The day has come! We are on our way to Hawaii! We woke up at 4am so that we could get to the airport at 5am. Have you ever seen more cheerful folks at 5 in the morning? They know what's coming!
Scott's father was an airline pilot, and he spent a lot of time in airports growing up. It made it very useful when we breezed through security in Juneau (it's a very mini airport) and we had a full hour and a half of waiting. It bode for a long, painful flight: "Are we boarding the plane yet? Is that our plane? When do we leave?" and from Tony in utter disgust, "Is this Hawaii?" Scott often called the kids over and pointed things out, teaching them all about the goings-on at airports.
Cady is really turning into a fashionista. Papa definitely isn't helping her at all. Scott bought her the cute sunglasses (broken before we even got to the condo) and flipped her hair the night before. At least he started flipping it. He's got the best intentions - the execution has to be carried out by Mama, though. I can just see them in 10 years, Cady dragging Scott around by the credit card getting prom dresses or... well, whatever daddies and daughters do together in teenagerhood.
After an agonizing wait, finally it was time to board!
This is Tony's (and all of the kids') second time on an airplane, and Tony couldn't even contain himself. He was bouncing back and forth excitedly. I thought he was going to wet himself!
It's very hard seating five people together, so we did two together, two together, then one by themselves all in three clumped rows. We thought it would be a great reward to be able to sit all by yourself. Apparently not, though. Randy tried sitting by himself for the first leg of the journey (from Juneau to Anchorage), but he felt very separated and loney. The rest of the trips, we did LOTS of switching around with the other passengers so that we were in clumps of 3 and 2 next to each other.
The flight to Anchorage was breathtaking. The view of the rugged mountains was very powerful, and I had no idea there were so many glaciers! It was definitely awe inspiring, and made me feel lucky to get to live in such a beautiful place.
We had a five hour layover in Anchorage, so we decided to get out of the airport and taxi it to a nearby park. I pretty much fell in love with Scott all over again at the park. He had so much fun with the kids! Well, I'm not sure if he was having fun, but the kids were having fun with him! He pushed the boys on the swings...
... monkeyed around with Cady on the monkey bars...
... and got stuck in small spaces with Tony. The kids had so much fun playing with laid-back and fun Papa. I love that man so much! We ate lunch in the park with our friends, Mark and Kelly (I curse myself that I didn't get pictures! I was too busy eating and catching up!), then headed back to airport to make our final journey to Hawaii!
Randy and I sat together this time. It was a five hour flight, and we had lots of toys and coloring tools and books. The airplane also let us rent movie players that had lots of tv shows, movies, and games already loaded onto it. Randy and I got to sit together and watch Goonies! My era, yes, but his choice. Love that boy!
Finally, after a very long flight, we were there! This is us just off the plane, and even the airport is tropical and beautiful! This is the last picture of us from this day because I started the trip off right by leaving my camera in the taxi. My new camera that we spent far too much on. Yeah... I wasn't to happy, and neither was Scott (this was the third camera I'd lost in six years). A few tears, multiple phone calls, and lots of prayers later, and the taxi driver dropped the phone off at our condo. This was just the first in many times we our prayers were answered on this trip.
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