Whirlwind!

Travelling with 2 kids under the age of 5 is the easiest thing EVER!

Oh wait, the 1st plane ride with both children and Andrew's first flight ever was on April Fool's Day?

Seriously.

Alexis has been in rare form lately just because "but I want to do what I want to do" is her excuse when she doesn't obey and calm down.  So even though she wasn't listening and being still for our trek to the airport and she was complaining, all became ok and when she met a little friend.

So we get to the airport and get on the "circle bus" (Parking Spot) and get through security and while Grant is buying some dinner, I'm shoveling Andrew's dinner in while he's in the stroller and Alexis is watching for airplanes out the window...a little boy approaches.

He says "hi" and Alexis turns to me and says "WHO is HE?"  I tell her that I don't know but she can let him look out the window with her.  So they babble about the planes and the baggage carts and the ladders and whatever else they see until there is a big bug on the window.  Then Alexis has a typical Alexis bug freak out so the little boy goes back over to his mom to get a coloring sheet and 2 crayons and he comes back and offers her getting to color half of it with one color while he colors the other half with the other color. At this point the other mom decides that if she wants to see her son again, she should probably move to sit near us b/c there aren't enough seats for us near her and her son has met a new playmate so as far as he's concerned since we are going the same place, this is his new spot.  As we are walking down the jetway (no, we did not get to pre-board with both kiddos) he turns to Alexis holding out his hand and says "do you want to hold my hand" she looks back and says "it's ok daddy, we're friends"  So she and Trevan (sp?) walk together and then his mom, then Andrew and I and then Grant come on down the jet way and onto the plane and she just keeps walking and gets in the row with them, so since her son is so smitten, his mom asks if she can sit with them, so we said "sure!" and we sat right behind her.  They spent most of the 1 hour flight "decorating" his mom with stickers from Alexis' backpack, not sharing silly bands because he didn't want the pink one she tried to give him and she wanted to keep the blue one, and talking about their ears "popping off".  Oh and taking pictures of each other.  Andrew on the other hand, decided he was tired of being held and fussed, batted at his head, played between our feet and finlly sat on Grant's lap to look out the window.  Getting off the plane, Alexis couldn't understand why she couldn't stay with her new friend because he was on the same plane so why wasn't he going to Mimi's too?

We get the kids settled, we visit, we munch and then we got to sleep until around 8 a.m.(!) with only a small interruption for a bottle.  It was the longest we've gotten to sleep on a Saturday in a LONG time.  Alexis still had some trouble being a big girl but for the most part was fairly well behaved for Nana's 90th b-day celebration and throughout the day, even with her moments at the microphone.  In case you haven't seen Alexis when she has an audience, she has the habit of discovering ways to have all eyes on her.  So after all the little great-grands sang to Nana, she said she wanted to sing another song, but instead of just singing it to Nana, she saw the microphone, so she sang a few songs all by her lonesome, waiting for applause between each one before she was told it was time for the big people to have the microphone back and to go back and play with the other kiddos.  She was so proud of herself.  The party wraps up, the kids are tired and it's time to make our way back to the airport.  

And at the airport in AMA, she was the best behaved she has been in ages!  She sat and spoke in a normal voice without yelling, she colored, and looked at planes and didn't whine and some of this was while Daddy was with both kids at the gate by himself because I was lucky enough to have to go through "additional screening" due to baby food.  It took 3 people inspecting the actual baby food jars after it was determined that I and everything else in the diaper bag were safe, but I was allowed to keep the food and continue to the gate after my pat down which was less invasive than most taylors.  Alexis continued to be good all the way through our 40 minute delay and then both kids' emotional states were beginning to deteriorate due to lack of adequate napping.  We were pretty sure that Alexis would be alright once she finally got on the "big airplane" but we weren't so sure about Andrew, so we headed to the back of the plane.  At take off, the kids were GREAT!  I was so glad, they were well behaved, decently quiet, smiling with other passengers smiling at them and our thoughts were that this flight would be alright.
...

And then it happened, just as quickly as lightening strikes, we became "that family".  About half way through the flight, shortly before we were to get Alexis' applejuice, we were getting Andrew settled with a bottle.  Due to airpressure and the temperature of the water, for whatever reason the airflow of the bottle wasn't working quite right and he fussed and fought it and all at once, the cap came unscrewed and he kicked and the bottle went flying.  Formula was everywhere!  Grant's shirt was the new "milky swirl" polo, my jeans were "formula bleached" and poor Andrew looked like he'd been painted white with his hair matted to his head and dripping off of his eyelashes and shorts and a few drops even made it all the way over to Alexis' seat on the opposite side of me.  For those of you that know Alexis' she's a bit of a clean freak, so we got her calmed with a few tears and were thankful that she didn't truly get wet as that would have made the distaster monumental.  Andrew was now screaming his head off but not drawing sentimental looks and offers of towels to help clean him off but rather looks of disgust.  Grant is so mad at the situation and that this had to be us.  So without even the offer of a beverage napkin for help, we manage to do the best we can with one burp cloth, stripping him down, pulling on a new onesie, get more water (b/c he's still hungry) and try again but with warmer water and a smaller amount.  This time, all works fine and he eats, falls asleep and stays asleep on my sticky arm.  Alexis was a little out of sorts still, and got worse breaking down near baggage claim, but she was calmed, we got on the "circle bus" and back to our car.  The kiddos were both asleep before we had even reached Harry Hines and we were hoping that this would not end up being a "power nap".  From parking at Love field to arriving back at our car all took place in just over 24 hours.  Whew!