A Nice, Long Trip

We are finally in Utah. YAY! We actually arrived Saturday night around 11:30 p.m., and I'm so glad to be here. All in all, it was a good trip, but very long. Here are a few shots of our fantastic voyage:
Amber loved the plane! As soon as we started taxiing to the runway, she yelled out, "Here we GO!" Then, as we accelerated to take off, she screamed, "MOM! THIS IS SO FUN!" She loved to look out the window and see the "map" beneath us (that would be the outline of fields, rivers, trees, etc.). She couldn't get enough.

After a 30-minute tantrum in the car while leaving Lansing, Karli finally settled down and was pretty mellow the whole trip. She had fun sucking on her finger, snuggling with her soft blankie, and eating treats for every meal.

In case you've never been to the Long Beach Airport, this is it. Yep, this is the WHOLE airport. It's a touch bigger than a church gym, and we got to spend ten hours here. We ran out of things to see after about 45 minutes, but thank heavens for portable DVD players. By the time we left, I think every airport employee knew us by name.

After we made three hundred laps around the pint-sized airport, I had to break out the blue Ring Pops to entertain the girls. They loved having blue tongues and teeth.

Rex was an angel as usual and chilled in the stroller for most of the time. He slept through each leg of our flight and was a great little traveler.

I knew it was going to be an interesting day when I boarded the plane in Chicago and the pilot immediately offered me a complimentary cocktail. Luckily I didn't need it; the kids were very well-behaved and didn't even have any potty accidents. After 40 hours without sleep (packing...fun), and a very turbulent ride to Salt Lake complete with five vomiters on the plane (all sitting within three seats of me; I nearly lost it, too), I was so thrilled to land in Salt Lake and to see the marvelous mountains. I don't think I'll ever fly standby with three kids again!