Part 4: Hey, were actually Getting to the Airport!
WEEEEENH. WEEEEENH. WEEEEENH.
Are you awake? That's my lame-o attempt to duplicate, in words, that horrible alarm clock noise. How'd I do? I'm open to suggestions.
No matter, anyway.
As if I needed the alarm to wake me up at waytooearly-thirty on the morning of our supersecretsurprise trip! I was up on my own at waytooearly.
DH and I had loaded the car up last night, after the unsuspecting offspring were asleep. The only thing NOT packed was Bunny. But we had notes taped to every door we would encounter on our way out to the car.
*DON'T FORGET BUNNY.*
Bunny is SydneyRalla's lovey. He's sort of a blanket with a bunny head, with that supersoft satiny edging on his ears and the bottom of his, er, blanket.
Isn't he sweet?
She can't sleep without him, really, especially in a strange Pack & Play. So we're nervous we'll forget him. And more nervous that he'll get lost en route. So we're bringing Taggie. A 10 inch fleece square with satiny tags all around the border. He doesn't at all have the status of Bunny, but is a reasonable facsimile. He's already packed.
So we go to wake up the babies and spirit Bunny away to SydneyRalla's carseat. Check.
It takes quite a bit of shaking to get DS5 to wake up, but when he hears "Get up and put your clothes on, mister. We're going on an adventure today," he's all in. Groggy, but on the way.
SydneyRalla is a snap. Scoop her out of the crib (yeah she's 2 and still in a crib. The first 2 kids got evicted from the crib by 18 months because of the next new baby/heir apparent. Syd can sleep in the crib till she's 6 if she wants) and change her diaper, put on her travelin' clothes, and done.
Two down, one to go.
We've met our match.
DD4, Piper, the Powerhouse. She's a little scrap of a thing, but wow, she is tough. And stubborn. And sooo sweet, too. When she wants to be. Today she doesn't. We finally get her out of bed and on her feet with the promise of an adventure and Dunkin' Donuts. Time to get dressed. No can do, and I'll tell you why.
Two words: Capri pants.
I thought I had been so very clever to choose this outfit for her travelin' clothes. Enough leg coverage to keep her warm (enough) to make our way through this chilly May morning to the airport, but still she won't be stifling when we hit the Florida sunshine. Add socks and sneakers, a cute little top (for Florida) and a sweatshirt over it (for NH) and we're good, right?
"I don't WANT to wear THOSE. I like my pants to go all the way down to my FEET."
Yikes. Never thought of that. Truth be told, she'd rather wear a dress any day of the week. I never really considered that she had rules about her pants.
I convince her that these are the perfect pants for our BIG adventure. She likes her clothing to be appropriate to the occasion, so she relents. (One time I tried to get her to wear khaki shorts and she let me have it: "Brown is NOT my favorite color and we are NOT going hiking and I'm NOT wearing those!" See, the day we WERE going hiking, she wore them, no problem. Usually I just let her dress herself, which is why she's usually in a dress striped in multi-shades of pink, with rainbow colored polka dot tights, and about 72 little clippie barrettes in her hair, which is still, somehow, hanging in her eyes. There are so many more important things to be the meanest mom about; as long as the clothes are clean, and no body parts are exposed that shouldn't be, I'm not getting in a battle on this one.)
At last. We're in the car, with everyone dressed. Heading down the road, we call DH's dad, aka Grampie, one more time to make sure he's awake and ready for his very important task. Get us to the airport on time. In code, of course, because we're still in surprise mode.
Conor the Car Man, who truly has an amazing eye for detail, especially when it comes to cars, notices right away: "Our suitcases are in here!" OK, so that's not such a small detail, since the entire hatch area of our minivan is heaped up to the rear window. "Are we going on vacation?"
Yep, kids, we're going on vacation. Wanna guess where? "The airport?" they guess.
Maybe our codespeak to Grampie wasn't so tough.
Yep, we're going to the airport. This, actually, is a huge piece of excitement for them because they've never flown. Except SydneyRalla, but she doesn't remember. Thankfully. She's just quietly singing to herself, her favorite song:
"Deem ... wiss ... hot make ... win ... fas ... sweep"
That's how it sounded. I know, because I have it on video. Not that morning, but at that age she sang it a lot. She doesn't quite know all the words, or how to pronounce them. Can you name that tune?
More guessing. "Are we going to the Children's Museum? Chuck E. Cheese's?"
Hellooooo, little ones. Do you think we're going to FLY a mile from the airport to Chuckeez? They're too cute.
They give up. Now they don't even TRY to guess where we're going. They are just too too excited to be going on a plane. Even though SydneyRalla is singing, and I've got the Classic Disney CD bopping away.
I lovelovelove Manchester Airport. I am SOOOOO glad we dont have to go to Boston to fly anymore. It's 25 minutes from our house, and Grampie lives on the way. So we stop and he hops in with us so that he can leave us at the terminal and then babysit our van for the week. AND pick us up again when we return. That is key.
(what's the matter with this guy? He looks like he has bandages on his hands)
