Oh my

Well, we made it back to Seattle.  Our long day started out at 11 am at Ithaca airport where we found out that our flight was cancelled due to the winter storms that were going across the Midwest.  We were supposed to leave at 12:20 pm and fly to Detroit and then land in Seattle at 5:20 pm.  Not a bad flight, right?  Well, due to the cancellation we ended up leaving at noon, flying to Philly and then all the way to San Francisco, and then finally up to Seattle.  So our 8 hour day turned into a 13 hour day.  Now, I consider that a long day of travel for anyone.  But oh my, with a one year old it feels so much longer.  The flight from Philly to San Fran was the killer.  It was a 6 hour flight with a Baeo on my lap.  A Baeo that had been up since 7 am Ithaca time with no nap.  A Baeo that does not like to sit still.  Okay, I need to give Braedon more credit than that though.  Given the circumstances, this kid is awesome.  Despite not having a nap all day and not going to bed until 11:30 pm Seattle time, he did great!  He didn’t cry at all and really was a trooper.  He clapped when the plane landed and I think that everyone around us wanted to clap as well, including the lady in front who had the pleasure of being kicked numerous times in the back of the seat and the poor guy beside us who was trying to sleep but was constantly woken up by Braedon trying to hand him magazines or trying to touch his face or touching his work clothes with sticky fingers from sucking on a sucker that I had given him to try and by a few minutes of stillness and quiet.  I’m sure the guys behind us wanted to clap as well considering Braedon thought a game of peekaboo should last for 6 hours straight. 

Do we look tired?

 

Because we are. 

When we made it to San Francisco we found out that in order to get to our next gate we had to walk out of the secure zone and go back through security.  Again, everyone who flies knows that security can be a pain, but having to go through security with a toddler is just flat out stressful.  I feel bad for holding people up behind us, so it feels like a race trying to get my shoes off, Braedon’s shoes off, taking off my vest,  taking out the sippy cups of milk and water, and getting all of our carry ons onto the conveyer belt all while trying to keep Braedon from escaping or crawling under the conveyer belt onto the security side or from picking up random trash off the carpet and putting it in his mouth.  I was sweating by the end of it…and that was before we found that we still had quite a ways to walk…with all of our carry ons, a car seat, and a Baeo to carry.  After dinner and a much needed shared beer, we made our way to our gate and were pleasantly surprised with a kid play area right next to it.  Braedon ran around like a sleep deprived but wired crazy kid for a good 30 minutes before we boarded our plane and he finally passed out across my lap.

At 10 pm we landed in Seattle!  We will be here for about a month and are looking forward to spending the time relaxing and enjoying the company of family and friends.

This is my version of our day.  Derek may have a completely different version and may or may not post his experience.