it and they did some research and called back to tell me they only had one pack-n-play. After explaining that my babies would not sleep in the same small pack-n-play (rolling all over each other), they somehow found another one.

We finally managed to get the babies calm and to sleep. Phew. One travel day done. We were exhausted and just fell asleep as fast as the babies.

So far so fun, huh?