Once every few years I make a trip out to my company’s corporate headquarters located in kinda/sorta/sometimes sunny San Diego. I normally don’t mind going but this time I needed to be out there a full week and I was really hating the idea of leaving my girl (and my husband) for that long so we finagled our schedules around, asked my mom if she’d watch the dogs, and worked it our for J and Ava to come out with me. The plan was that they would have plenty of time to explore while I was working and then we’d do a few more things at night and on the weekend.
But oh how I was dreading that flight. The last time we flew with her she managed to pee on me right after we’d checked all the bags. This was before I learned to always carry a full change of clothes for both baby AND parent, although I did learn that day that one cannot wash a leg of jeans in the airport bathroom and expect the hand dryer to be sufficient to dry them in the 15 minutes or so before boarding. The flight before that with her was our return from China and that is an experience that I would like to blot out of my mind completely. And really, it’s not that she was so bad. I, on the other hand, was an exhausted, sickly train wreck of a new mom and cried every single time anyone looked at me sideways which meant that it was the longest (figuratively and literally speaking) plane trip of my life.
My point? I was expecting the worst. We had to get up and leave our house at O’dark early in order to drive 4 1/2 hours to my parents’ house in order to drop off the dogs, then turn around and drive another hour back to the airport, stop and get her lunch on the way, heft way too many bags + car seat into the airport, and make it onto the plane with as little stress as possible. J boarded earlier than we did in order to get the carseat installed so I was left to manhandle her, my carry-on, and her backpack down the stairs, across the tarmac, and up the teeny ladder stairs into the plane. And you know what? It mostly worked. There was a bit of a fuss when the plane started taxiing – just enough to make my stomach clench up in a ball of nerves – and the next thing I knew she was asleep. Slept all the way to our layover airport. Easy-peasy.
The Sit-n-Stroll once again proved that it is worth its weight in gold. It came in very handy maneuvering our way through the airport and got lots of envious looks from other parents trying to corral their unruly toddlers.
My new iPad was also getting lots of envious looks from curious bystanders. And Ava? Well, she pretty much thinks it belongs to her.
Our second flight was as uneventful as the first. I pestered the lady at the gate until she let us pre-board with Ava early since we had the car seat to install and J got the seat in place lickety-split. Just in time for her to settle in for some light reading and a snack…
before snuggling up with her Elmo blanket and her ‘yam.’ It took her about an hour to fall asleep this time and then, once again, slept the rest of the flight away.
Our arrival in San Diego was uneventful and our most pressing decision was choosing what color minivan we wanted from the rental car fleet. The hotel was marvelous as always and J was fortunate enough to be officially welcomed to the state by a California Highway Patrol officer who kind of wanted to know why J made a funky (and obviously) illegal turn. Thankfully Officer Poncharello was very understanding when J pleaded ignorance and let him go with a cheery “Welcome to San Diego.”
Indeed. Welcome to San Diego.