INTO THE WOODS: March 2013

February 20, 2013

Lance's Mom turned 60 on February 19th, so Lance's siblings planned a surprise weekend where we all showed up in St. George at the new 2nd home his parents just bought.

This was by far the most dramatic trip we've ever had.

For posterity's sake (and to remember exactly what we were able to endure) here goes...

We were scheduled to leave out of Philly at 4pm, so our plan was to be there at 2. In order to do this we would have needed to leave our house by 11:30ish. Unfortunately, Lance didn't want to have to take a vacation day and just planned on leaving as soon as he got off. (He was planning on being done by noon that day)

To make a long story short, he was late, I wasn't quite ready, and although we made good time, we arrived at the parking lot of the airport a little before 3. As we unloaded and attempted to carry our suitcase, carry-ons, two carseats, a diaper bag and children, the shuttle bus drove up. We smiled and waved to her! She stopped the bus, looked annoyed at us and pointed to the waiting area about 20 feet behind her. She then proceeded to drive past us to the airport!! We were floored!

After waiting about 15 minutes for the next bus, we got off at the wrong terminal. You see our flight was being covered by 2 different airlines and Lance picked the one that was at the top of the ticket. Poor Lance. Then after waiting in line and finally getting to the check-in counter, we were told that that particular flight was being covered by a different airline.

We gathered all of our things and headed two terminals down to the correct airline. Once we got there we were very matter of factly, and quite insensitively, told that we were 5 minutes too late to check our bag so we would have to go on another flight. For the record you need to be there 45 minutes prior to the flight to check a bag. We arrived at the second ticket counter 40 minutes beforehand.)

The real torture was getting to our gate two and a half hours early and watching the direct flight to Vegas that we were supposed to be on, board and leave. Oh, so sad!

The plan was to fly one way to arrive in Vegas at 7:30PM and then rent a car and drive to St. George to Grandpa and Grandma Egbert's house. We would have been able to get the kids to bed before 10PM which would feel like midnight our time, but still not too bad considering a cross country trip.

The new flight had a layover in Phoenix and wasn't scheduled to get to Vegas until midnight. Then that second flight was delayed. We sat on the plane for 45 minutes with the lights on while they "fixed" the problem. Reuben cried incessantly unless I stood up with him at which point I would be told by a flight attendant to sit down in case they were able to fix the problem! REALLY?!! Sheer torture for all!

We didn't get to Vegas until 2AM (4AM our time) and by the time we rented our car and drove to St. George it was 5:45AM (7:45AM our time). Lance and I had been awake for over 24 hours! And let's not even talk about our poor children who refused to sleep all day until they finally crashed on the last flight around 12:30AM. They were able to sleep in the car, but it took them over a week to compensate for the sleep deprivation.

Lance and I crawled into bed at 6AM (8AM our time) and Reuben woke up at 7:30. We were tired. The boys were tired. All of us were tired the entire trip.

However, with all of that being said, and although we were a tad on the tired side, we had an awesome time with Lance's family once we finally got there! :)

Now for the pictures...

The boys on the airplane.
The first flight.