Worth Every Penny!

Flying from Germany to Utah with Toby...

Well, I expected the worst...and that's what we got!

As we were in the boarding/getting settled process, I got the pleasure of sitting behind a man (I will not even go as far as calling him a "gentleman") who when he noticed Toby said, "Oh my God, a baby!" then he started grumbling about how he doesn't know why he always gets to sit next to the babies... at that moment, Toby was sitting on my mom's lap and he was kind of trying to engage in a conversation with me, but he didn't even flinch when I told him that the "baby" was actually mine. A few minutes later, the brilliant man started yet another conversation with me telling me that recently he took a flight from New York to somewhere and the baby sitting next to him cried for six hours straight. I looked right at him, with a somewhat raised voice and said, "Well, I'm hoping my baby doesn't cry for six hours straight!" he replied, "Well, ME too!" That was the last time we spoke or had eye contact with one another.

The flight actually started out good, Toby was exhausted and fell asleep before we even took off. He slept for just about an hour. For that hour, I was hopeful that maybe things would be better than I had been anticipating. I had been second-guessing my decision to have my mom fly out for a while. Would it be a big waste of money? A waste of her time? Then, Toby woke up and it was all downhill from there!

He woke up and was in one of those mad/delirious/screaming moods. I quickly got him to the back of the plane where I tried to calm him down, but nothing would. Looking back, I can now say that his ears were most likely hurting him at this point. Since nothing would snap him out of it. After a while, he did calm down but then he'd go into those screaming fits again. When he was happy, he was content walking (keeping a hold of an index finger) around the little area by the bathrooms and where they keep the food. He never wanted to stay in his seat...he'd only last about five minutes and we'd be up again. My mom and I spent approximately seven hours walking/holding Toby. He had numerous screaming fits that would come out of the blue. He'd scream, arch his back, scream, push his head against ours, scream some more and then he'd be fine again. The only nap Toby got the entire day (including before we arrived at the Frankfurt airport) was that one hour at the beginning of the trip. He was exhausted, you could see it, but he would not give up!

Luckily, we had a very smooth flight and the only time we had to be in our seats was when we were descending. The flight attendants were absolutely wonderful. We flew with American Airlines.

Thomas was really, really good on the flight. It was long for him but he was no problem. He played a lot of Old Maid with my mom and the new Matchbox cars were also a hit! He barely used the DVD player or his Nintendo DS...go figure!

Our layover was in Chicago. We had about two hours which I would say is the minimum amount of time that you need if you are coming off of an international flight and you have kids. We got off the plane and had to get our checked bags and then re-check them. Then, we had to go through customs, get on the train to go to another terminal and go through security all over again. Since I had had hardly anything to eat, since Toby woke up when our lunches were served and I was in the back with him when they served pizza at the end, I was starving so I had just enough time to grab a bagel with cream cheese and then it was time to board again.

The short flight from Chicago was only 3 1/2 hours long. My mom and I were already physically exhausted, but we figured we could endure another 3 1/2 hours of "fun" with Toby. I mean, what choice did we have, really? With this flight, however, we didn't ascend very high and Toby was perfectly content sitting on his seat or on the floor, in other words, he was a completely different child! Finally, at what would have been 3 AM Germany time, he got a little fussy, I took him to the back of the plane where I kind of rocked him and he fell asleep and stayed asleep for the remaining hour+ of our flight.

I'm glad it's over and I'm truly glad that my mom was there to help!

Until later,

Emily