We left on Saturday after a day with Laura and Andy and a rushed lunch and headed to the Detroit airport. Getting through the airport with 5 bags, 1 stroller/carseat and 1 3.5 month old was not as difficult as we feared that it would be. Laura and Andy dropped us off and we toted everything up to the ticket counter, got checked in and headed off to the gate. The security check was also pleasantly easy to get through other than having to put everything through the x-ray machine. They even made Lyla take her shoes off!!! Picture to the right is of Lyla looking very excited to have made it through security with being "randomly" selected for a bag check.Safely through the security check we headed off to our gate and to get some much needed coffee. Lyla was very good as we sat at the gate. She and I sat there while Katherine got coffee and then figured out the procedure for gate-checking our stroller/carseat. Here we are waiting for them to board our plane:
After a short-ish wait, they called our flight. We thought we would be able to preboard but they never announced any preboarding for "families with small children that may need a little extra time." So I was disappointed about not getting to take advantage of that. Not that boarding was difficult, Katherine and I were able to handle it pretty well. We went down the ramp, left our stroller/carseat at the end of the ramp, headed to our seats, and got settled in no problemo. Lyla was good the whole time, looking around at all the new things:
We were a little apprehensive about the take-off disturbing Lyla because of the change in pressure. Katherine was all set to start feeding her in order to force her to swallow and relieve the pressure build-up. As you can see, our concerns were unfounded:
The flight was very uneventful, the highlights included 6 foot 6 inch Kevin changing diapers in the lavatory and Lyla reading Sky Mall magazine. -->We were a little anxious for that Lyla would get upset as we were landing but again our concerns were unfounded and she fell asleep as we were making our approach to DFW. I think Katherine and I were both pleasantly surprised at how easy the trip had been. We were both expecting any of the travelling with small children nightmares you hear about: inconsolable crying, massive spit up, out of control dirty diapers... but Lyla was perfect. She set the gold standard for air travel (a standard that would prove very difficult to live up to... tune in for the post about our flight back for a polar-opposite version of this story).
We arrived, de-planed, picked up our stroller/carseat and headed to the baggage claim. Katherine's parents (who came to pick us up) decided to park and come meet us so we had a nice visit while waiting for the luggage (I also appreciated the help carrying bags). Katherine's Dad had never met Lyla so that was neat (since the main purpose for the trip was to have Lyla meet 77% of our immediate family, it was great to have that start as soon as we arrived). Grandpa was super excited to see Lyla (so was Grandma) and Lyla was super excited to see them (though this kicked off a week of Lyla having to deal with people unfamiliar to her). After a long day of travel, we were glad to have arrived safely and without incident and were super glad to be in a familiar home with a bed to crash into.
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