On Airplanes

When we woke up last Tuesday morning everyone was anxious and excited for what the day would signify for our family.  Josh, Harper and I were about to finally start the journey to finally meeting our newest little guy.  It was only fitting to have a celebratory departure breakfast.

We would spend a some odd 18 hours on planes over the next few days.  I had forgotten how long of flights they really were.  We flew on four different airplanes to finally get to our boy.

Harper was quite the trooper.  The morning we left I went to my 300 fit class and asked everyone to please pray for our trip and especially Harper.  My friend Todd said she would be fine…it was Josh and I that we should be worrying about.  Sure enough he was totally right.  Harper rocked.  She was happy and helpful and adjusted to the time difference totally fine.  She was such a trooper and was just thrilled to be along for the ride.  Josh and I did fine too 🙂

Both there and back, we had an 11 hour layover in Germany.  The Frankfurt airport is now an arch enemy of mine.  It was the biggest airport I have ever been in and the most confusing.  Terrible, terrible, terrible.  Harper was a tad bit thrilled to find Iron Man there and was super excited to show the boys the picture.  Josh and I were both pretty stoked about Iron Man as well…he was way super cool.

On each plane Harper thoroughly investigated the safety manuals.  I told Josh she was freaking me out a bit, but I was confident that if something went down, Harper would rescue me and her both.  She asked a million questions about each safety manual…she was prepared.

The plane food was interesting.  It varied plane to plane and country to country.  My most favorite thing we ate were Muffin Tops for breakfast when we left Frankfurt.  Literally, the package said “Muffin Top” and sure enough it was just the top of the muffin.  I totally cracked myself up with lots of jokes about having my own muffin top and not needing a pre-packaged one.  I soooo wish I had taken a picture.

I am now on the look out for some plastic small coffee/tea cups like the pretty green one above.  Harper adored drinking out of hers…it was the perfect size.  She also enjoyed poking her bread with the toothpicks provided with each meal 🙂

On the planes we colored, read a lot, slept a little and watched way, way too too much TV…movies and cartoons.  They even had old school black and white cartoons and things like Tom & Jerry.  Harper watched every last single show and movie available to her that were appropriate and then started over again 🙂

I read Cold Tangerines by Shauna Niequist from front to back on the flights home.  I have never read a book front to back like that before.  I’m not a big reader…I wish I were, but I just tend to read a little here and there and then never finish…it’s just my style apparently.  But this book was insanely good and encompassing for my mind and heart.  Really, really good.

Flying and the sky were wondrous.  Ethiopia is beautiful from the sky to the ground.

And maybe the best part of flying and airports and planes was finally landing in Ethiopia and while unpacking I found my BIL Jon’s knife in my CARRY ON backpack…yes, my CARRY ON.  So lets see…I had been through one million security checks at this point including like 4 just in the US and made it all the way to Africa with this little guy in my bag.  Josh and I had quite the laugh.

Flying for so long and for so far was quite the adventure and now holds such precious memories for me.  What a journey to get to our boy.  So blessed to have shared it with Josh and Harper.  Cannot wait to pack again and get back on that next plane.

Happy Thursday!