The Last Leg of Our Trip

 

Tuesday morning, March 2, we had a 1:02 pm flight. :( We were sad to be going home! While the boys didn't wake up and watch Sesame Street at their grandparents' house, they did watch it in the hotel that morning (and I thought this picture was so cute and I missed posting it before). Shawn & I worked out separately - he went first while I started organizing our things and getting the boys dressed, and then I went down while he fed them breakfast. Afterward, we got ready and made sure we had everything in the suitcases. Since last time our suitcase just made the cut, we didn't want to be over somehow on the way back, so we switched some heavier items to the boys' suitcase like our toiletries and moved lighter items like their teddy bears to ours. No need to spend an extra $50 unnecessarily for overweight luggage!

 

Earlier in the week, we discovered someone had 'dinged' our car. Shawn said it definitely wasn't there when he picked up the car, and there was no mistaking the mark (which I photographed in the above picture). Shawn's Dad said it looked like maybe a truck or trailer with a hitch backed into us and left the grooves in the car. UGH! Our heart sank as we thought of the money & hassle awaiting us when we returned it. Shawn spent the morning looking up his credit card's auto rental travel accident insurance, but he couldn't print it out because people were already stationed at the hotel's business lounge (all morning! so annoying!). So, he decided to just bookmark the site and have the laptop with him. Only when he left to see if the printer was free yet, one of the boys spilled his open soda bottle on his laptop and it died. Literally crashing from taking on the syrupy liquid. Double UGH! Our day was not starting out too well. Then Joshua wanted to try to go potty and sat in there forever not doing anything. So, we left later than we wanted to to return the car. I feared that we might miss our flight if they gave us a hard time. I prayed the entire way to the airport return. Please, Lord, let them let the ding go and call it part of renting a car. There was a young guy working as we took all our stuff out of the vehicle (the boys were with the grandparents since they had the car seats). He put his thumb in the grooves, looked it over pretty good, walked around the car, and finally said "these folks are good to go." Then he hailed a little golf cart looking shuttle to take us to our terminal. We checked in and our luggage was fine, too. GOD IS GOOD! ALL THE TIME!

  

The boys enjoyed watching the airplanes. I LOVED this picture above of the boys. Sooo cute! Here they are again with Papaw & Aunt Erica.

  

We said our farewells and waited in line to go through security. Joshua didn't want to give hugs & kisses goodbye because he didn't want to say goodbye. He told us the entire time that we should be going back to Mamaw & Papaw's house. Caleb, on the other hand, waved bye and kept saying their names. I had mixed emotions. I was happy to be with my kiddos again, but sad to be leaving the sunshine and family.

  

We got through security fairly quickly, thank God, and we rushed to get to our gate. Unfortunately, that didn't leave us with time to get any lunch. They were already on the final boarding call for our flight, and we were one of the last ones to get our seats. We've never cut it that close before ever. I felt bad for the kids - we were all starving and hadn't eaten all that much for breakfast. Thankfully, we always have snacks in the diaper bag. So, we all ate goldfish, crackers, pretzels and gummies (thanks, Mamaw!) for lunch. It was a little repulsive, but I knew if we didn't eat something there were better chances of us getting motion sickness.

  

Caleb was wide awake the entire flight home. He bounced back and forth between me & Shawn - sitting still is all but torture for him. And while both kids were really good, there is something about being in an airplane that makes time stand still. At one point, I thought I had looked at my watch and it was 2:10 pm. I looked again what seemed like an eternity later and it was only 2:00 pm. Triple UGH!

  

Joshua slept most of the flight home, and when he woke up, he watched a little video on the portable DVD player that Mamaw & Papaw had bought him for Christmas (thanks!). We were SO glad to have it since the laptop had died. On a side note, after the laptop dried out, it worked again. Shawn said (and I quote), "This thing just will not die!" I had offered to buy him one for Christmas, but he'd rather wait and save the money until it's a need, which I completely understand. So, it's back up and running again.

 

We got back to Baltimore without any hiccups or delays, and this time since I was more organized, I knew EXACTLY where our keys and parking stickers were, etc. We got on the Express bus and headed back to our car. It had started to rain, and we were still starving, so Shawn's first stop (thanks to AXEL) was McDonald's where we waited in a non-existent line for over 20 minutes to get our "fast" food ??? Then we got on the beltway and it was bumper to bumper traffic. It took us almost four hours to get home, not including our quick bathroom breaks. (Joshua cried when we sat down that he still had to go No. 2 and the 'fasten-your-seat belt' sign was on. But, he didn't want to go once it went off... that poor boy!). We got home late on Tuesday night, simply throwing our luggage on the living room floor, digging out their blankies and t-bears, changing them into jammies and all heading to bed, exhausted from the fun trip and sad at the cold, ugly weather we came back to. But, we also were praising God for His protection, safety, health, and overall blessings. We had a great time!