The Last 48 Hours

My goodness we have had an adventurous couple of days.  Yesterday morning we were up bright and early cleaning the apartment and making our last minute preparations to head out to Denver.  As some of you know, Ben's younger brother Steve was arriving home from his mission today.  Some upstairs neighbors, bless them, watched Logan while we got things finished.  He had already watched four episodes of Elmo's World and I wasn't going to let him watch any more, but what else would I do?  Whenever we clean he likes to follow us around and undo what we have just done.  So off he went to play with little Emma upstairs.  (They are good buds).  Once we finally had things ready to go, and our newly-oiled car packed, we took back our son (much to Emma's dismay) and set off for Utah.  Luckily Logan conked out after the first 30 minutes into the drive and slept for almost two hours!  (A tender mercy for sure)  We finally arrived safe and sound at the airport in SLC, parked, hauled everything onto the shuttle, then hauled it back off the shuttle into the terminal.  Silliness, it was 60 degrees when we left Rexburg and it was 91 in Salt Lake, so just inside the airport we dug into our suitcases for sandals and shorts.  We changed and stuffed everything into the suit cases and went to check in.  We were flying with buddy passes, which basically translates as standby, so we prayed as we left our bags at the x-ray that we would make it into 2 of the 4 seats left on our flight.  We still had over an hour to wait at the gate, once we had stripped ourselves and taken apart our perfectly packed carry-ons and gone through security.  We still didn't know if we were going to get on the plane and we were told they wouldn't know for sure until 20 minutes before take off.  So we sat, and waited, and Logan played and ate.  After a while they started boarding the plane, and we waited.  Once they had EVERYONE on board, they called our names and told us that we would take the last two seats on the plane!  You can imagine our relief.  If we hadn't gotten on that flight, the next flight was four hours later! So we hurried onto the plane just before take off, praying that Logan wouldn't be screaming the whole way especially with a completely booked flight.  But, Logan did great!  I guess he should by now.  He's flown more times in his first year of life than I had my entire life up until I married the son of a chief pilot.  Go figure.  There was once when he started to get tired of the sitting still and started to wail.  Hating myself for doing it as I did it, I pulled a red vine from my purse and put it in his eager, curious hand.  Well, at least I didn't get any evil looks from the other passengers.  Ben and I got to talking and only a moment later when we looked down, Logan's face was a mess of sticky red and there was half an inch of mushy, slobbered licorice left in his hand.  He had sugar, and he went to town!  He was so happy after that from his sugar buzz that the rest of the flight went by so quickly.  To my very great relief there was barely any turbulance.  (I hate that feeling like the plane is falling out from underneath me).  We finally got off the suffocating plane (it was very hot) and met up with Ben's dad who was upstairs doing work in his office.  Poor Logan was lights our almost before we'd even left the parking garage.  Then 40 minutes to the house where Logan's grandma was eager to see him.  She was happier than I was when he woke up as he was being removed from the car, and even more so when he didn't want to go back to sleep.  So we played and Ben's sister Nancy came over, nearly bursting in her middle.  She has a very stubborn little girl who simply does not want to be born.  Once Logan was finally in bed later that evening, Ben and I immediately hit the computers to write papers we both had due in the morning.  Midnight came and found us finally wrapping up and emailing the finished products to our professors.  Then thankfully we crawled into bed and fell asleep.  It seemed I had just dozed off when I heard a terrified wail from the next room and ran in to find my little Logan standing up, shaking, frightened tears streaming down his face.  He clung to me and even though I was exhausted I loved it when he held me like that.  After a while, we calmed him down and put him back to bed, and once again crawled wearily into bed.  Bless Logan, he slept till almost 8:45 this morning.  That was very very nice.  Well, we had a few hours before we had to leave for the airport to pick up Steven at 1:53.  When we arrived upstairs we were informed that that stubborn little girl of Nancy's had apparently decided today was the day!  So mom had gone off to get Nancy's kids and brought them back here to play.  We entertained them and started to get ready for the day.  Then we got word, false alarm, and Nancy was on her way home from the hospital, so back went the kids.  After I had played with them, showered and made myself look decent, we went upstairs to eat lunch and hopefully put Logan down for a very short nap before leaving.  I hadn't eaten anything yet and was eager to get Logan eating so I could find something myself.  Just as I had laid out Logan's delicious lunch spread on his high chair tray, dad begins shouting from upstairs, comes hurrying down and announces (with a panicked look)that we must leave RIGHT NOW!  He mistook the flight itinerary and the flight was really scheduled for 12:53, not 1:53 and it was already after 12.  I snatched Logan from his high chair, poor kid, grabbed our things and we were out the door, calling family from the car to tell them to leave, praying we would all make it in time.  It is almost an hour drive for everyone, more for others.  So Ben was driving 80 in a 55, my job was to watch for cops and we made it to the airport with minutes to spare.  Luckily Steve's flight was delayed ten minutes, and then the poor kid, that darned airport is so big, got lost in the different terminals (you have to take a train between them) but it was a blessing because everyone was barely able to make it in time.  So Steve was greeted by two parents, one grandma, 3 sisters, 2 brothers, 1 brother in law, two sisters in law, and 14 (almost 15) nieces and nephews.  It was so fun to see him coming up the escalator as everyone was shouting "There he is!"  Just as the excitement of it all was sinking in, I smelled a most ominous smell.  Soon others started to complain and each parent started smelling their children to see who was the culprit.  Of course, it was my Logan.  So off we went to the ladies room where we thoroughly disgusted the other women there with a truly awful smelling diaper.  When I came out of the bathroom, everyone was gone.  I still hadn't gotten to hug or greet my little brother-in-law.  Out in the parking garage mom, dad, grandma, and Steve were getting into the car to leave, and quickly I got my hug in.   Off we went. Everyone would be meeting at the park for a big family luncheon.  By this time Logan had had about enough, so we bypassed the park and went home.  Ben dropped us off and Logan went down for his nap as Ben headed to the park to be with his family.  I was a little bummed, but I called my mom and we had a nice chat, and I got to catch up on reading some favorite blogs.  I have been reading one that has been truly inspiring lately that my sister told me about.  It is www.cjanerun.blogspot.com.  If you read it, you have to go back quite a ways to understand what is going on, but it is beautiful.  Anyway, well, the evening is finally calming down, Logan is in bed, Steve is being released as I'm writing this, Ben is off to one of his favorite places in the world: Guitar Center, and I am procrastinating another paper I'm supposed to have emailed in for tomorrow.  Oh well.  I love the peace that comes at the end of a crazy day, or a crazy couple of days, that is.