Our Travels

September 16, 2008

Longest Day EVER!

Sunday morning at 9am Ukraine time Keenan and I made our way to the airport to start our 20 hour journey back to Montana. Yes, I was a little freaked out at the thought of traveling so far with just me and Keenan. I have always had good luck flying alone with Keenan. There has always been someone willing to help out the struggling mom trying to balance a kid on one hip, a carry-on bag flung over one shoulder and basically kicking Keenan's carseat down the plane isle. Usually its a guy and they confess they helped out because their wife has told them how hard it can be to travel solo with the kids so please when you see the struggling mom in the airport, Pay it Forward!

During our first layover in Amsterdam I discovered that Keenan and I's seats were not together for the next leg of the flight to Minniapolis. The first flight attentant I talked to about this as I was boarding, with a nice man in tow carrying all my stuff, told me to take the seat further back and then ask the other person if they would move forward, but I liked the other seat better. The first seat we were assigned to had the wall in front with a small hallway on the other side, there was lots of extra leg room and room for Keenan to walk around in. I immediately decided these were the seats that we really NEEDED, so I set up shop there and patiently waited for the person who had the other seat. When that person finally came to claim his seat with all the extra leg room I explained my situation... he didn't look too happy about moving to the back of the plane so I quietly suggested that I give him and his wife a bag of crackers to feed my son and I'd go sleep peacefully in the back. Apparently he liked that idea less so and he happily (maybe a little unhappily) moved to the back of the plane.

It was really nice to have the extra room for Keenan, we did a lot of pacing back and forth in the little hallway whenever he got restless. Maybe Keenan was nervous... maybe it was the billions of raisins he eaten the day before... the change in air pressure... who knows but the little guy had some majorly rank gas the ENTIRE flight.

Overall Keenan was a trooper and was pretty good for the 20 hours of travel time. He didn't sleep near enough and was immediately refreshed when we finally got to my parents house and he saw all the toys. It's taken him a few days to readjust to being 9 hours behind in a different time zone but overall not too bad. It feels good to be back on American soil and see my family. Since we left 6 months ago there has been two new members of the family born.

2 comments:

jsully21 said...

I'm soooooooo glad you got to come home while Eric is away. I bet your parents are LOVING having you guys around! Glad the seating situation "worked out" on the plane:)

Corinne said...

I am glad you made it!!