We're home!

We are home from Boston. We had a great trip. I loved hanging out with my family. We had a great flight up, no issues to speak of. We went to a really cool place while we were there called Davis Farm Land, the girls went to a movie with Nana Nana, Erica and Tyler, we went to the Old Country Store (a Mansfield fav,) made smores in the fire pit, played in the sprinkler when the high was 80 with ZERO humidity!, played name that tune for hours with the tens of thousands of songs on my dad's ipod, and just enjoyed all of us being together.

Then there was the trip home. Everything started well. Our plane to NY left at 1:15. So we left my parent's house at 10:30 (they live an hour from the airport) armed with food for the day. LOTS of food! We got to the airport and found that they were not doing curbside check-in. So that was fine. A skycap offered to help me inside. All he did was take my bags to the regular ticket line where I had to get in line. And then he actually said to me," You can settle up with me now." HUH?!?!?! Anyway, I gave him five bucks and he went on his way. We get through the line where the lady doesn't even check my license, I guess I don't look threatening with the girls or something. And we head to security. That is fun with 4 kids, 3 back packs, 4 tote bags, a stroller and five pairs of shoes. And since I am FREAK, all of us had socks that we put on just to walk through. But this time was a little easier than the way up because at least Madison walked through this time. (On the way up I had to carry her and Vivian through.) Anyway, so we make it through and collect everything and put our shoes back on and we are on our way. We ate lunch before we got on the plane, and that went pretty smoothly. After 7 trips to the potty, we are ready to board the plane. The plane between Boston and Laguardia is very small. So we had two seats and then the two behind as well. On the way to Boston this flight went great. On the way home, not so much. Leah decided she wanted to sit next to Mackenzie. Which would be fine were she not the drama queen of the south. So Mackenzie and I work to get the Cares latches that we have for Madi and Leah hooked up. They are pretty cool, they make the seat more like a car seat so they have the shoulder straps and can't get out. And then I put Vivian in her little vest that attaches to my seat. Did I mention I am a FREAK?!?!?! Again, all these things worked better on the way to Boston. So anyway, it's a 40 min flight from Boston to NY of which Vivian cried the whole way and Leah screamed about every possible ailment a child can have. Fun times.

So we arrive in NY. Did I mention that both ways we had to go through security again in NY? So fun. Back on go the socks, fold up the stroller, count heads, shove 87 bags on the belt, go through in the right order (oldest to youngest) get stopped b/c you have filled the water bottles up with water, get cleared b/c you obviously don't have the time or the brain power to remember your bomb when you are a part of this circus, collect everyone and all the bags, fold out the stroller, put children in the stroller, take socks off, put shoes back on, etc. Are we having fun yet? After all this we still have an hour to kill before our flight leaves. So we sit down for our snack, the little ones run around, drop food all over the floor, load everyone up and all the bags and head down to the bathroom 8 times, try to convince Madi that this potty is suitable for use (what is it about the bathrooms in NY? She wouldn't go either time), etc. So finally it's about time for us to be called and they come over the speaker and say we are a bit delayed due to the plane not arriving on time. No problem, more running around, more snacks, more falling on the floor and giving me a heart attack thinking about what kid of germs they are picking up, and more pottying. Finally the plane comes in, the people get off, they clean the plane, they board the first class and are about to board us, when Leah has to go potty. Run back down the hall, kids and bags flying to race to the potty. Race back up the hall and are the last ones on the plane. Excuse me as we bump into every single person we pass as we go down the aisle. I put the latches on both seats, get the bags stowed, snacks accessible, water bottles out, kids in, and tried to put Vivian's vest on and she went nuts. So I just decided to let her sit in my lap. Thankfully there was no one next to Mackenzie on the other side of the aisle, so I knew we could move kids around if needed.

We sat on the tarmack for about 30 min and then the pilot said over the intercom, "We are experiencing a delay due to plane traffic. We are #15 in line." I thought, Oh my word! Seriously? But I kept it together. We sat there for another 30 min and he said," Ok folks we are #3." SO I tell the girls we'll be taking off in just a minute. 5 minutes later the pilot comes back on and says, "Well folks, we have another delay. We are going to have to go back to the gate and shut it down due to weather in Atlanta." I started crying. I was so tired and done. Thankfully we circled around the airport and they did let us take off. Finally once we were in the air they could watch their movies. And Vivian and I played with the headphones for a while. We hit another delay once we got to GA. They put us in a holding pattern due to weather. I really thought we would never get here.

When we got up to get off the plane, the older lady who was behind us stood up and said, "Honey, you deserve a medal!"

We finally got home about 9:30 last night. Whew! I have tons of pictures to post and I promise I will get to them soon.