Hello everyone. Sorry for the delay. I was trying to keep this log in order and upon arriving I found myself locked out of the hard drive that we brought with us. So I'm going to skip the last weeks in Australia, our camping trip, and come back to it once we recover our data (hopefully we can!).
On Feb 11th we embarked on an Adventure. I took the three kids to Brisbane airport and Michael dropped us off and ran. We stood for nearly an hour in line and then the lady booking us in took another half an hour arguing with me on how many pieces of luggage we could take. Delta's website said two, Virgin - their partner - said Delta only allows one. As to not miss our flight I finally had to pay for the extra bags and am still trying to put in a claim with them to get that money back. As it was, we barely made it through immigration (Thomas crying the whole time because he got hurt), through security and to our gate, being the last ones to board.
The first flight - Brisbane to Los Angeles was ok. It was 13 hours. I let the kids watch tv and play, then they served us dinner. I let them watch tv a little bit longer until all the dinner was collected and we could make it to the bathroom to brush our teeth and 'get ready for bed'. I thought I could trick them into sleeping. They did go to bed well, but they only slept for 2 hours - which is right for their body as it was only their afternoon nap time. Considering that, they both did really well the rest of the time. Thomas had to change between activities pretty often but he didn't get too cranky. He did have this habit of always having to go to the bathroom after meals and trays were all handed out. Thankfully Blake was able to help out with these trips.
Upon arriving in LAX, I thought the kids would be excited to walk around but Thomas only wanted to be carried at this time. So I carried him all through immigration and the really long walk to customs. Here I had to put him down to get the luggage and he cried the whole time until I could get the luggage checked and put back on to go to the next leg. Once I picked him back up, he was fine. Thankfully my mom met us right as we got rid of our luggage and was able to help with our carry-ons so I carried him some more. We got all the way through the airport, rushing, to get to the boarding area just in time, but then found out that there was a delay. The kids got to run around for about 40 minutes before boarding again which was good, but we knew we wouldn't make our next flight.
The plane from LAX to Minnesota was shorter, but they didn't have tv. Thankfully the kids fell alseep for most of it. Upon arriving in Minneapolis, we ran to the next gate to arrive with 7 minutes to spare, just to find that the plane had left early! So off I went to customer service which took 45 minutes. Thankfully my mom was able to find a play place for the kids to play at while they waited. Delta was very good and gave us heaps of food vouchers and two very nice hotel rooms. At this time it was 3pm in the afternoon, where we were, but past midnight at our starting point.
We had a nice dinner and then arrived at the hotel to have baths, downtime, and bed by 6pm local time. The kids slept well for the first two hours, then Thomas ended up climbing in bed with my mom but fell back asleep quickly at 8:30ish. At midnight both kids were awake. Sophie climbed in with my mom and Thomas snuggled with me. He didn't got back to sleep until about 1:30am but he did lay really still so Sophie and the rest of us could sleep. The next morning we had to wake them at 8:30am. We were down having an awesome buffet breakfast at 9 and off to the airport. Unfortunately we forgot to take the tram so it was a very long walk to our terminal and again we only waited about 10 minutes before boarding.
This plane was very little. Thomas and I sat in the front row, Blake in row 2 and Sophie and Grammy in Row 6. The kids did very well. I did pull out the ipad for Thomas but this was the first that I needed to use it the whole trip - for the kids :).
We arrived in Rapid City, SD, got our luggage and hopped in the truck. The kids were asleep before we got to the main road and had a good hour nap before we reached home. We just unpacked a little, played with all the new toys, and went to bed early.
I'll do the next few posts every 2-3 days till I catch you all up to date so stay tuned.
At the hotel getting ready for the last leg of our journey. Of course our coats were in our checked baggage so Thomas is wearing my mom's extra and Sophie has one of mine one. Thankfully I put their jeans and hats in their carry ons.
Airport play place.
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