Airplane Drama

Who said airplanes were the fastest way to fly?

Our transportation adventure began when our flight was an hour late leaving Raleigh Durham on our way home for our second Christmas trip. They said that it was weather related but they also said they had a computer glich and problems not getting in the formation for takeoff. We arrived in Memphis and of course had missed our connecting flight. They said we could stay in the airport all day and wait and Adam told them, “Not with two little ones we can’t” so they rerouted us to Houston. We had 15 minutes to get at least a mile maybe two. We had already ran from our gate to the ticket office so Jack was tired and sat in the stroller. I carried Charlie as far as I could and then made Jack get out and run some more. He was such a good sport we ran and ran and made it just in time. We ran out of diapers because our airplane was too small and we had to gate check our bag that had diapers and spare clothes. Charlie had 2 blow outs and had to just be astinky baby. Instead of arriving in Salt Lake at 4:00, we arrived at 9:30 – a 13 hour trip. Our bag we had checked didn’t make it but they delivered it to my parents house in the middle of the night which was quite nice. That was the first leg.

On our trip home, we hoped it would be much less adventurous. I was going to be prepared so I packed 2 changes of clothes for Charlie and a pair for Jack, diaper, wipes and lots of snacks and toys to entertain on our short layover. The mean man at the ticket counter made us check that bag and pay $45 to check them. We expected to get back to Raleigh at 9:45 and then drive our 2-hour trip home so Adam could get some sleep before his first day of school. (He already missed the real first day which was Tuesday and so was going to have to register late and get permission from all his instructors. Our flight left and we landed in Memphis with no problems. Charlie decided not to sleep and was getting a little grouchy. Our plane took off and we were excited because we talked the person next to us into switching seats so Charlie could sit in his car seat. Charlie fell asleep and we were on the home stretch. Then after about 30 minutes of circling the airport, the pilot announced that there was a problem with the landing gear and we would have to return. When we landed the firetrucks were lined up and ready for us- that makes a person a little nervous. We had to de board and of course Charlie woke up. They found us a new plane which we boarded and they told us it would be midnight before we got to Raleigh. We took off again and wouldn’t ya know, we had the exact same problem- the doors on the landing gear wouldn’t close and we had to return to Memphis again. The firetrucks chased us down the runway again. This time, Jack had fallen asleep and we had to wake him up as we deboarded yet again. By now it was 11:00 p.m. and our boys and one other baby were the only children on the flight. We had to wait in the back of the line for 1 ½ hours so that they could tell us we were going to spend the night and could take a flight out in the morning. By now we had burned through the diapers from my purse and had zero diapers left since we had checked the bag with spare clothes and diapers. They said we could get our checked bags but we would have to wait another hour and fill out more forms, so we just went to the hotel. Adam took a midnight taxi to Wallgreens to buy some diapers and milk. The next morning we woke the boys up early and met up with our “friends” from our original plane ride and flew down to Atlanta. We had some minor problems with not finding the right gate and taxiing around the airport for 40 minutes but at least we were out of Memphis. We our now on our final leg home, Charlie fell asleep and was doing really well when he started coughing and threw up all over himself right before takeoff. We quickly grabbed his slightly less dirty onsie and I mopped up Charlie while Adam mopped up his carseat and the floor. We are hoping to get back to our car drive as fast as we can to Adams school so he can make it to the last few minutes of his last class and apologize profusely to all his teachers so they will still let him in their classes. That will make this leg a 26 hour tip! Needless to say, we have little desire to fly again anytime soon.

"Try not to act like a country bug"

We took the youth to Washington DC for the annual temple trip. The DC temple is our assigned temple even though it is about 6 hours away. We had a great time. We went down early to explore a little. We saw the Smithsonian: The Air and Space, The Museum of Natural History and the White House. It was bitter cold- we all had to buy some extra snow hats and gloves in order to be able to walk around. We told the kids to wear their warm gear so, being from the country, they brought their camoflauged waders and huntin' gear. We took the metro down to the city and as we were traveling along, our group started taking about how fast they thought the train was going, and how big the tunnles were. Adam leaned over to me and quoted Bugs Life, "Try not to act like a country bug," we were all feeling a little overwelmed by the big city. It was great... the youth did baptisms and then the next day the youth, and the Moxlies, watched all the leaders kids while we did a session where Ben took out his endowments. That was the best part because I don't know how else we would have gotten that opportunity to go to the Temple, since it would be kind of immpossible to get a babysitter for 18 hours if we tried to go up by ourselves.

After we saw the Museum, we had to buy the Night at The Museum II movie. Jack loved it! He kept recognizing the places that we had visited. Next time, he'll expect them to come back to life.

my favorite picture of Charlie

I was so excited to see The White House. We didn't get to on our last trip and Im just so intrigued by all the goings -on and how the workers interact with the First Family.

Christmas Morning!

We had a great time at Christmas and we were all very spoiled. For the first time, I had everything wrapped before Christmas Eve, we had noone we had to go visit and we were able to do a little Christmas Eve story, put the boys to bed early and cuddle up together by 8:00.

The only thing jack wanted this year was two swords- one for him and one for us to fight him with. :)

Charlie got his first 4-wheeler!!

Attempting to go down the stairs in order youngest to oldest.

The Biggest Snow in 10 Years!!

The night before Adam’s birthday, his dad, Grandma and Nick flew in. When they had asked a week or so before what they should bring we told them, “Bring a light jacket but don’t worry about a real coat or gloves or anything and don’t worry about having to drive in the snow because they don’t get snow here.” Which is what we had been told, but the night they flew in, we had the biggest snowstorm that anyone had seen in about 10 years! They arrived safely but said the past a bunch of accidents on the highway. We wanted to take them to our favorite restauraunt for prime rib, but the town had closed down. Most of the businesses had shut down early and sent their employees home at noon. We were snowed in all day Saturday and although it was only about 10 inches at the most, it shut everything down. We ended up cancelling our Branch party so we didn’t get to use my cute costumes and sing our Mary and Joseph song and they actually cancelled church as well. Although we had wanted to take Adams family to the beach and show them some sights, it was kind of nice to stay warm and cozy and play “our new wii game/”(which is Jack’s favorite new phrase- “Can we play our new wii game please oh please?”). Like true Utahns should, we busted out Jack’s play shovel and the boys shoveled us out of our driveway, donned our snow chains and we were able to do some exploring. We went up to the Lake and showed them the church. They couldn’t get over how dead the city was for the whole weekend and how ill prepared we are for snow. The people I've talked to said that along time ago it used to snow like this but as the climate has changed they’ve had more and more mild winters so they just weren't prepared with snow removal.