We Have Arrived!

We arrived at the St. Louis airport around 11am with 6 people (plus grandma and grandpa), 3 car seats, 1 bicycle,  13 bags, and 5 carry ons. Whew!!

After checking in and going through security - in which I was pulled aside for something suspicious in my backpack (which turned out to be a night light and a 8v battery beside each other) - we went to Chili's Too for lunch. Our flight was finally called and we were one of the last ones to board. Our seats were almost all the way in the back, and that was a challenge with all the kids and the car seats!

I got Donovan's seat installed then went to work on Jocelyn's. Then the flight attendant informed me that Donovan's seat needed to be against the window. Oops! I knew Jocelyn's needed to, but not his. So then I had to rush to move his. Then back to Jocelyn's. That was NOT easy! The buckle was just in the wrong place to install it. I finally got it, though. However, I was still working on it as the plane was pulling away from the gate! We got everyone buckled in before the plane took off at least! Haha! We were off!!!

The first leg of the flight was pretty uneventful. We arrived in LA where we had an hour layover. We purposely waited to be the last ones off the plane with all of our stuff. We hung out, lost Donovan for 10 minutes, and hung out some more. Because, well, our plane was having issues. First one of the flight attendant seats wasn't working so they had to fix that. Then they said the navigation system that lets the plan navigate over the ocean wasn't working, so they had to fix that! Thank goodness, huh? Finally, an hour after we were supposed to leave, we got to board. This time we were a little more prepared on what to expect, and waited for everyone else to board before us.

We got everyone into their seats a lot faster, but Jocelyn's seat would not install on the plane. With or without the car seat base! Even David couldn't get it in. The buckle was right in the belt path and no matter what we tried. So in the end we just put her seat in the seat unbuckled. She would be a lap child on this flight, and I would put her in her seat, unbuckled and swaddled, when she fell asleep. I admit it, being the car seat Nazi that I am, I shed a tear about it.

The kids did great on the flight. The in-flight movie was dumb, and the headphones sucked, but I had new books, activity books, toys and snacks in each kids carry on that they got to discover and play with. When it was time to eat dinner, they came around taking orders as it cost money on this airline. I ordered the pastrami sandwich, and the kids picked things like chips or cheese platters. Then the flight attendant did a very surprising thing. When he found out we were military, he comp'd our entire order and begged us to get more. So we ended up getting a ton of food, and he kept bringing us more. What a great guy!

Finally, 16 hours after our adventure began, we arrived at our hotel in Oahu. Yay!! It was about 3 in the morning for us, and we were exhausted.