We're Leaving on a Jet Plane

Several months ago, Brian & I decided we should make the trek down to Puerto Rico to visit my grandparents. They are clearly not getting any younger and my grandfather had never met Reese. This was the perfect time because Brian has flown so much in the last year that he earned a free companion pass (anytime I fly with him I am free),  enough Rapid Rewards to have free flights and Reese isn't 2 yet so she is flies free. Turns out that Brian had enough points that he AND Jaxon were both able to fly to PR for only $20! Holy cow!

Our trip began Sunday. I was quite a bit nervous about flying with Reese. For obvious reasons. She isn't exactly the sit-in-your-seat-quietly type of girl. I downloaded a bunch of apps, borrowed tons of movies from Ami (new ones), bought new coloring books, crayons, snacks and books and away we went.

On our way to Phoenix. A happy family.

Reese loved walking in the airport

Here we go! On the jetway

Look who got wings!

Reese too!! 

Our first flight was a long one, 4 hours, to Orlando. Since Reese flew for free, she was a lap child and we should have only had one row of 3 seats for our family of 4. Brian, ever so smart, sat in the row next to us and the Reese, Jaxon & I each sat in our own seat. The point was to detour any other passengers from sitting near us, this way we would have 4 seats for 4 people. Genius right? Thankfully it was not a sold out flight so his plan worked! Reesey had her own seat. Hooray! 

The pacifier was an absolute God send! 

3 hours in, Reese FINALLY fell asleep. It took a lot of pleading and pretend sleeping from Brian, but she did it. Only for 40 minutes, but hey, it was better than nothing!

A tired family

We made it Orlando with no major incidents. 

We had a 3 hour layover so we found a nice little seating area where the kids were able to run, play and color. And I was able to enjoy an Chai tea. 

A little Mickey D's ice cream

Now, our flight from Orlando to San Juan did not go as smoothly. It was a much smaller plane and it was sold out, so no extra seat for us. This was not okay with Reese. She wanted to sit by herself. This turned into a lot of crying, arching of her back, kicking the seat, climbing on Mama & Daddy. Plus she was absolutely exhausted. We gave her some Benadryl with hopes it would mellow her out. Yeah. Bad idea. It made her ANGRY. Oh dear. It was the longest 3 hours of our lives! To please her, I had to sit in between seats, smushed next to Jaxon. Thankfully we are both fairly thin. 

*****

Our first day here we headed to my grandparents house. We had such a nice time sitting on the porch, playing, eating  and chit chatting. The kids absolutely love their great grandparents so there was a lot of hugging and kissing. It's funny to me how much love there is when they have only met my grandma a handful of times and my grandfather once, well, this was the first time Reesey had ever met him. But, boy they sure did love him. 

Jaxon keeps telling me, "I love Abuelo. He's cool. I really like him." 

Trying to get Reese to look and Jaxon to smile is quite the feat. 

Reese is showing us her teeth here. 

Teeth again

My brother and I sat at this counter many, many a times.
Same chairs and everything.
It's comforting to know somethings never change.

For months now, Jaxon has been saying he was going to have sugar cane in PR. Well, guess what? He did. My grandfather got wind of this and he made sure to have some sugar cane waiting for his great grandson.